Duncton Quest

by William Horwood

  But, they all agreed, such a plan was tenuous, and many things could undermine it.

  “We cannot know now, nor will we for several moleyears, how our struggle will develop,” said Tryfan. “We will each of us be concerned to prepare the ground for the coming of the Stone Mole, by heartening those who have faith in the Stone, and by preparing those who will do battle for it. Where, or when, or how that may be we cannot know.

  “For myself, and for Spindle here, our task and direction has been set for us by Boswell. To the east we will go, to the very centre of the Wen itself, for he told us we will find inspiration and guidance in the journey itself, and at its ending. Others will go where they will, or the Stone directs. They will for a time be lost to Duncton, and to each other. Each will pursue his own quest for the Silence of the Stone, and I believe that some will find it, or come near to it, but that it will only be with the coming of the Stone Mole himself that the true Silence will be known.”

  “What of those like me who have doubts of the Stone, and of the Word, and of any such beliefs?” asked Skint bluntly. “Same goes for Smithills.”

  “And me!” said Marram. But Alder said nothing, for he was of the Stone.

  “There are many doubters such as yourselves,” replied Tryfan philosophically, “and though I would have you be believers, well, nomole has the right to tell another what to think or do. It is enough that you support us, enough that you recognise the corruption and evil of the Word. But I would say only this: do not bear false witness of the Stone. Be as open with each other as Skint has always been with me, discuss your doubts, and honour those who, though they do not share your faith, yet speak from their hearts with truth and dignity. It is not the mole you attack but the idea, and the Stone embraces allmole whatever he may be.

  “If in time you find faith, then I shall be pleased. But I would prefer to have one doubting truthful mole at my side than a hundred moles who profess to the Stone yet feel they do not carry its truth in their hearts and paws.

  “One last thing about our future meeting,” Tryfan continued. “It may be that circumstances will militate against us reaching Rollright next Longest Night. Much has yet to happen. So remember this: in the long moleyears of struggle that I think is yet to come, the Stones of the seven Ancient Systems will always be there to guide moles who trust them. I know that at Longest Night or Midsummer, moles of the Stone will always strive to be at a Stone, whether it be of the Seven or not. So if you are lost and isolate, and know not where you are or where you should go, listen to the Stones, be guided by them, and they will see you right.

  “I know that in time it will be necessary for the followers’ leaders, whoever they may then be, to summon a convention, to discuss our strategy against the moles of the Word. A way will be found so that you know when it is. It must be found!”

  The moles nodded to each other and talked some more until the time came when those moles leaving Duncton had to join the others at the entrance to the tunnel under the Thames. Throughout this Marram had been quiet, but he came forward at the end and said, “I know not if it matters to the future, but I can tell you that you’re not the only moles resisting Henbane.

  “There have always been one or two in places difficult to attack, but you’ll know of them... But lately I’ve heard the Siabod moles have begun to fight back. We all knew that the attack on Duncton would have come much sooner if Wrekin had not had to deploy some of his forces back to Siabod, and not to much avail I’m told! Well, I thought it might cheer you to know that you’re not alone in moledom in offering resistance to the Word!”

  “I’m sure Tryfan’s glad,” said Spindle, “for he’s named of Siabod.”

  Which several there not knowing, Spindle quickly explained, for Tryfan’s mother had been to Siabod and pupped there, though not of Bracken’s mating. Yet when Tryfan was born, Bracken named him after Tryfan’s snowy heights, for there stand two Stones, unreachable by mole. Few moles have even seen them, but Bracken did and ever remembered it, and when he first saw his pups he said it seemed he was reminded of the form of that mountain in the way one of the male pups moved, and so named him Tryfan.

  “It’s true enough,” said Tryfan, “and it’s heartening. The Siabod moles are like no other, and I have kin there of my mother, and would one day be there, or at least know them.” He thought in silence for a while, but said no more of it.

  Then, after last words of parting to the watchers Skint led Tryfan and the others back to the surface. His last words were for his friends: “You watch over Smithills for me, Tryfan. You’ve got to keep the old fool going until I can join you again, so I can lead him back up north! He’ll never make it by himself. He’ll get in some scrap or other and get himself killed!”

  Then to Spindle he said, “And you... you look after Tryfan for all of us, for I’ve a feeling you’re the only one he listens to, though Stone knows why!”

  “Yes, I will, or I will certainly try!” said Spindle.

  At which, with a laugh and a final touch, Skint disappeared into the undergrowth and was gone back down to his companions, and the wood was silent, and the great dead tree rising, as if nomole lived there, and never had.

  “That Skint’s as brave a mole as I’ll ever meet,” said Marram with admiration. “And not even a Stone believer!”

  “He’s closer to the Stone than most,” said Tryfan. “It’s what a mole does, not what he says that brings him to the Silence.”

  “Well, may he be kept safe to see a Longest Night or two through yet,” said Alder, who had grown to respect Skint greatly. “And at my flank as well!”

  “We’ll all agree with that!” said Tryfan.

  Under Comfrey’s leadership, the evacuees had already made their way down to the far edge of Marsh End, and then in groups to the very entrance of the deep tunnel itself. By the time Tryfan and Spindle arrived, two groups had already gone through and the third was setting off, under the guidance of Holm.

  It was a vulnerable time, for there was too little space underground to accommodate all the waiting moles, and they had been dispersed on the surface, not far apart but in an encirclement of positions, with outlying watchers to guard the approaches in case of attack. Indeed, Tryfan and Spindle themselves had been stopped in the murky light of the afternoon by a watcher, a fact by which Spindle was impressed and Tryfan reassured.

  But his news had been grave.

  “Tryfan, Sir, the grikes are into the system at the high south end, and making their way steadily in on the Eastside. Two of us delayed to watch them come in, and a third joined us after watching their southern entry. I know not how long they’ll take to come north down here, but if they’re swift they could just catch us!”

  “Well, mole, you have done well to wait... Now come with us lest you’re left alone.” And so, with the grikes already into Duncton, Tryfan reached the area near the river tunnel.

  Below ground, at the tunnel entrance itself, the air was cold and wet. Although the rain had long since stopped on the surface it was still seeping down, and the moles waiting there stared uneasily at the dank and dripping walls.

  Reception burrows on the far side had been prepared in the weeks before to accommodate the evacuees and to avoid the problem of surface exposure which, because there was little vegetation on the far side, meant danger from owl attack.

  As Tryfan waited, staring down into the tunnel, a voice came up at them out of it, accompanied by the sloshing of wet pawsteps.

  “Sirs, welcome; welcome, Sirs. It is a relief and a privilege to see you in this dark and dirty place, most certainly it is; and all so successfully done, so expertly accomplished, so brilliantly conceived, awesome Sirs!”

  At first they could see nothing coming towards them, then hardly anything, then a mole who was the same colour as the mud and wet of the walls around him, but for the pink, glistening point of a thin and weedled snout. But the voice and the words told them who it was: Mayweed!

  “The third party is proceeding
through nobly, valiantly led by my good friend Holm,” continued Mayweed, as he approached them. “I passed them in the middle of the tunnel. But, and it is an ominous inauspicious but: I have to say, Sirs, that we had better get on with it since the walls are getting wetter and more unstable by the second; yes, it is so, unfortunately it is!”

  “Tell us what has happened so far. Is Comfrey on the other side?”

  “To answer your concerned query: Comfrey and Maundy are already through and taking good care of things over there. It has all gone well according to your noble and grand strategy, Sir,” said Mayweed, his muddy face breaking into one of his earnest smiles, and his teeth, whose normal appearance was yellow, appearing for once nearly white in contrast to the filth on his face.

  As the next party assembled, he told them both, as quickly as he was able, and with as few “Sirs” as he could manage, what had happened earlier....

  Conditions were worsening so rapidly that he had advised Comfrey not to wait for Tryfan’s arrival before the old mole gave his authority for him to lead the first group through. He had made sure that the youngsters among them were well placed between adults, and that silence was strictly kept so that instructions could be heard clearly in the black, dripping and echoing tunnel.

  The first group got through easily, but in the second an elderly mole lost touch with the party and, dreadfully, drowned in the mire. Mayweed and Holm had the grim task of finding and removing her body, for it was unthinkable that they could continue with it there, lest more panic ensued should it surface from the water.

  Mayweed was careful to make sure that those still on the Duncton side did not know what had happened, for a general panic would certainly have slowed proceedings down, and perhaps made the continuance of the evacuation impossible. Holm had taken the group on through the tunnel and in pitch-black Mayweed had buried the body in a wall and been rejoined by Holm to return for the third party from whose crossing Mayweed had just returned, having left them at the halfway point to save time.

  About the death, Mayweed, normally voluble, was nearly monosyllabic.

  “Hard, Sir, not nice. Nomole knows but Holm and self, Sir, nomole...” he said. “Must move on quickly, Sir, tunnel soft, tunnel dangerous, more water each time at the lowest point, more mud. Hard for youngsters, so hard for them... I know how they feel, Sir, was young myself once.”

  Mayweed smiled, a real smile; but it was sad, and wan, and a little haunted. Tryfan noticed that Mayweed stayed near the most nervous of the youngsters, encouraging them, joking with them, and telling them that on the other side the tunnels were lined with golden sunlight, which some of them half believed.

  While for their part the youngsters, who clearly knew and trusted Mayweed, clustered around him.

  “Really, Mayweed?” he heard one young female say. “I mean, if we get through will it be sunshine?”

  “Well, Madam young thing, this mole would say it was sunshine but others might say different. Yes, yes, but if you think it will be then it will be in the end, always and ever. Yes. Don’t be scared....”

  “I want to go with you Mayweed, Sir!” said a voice that Spindle recognised.

  “Me? Sir? No, no, no, not worthy of that! That’s for Tryfan here and Spindle. What’s your name and where are your parents and siblings?”

  “Lorren’s me and my sort of brother’s Bailey and my sister’s Starling. Don’t like her.”

  “But she’s your sister,” said Mayweed.

  “She’s mean, wouldn’t share a worm and let us play. My father’s fighting with Alder. My mother’s somewhere around, but I want to come with you, please, Mayweed. You’re nice.”

  Mayweed smiled in an embarrassed way at Spindle who was looking for his son Bailey and Starling. At first the crush was so great that he could not see them, but then a paw tugged at his side, and from a drier spot, which she had carefully won for herself and Bailey, Starling smiled.

  “Hello!” she said. “Bailey wants to say hello.”

  “Hello!” said Bailey in a small and serious voice.

  It was not hard to see why he sounded serious, for having greeted Spindle, his gaze had moved to Tryfan, whose size and strength seemed to fill him with awe, and before whom all the youngsters fell silent.

  “Well now,” said Tryfan, looking down at Bailey. “And who’s this Spindle?”

  But Spindle’s expression of concern and unfamiliar parent love was enough to tell Tryfan exactly who Bailey was. He knew that the youngster had been given out to a pupped female on Thyme’s death, and that Spindle had only seen him once since.

  “Well, mole, you look calm enough to calm the rest of us!” said Tryfan, reaching out a paw to touch Bailey’s head.

  “Thank you, Sir!” said Bailey, eyes wide.

  “My name’s Starling,” said Starling, pushing forward. “I bet I look calm too.”

  “Very calm,” said Tryfan with a smile, and turned away to see to other things. But it was Spindle’s touch that Bailey afterwards most remembered, for though it was nervous, and hasty, and that of a mole not used to being a father, yet it was caring and accompanied by a whispered message that was for Bailey alone, and which not even Starling heard.

  “You’re much loved, Bailey, never ever forget that,” said Spindle, and turned then from his son to accompany Tryfan on his rounds.

  “What did he say?” demanded Starling.

  “It’s a secret!” said Bailey.

  “Tell me and you can come through the tunnel with Lorren and me,” said Starling.

  “No,” said Bailey, “I won’t!”

  “All right then,” said Starling. “Come on, Lorren!” And in her most haughty and commanding way, and without another look at Bailey, Starling went up to Mayweed and said, “We’re coming with you.”

  “But beauteous Madams, I’m not a mole to go with, not humble Mayweed who goes here and there and everywhere. You’d get lost with me.”

  “Well, that’s not good enough!” said Starling. “You’ll just have to make sure we don’t get lost because Lorren gets very nervous, don’t you Lorren.”

  “Yes!” said Lorren.

  Mayweed sighed, and grinned, and nodded, and told them that they’d be in the group after next and they were to watch out for him and he’d see them through.

  “And Bailey,” said Starling. “He’s with us too.”

  “I thought you said he couldn’t be,” said Lorren.

  “That was just to teach him. “Course he’s coming with us, he’s with us.”

  But Bailey was not there. He had thought Starling was serious, but, quite unperturbed, he had turned to follow after Spindle. Yet somehow in the darkness and the crush of moles, some going this way, and some going that, he had lost sight of Spindle, and of Tryfan, and could not seem to find any mole he knew.

  Not that he panicked, but, rather, started to search for somemole who would look after him, as Starling, for all her superior ways, always finally did.

  Anyway, he said to himself, if nomole else does look after me she’ll come and find me, and that will be all right.

  Meanwhile, Mayweed had begun to lead the fourth group down into the mud-filled tunnel, hurrying them along and allowing none to pause, reassuring them as they sunk into the wet and slimy darkness, where a mole could lose direction and never know he had done so. Tryfan had taken a place in the middle and Spindle and some other adults brought up the rear, but it was Mayweed who directed them all.

  “Keep touching the one in front... yes, yes, move on... now don’t start panicking because it’ll be all right. I’m right in front of you....”

  “Where’s Mayweed. Mayweed!” A youngster called out pitifully, his voice rising towards hysteria.

  “Here I am, good Sir! Ahead in the pitch-blackness and enjoying myself very much, thank you!” Mayweed’s voice came back to them, cheerful and comforting, as their paws sloshed into the increasingly mud-filled water, and they did their best to keep to the higher left-paw side.

  Goi
ng through for the first time in several days, Tryfan noticed that the hishing roar of the river overhead was louder than it had been before, and that here and there water tumbled down from the ceiling onto his face. The sound of wet pawsteps, nervous effortful breathing and the occasional reassuring voice – sometimes for a youngster, but there was one older male at the back who seemed to be being got through by one of his offspring – was all he could hear.

  Then light at last, and the climb up the more gravelly higher part of the tunnel until they were beyond the river and there were moles there to welcome them, and help the youngsters groom themselves clean again.

  Tryfan felt relieved to have crossed, but knew he would have to go back again. He felt more and more respect for Mayweed and the silent Holm, who had done the terrible journey several times already.

  Indeed, almost the moment they had seen the new arrivals to safety, Mayweed was turning back to go through once more.

  “Must go, Sir, not many now. Tired, Sir, you are, very.

  Mayweed can go on, Sir, you stay here with good Spindle.”

  Tryfan laughed. “I may look tired, Mayweed, but you look awful. I’m coming with you for this last journey through the tunnel. We’ll take the remaining moles through as one party.”

  “Indomitable you are, Sir, I can see it even now written on your face: hero, moledom’s finest son!”

  “Let’s go, Mayweed,” said Tryfan shortly, as moles around them grinned at Mayweed’s flowery words.

  “What I was saying, intelligent Sir.”

  The reason for Mayweed’s haste was clear enough: although they could see little at first, and nothing after a while, it was apparent from the sound of water running and dripping, and the slurry that had already surged across their path in places, that the tunnel was near collapse. There was an air of imminent crushing, drowning, muddy slump to the place, and when they reached the lowest central point, where before they had only had to swim a few feet, it was now necessary to swim several moleyards. Tryfan himself would have become completely confused but for Mayweed’s special skills....