Animal Factory

by Philip Caveney

  ‘I was taking them out on a play-hunt,’ explained the vixen. ‘Then we smelled you.’

  ‘And you weren’t afraid?’

  ‘I could tell you were in trouble,’ she said. ‘And I was ready to run if you’d turned out to be a Shadow.’

  ‘A Shadow?’

  ‘It’s what we call the big black dogs from the farm,’ she said. ‘We’ve been chased by them a few times lately.’

  ‘I know the feeling,’ said Ralph. ‘They came after me, last night.’

  ‘After you?’ The vixen took a step closer. ‘But . . . you’re from the farm, aren’t you? You live there.’

  ‘I used to,’ admitted Ralph. ‘I’m afraid I’m not wanted there any more. There have been changes.’’

  ‘There are strange things happening at that place,’ said the vixen. ‘Bad things. It frightens me.’ She thought for a moment. ‘Forgive me, I have not introduced myself,’ she said. ‘My name is Leah

  ‘And I’m Ralph.’

  ‘It sounds like a bark,’ said Leah.

  ‘Yeah, tell me about it.’ Ralph pulled himself into a sitting position with a grunt of effort. Every bit of him seemed to ache. ‘These are your cubs?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes. My first litter.’ She indicated the nearest of them, bigger and bolder than the other two. ‘This one is Sam,’ she said. ‘And these are my two daughters, Rowan and Daisy.’ The two smaller vixens gazed intently up at Ralph. They were as alike as two peas in a pod.

  ‘And their father?’

  Leah lowered her head. ‘Gone.’

  Ralph looked around, misunderstanding. ‘But he’ll be coming back?’ Leah shook her head. ‘Gone forever,’ she said. ‘He was caught in a set of big metal jaws on the edge of the woods, only a few days ago. They snapped shut around him and we could not open them again. He was held tight in them. It took him a long time to die.’

  Ralph remembered the dead fox that Farmer Morton had hung from the farm gates by his tail and he felt awful. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said.

  ‘It is the way of things,’ said Leah. ‘We foxes learn to expect the worst. There are so many out there who seem to hate us. But I do miss him. He was a fine husband and a good father to my little ones. I do not know where the metal jaws came from, but they smelled like something uprights would use.’

  ‘That was my master’s doing,’ said Ralph, feeling thoroughly ashamed. ‘Well, my ex-master now. He would never have set a trap like that when I first met him. But he’s changed.’

  ‘Lots of things have changed,’ said Leah. ‘I watch the farm from time to time. Now there is the big place where the horrible noises come from. Many chickens go in there and they never seem to come out. In the old days, there was the occasional chance to grab one for your supper, but not any more . . .’ She looked down at her cubs. ‘Now we have to make do with what we can find in these woods. Don’t we children?’ The cubs looked up at her, their eyes trusting, their stumpy tails wagging. ‘What will you do now?’ she asked Ralph.

  ‘I’m not really sure,’ he said. ‘They’ll be looking for me, the . . . Shadows? I think I killed one of them last night.’

  Leah looked impressed. ‘You’re obviously fiercer than you look,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, I’m a fighter when push comes to shove,’ admitted Ralph. ‘But he attacked me. He would have killed me if he could.’

  Leah thought for a moment. ‘And now the other Shadows will be wanting their revenge?’

  ‘I imagine so.’

  ‘I know a safe place,’ she said. ‘You’re welcome to come with us, if you like.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Ralph. ‘I wouldn’t want to put you or your cubs in danger.’

  ‘We’re pretty good at hiding,’ Leah assured him. ‘And you need somewhere to rest up, get your strength back.’

  ‘That doesn’t seem right,’ said Ralph. ‘After all, I’m a sheepdog and you’re a fox. We’re supposed to be enemies, aren’t we?’

  Leah’s eyes glittered mischievously. ‘I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.’ Ralph laughed at that and realised it was the first time he had laughed in a long time. He sat there, looking into Leah’s lovely face and couldn’t remember when he had last felt so comfortable in another animal’s presence.

  ‘Is it far, this place?’ he asked.

  ‘Not so very far. Come with us. I guarantee the Shadows will not find you where we’re going.’

  Ralph nodded. He realised how unusual it was, a sheepdog walking with a fox, but right now it seemed like the most natural thing in the world. He got to his feet and followed her into the heart of the woods.

  She took him to a place where a shallow stream cascaded down a steep hillside and showed him where there was a narrow opening in the rocks; the entrance screened by thick tufts of fern and clumps of bracken. Anybody passing would never have guessed the opening was there. They slipped through the gap in the rock, one by one, and crawled down to a small cave beneath the ground, a warm, gloomy sanctuary with enough room for all of them to stretch themselves out. A litter of bones and feathers in one corner indicated that the family had spent quite some time here. The cubs occupied themselves by play-fighting and Ralph watched them, marvelling at their antics.

  ‘My husband found this place,’ Leah told him, her voice echoing slightly in the enclosed space. ‘We have been safe here. I don’t think the Shadows will ever discover it.’

  ‘It’s perfect,’ said Ralph. ‘You were lucky to find it.’

  ‘Luck had nothing to do with it,’ Leah assured him. ‘I owe it all to my husband. He was a good provider.’ She sighed. ‘But I cannot live in the past. I must look to the future.’

  ‘It can’t have been easy for you,’ said Ralph.

  ‘Life is never easy for us foxes,’ she told him. ‘So many of the upright creatures seem to want to kill us. They shoot at us with their thunder sticks, they put down food that poisons us or they leave cruel snares that kill us slowly. I have even heard that sometimes they dress up in red clothes and chase us on horseback with packs of dogs. And why? Because we take the occasional chicken? Your master must have thousands of them, why would he begrudge us one or two?’

  Ralph found it a difficult question to answer. ‘I think with uprights, it’s about ownership,’ he said. ‘Farmer Morton feels the chickens belong to him.’

  ‘How can one creature belong to another?’ asked Leah scornfully. ‘Surely an animal belongs only to himself?’ One of the cubs padded over to her and began to lick her face eagerly. ‘He’s hungry,’ she said. ‘If you will excuse me, I will go and hunt something for our supper. Will you . . . look after my cubs while I am gone?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘I will defend them with my life.’

  ‘That’s very dramatic,’ said Leah. ‘Hopefully it won’t come to that. I should tell you that there is another way out of here.’ She nodded towards the back of the cave. ‘It’s along there. The children will show you where. We dug it out ourselves, just in case we ever needed it.’

  ‘Good thinking,’ said Ralph. He watched as she got to her feet and found himself admiring the lean grace of her, the way she moved as swiftly and silently as a ghost. It felt odd for him to be thinking of a fox in such a way. After all, from a pup he had been taught that such animals were to be despised. But Leah had been the first creature to show him any kindness in a very long time and for that he would always be in her debt. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I owe you so much.’

  ‘You owe me nothing,’ she said. ‘I think we are two of a kind, you and I. The Shadows hate both of us.’

  And with that, she went out through the gap and was gone.

  Ralph laid himself down. He felt safe and secure in this hiding place and the horrors of the Animal Factory seemed a long way away. He settled himself down to sleep, but the cubs had other ideas. After a little while, their playful antics brought them closer and closer to him and the next thing he knew, they were playing with him, pouncing on his tail and fastening their little t
eeth painlessly into his flanks. At first he just tried brushing them gently away from him, but they kept coming back for more and soon enough he was involved in the game and he found himself enjoying the rough and tumble of it. It was so long since he had done anything like this. The cubs nuzzled against him affectionately, they licked his face and swiped at him with their tiny paws. Finally, when they had tired themselves out, they put their warm bodies against him and slept and he slept too, enjoying the nearness of them, the sounds of their little lungs breathing in and out.

  He woke some time later to the soft sounds of something pushing through the entrance and saw Leah, holding the plump body of a rabbit in her mouth. She laid it down in front of him and he sniffed at it. The body was still warm.

  ‘Eat,’ she told him. ‘I’ll go back out and get something for the cubs and myself. The hunting’s good tonight.’

  ‘Oh but I can’t . . .’

  ‘You can,’ she told him. ‘You’re little more than skin and bone. Now eat.’ And with that, she turned and went out again.

  Ralph regarded the carcass of the rabbit doubtfully. He was not used to eating raw meat; the scraps he had been given on the farm were generally cooked. He felt a growling hunger in his gut and realized that he could not remember when he had last eaten, so he flipped the rabbit onto its back and began to tear wolfishly at the body, stripping the fur away and lapping at the warm blood within. The fresh meat revived him and gave him strength. He ate everything save for the fur, even crunching up the bones for the rich marrow they contained and then he fell asleep again, more content than he had been in a very long time.

  He dreamed and this time the dream was a good one. He dreamed he was walking around Morton’s Farm, but the farm was as he remembered it when he had first arrived there. He was a small pup again and Fred was still alive, looking down at him sternly and making his wry comments. Jonah was there too, as endearingly dim as he had ever been and of course dear, kind Henrietta, putting a wing around him and telling him not to worry, that everything was fine and he was going to enjoy his stay there.

  When Leah came back a short while later she had a pheasant she had caught and she woke her cubs and shared the food with them, chewing up mouthfuls of meat for her little ones and then regurgitating it, so it was easier for them to digest. Exhausted as he was, Ralph soon fell back to sleep and he spent much of the next few days like this, waking only to eat and replenish his strength, then drifting off again to a place where he was secure and where there were no more bad dreams to trouble him.

  Chapter Twenty One

  A New Beginning

  As Ralph’s strength returned, he began to make trips out of the cave with Leah, helping her to hunt, though he felt loud and clumsy compared to her. She never shouted at him when his awkwardness scared a potential meal away. She was patient with him and taught him how to hug the ground and move very slowly, inch by inch, creeping up on an unsuspecting rabbit until he was close enough to make that one swift dash upon it. The day that he caught his first rabbit was a good one and he felt proud that he was finally contributing to the family meal.

  Because they were a family now. The cubs had come to think of him as their father and at night, in the secret den, Leah would lie alongside him, the warmth of her body comforting him and they would match their breathing to each other. He felt loved in a way he hadn’t experienced since he had been taken away from his mother.

  The cubs looked to him for guidance. They asked him to tell them stories of his world, the world of the farm and he told them of how it used to be when he first came there. But when they asked him to explain what was happening there now, he found that he could not do it. It all seemed to boil down to one word. Madness.

  One day, when Ralph and Leah were out hunting in the woods, Leah became aware of a scent on the air. Her senses were more finely tuned than Ralph’s and she looked at him and whispered one word.

  ‘Shadows’

  She led Ralph to a high vantage point and, peering down through the bushes, they saw Manfred, Elsa and Brigit prowling through the trees in a column, sniffing at the ground and the surrounding vegetation. It was evident that they were searching for Ralph. Without further ado, he and Leah raced back to the den, going by a roundabout route and taking every opportunity to run through flowing water. Once back, they lay down beside the cubs and told them to stay as quiet as possible.

  Soon enough they could hear the stealthy sounds of the Dobermans moving past the den and Ralph lay, hardly daring to breathe, convinced that he was going to bring the wrath of Kurt and his followers down upon Leah and her cubs. But the Dobermans moved on past and Ralph was able to breathe again.

  He grew a little stronger every day and when his strength was fully returned, he found that he simply could not help himself. For an hour or so, every day, he would steal away to the outskirts of the forest and take up a position where he could look down, across the sheepfold, into Morton’s Farm and observe what was going on there. It was no great surprise to discover that the slaughter of the chickens was still going on. Indeed, if anything, it had intensified. The factory still operated around the clock and now the huge chicken enclosure was absolutely packed, the birds so crowded together that they were virtually walking on each other’s bodies.

  Whenever he saw Farmer Morton he always seemed to have one or two Dobermans walking alongside him and it quickly became clear that they were there not as his companions but as his guards. Whenever he had to leave the house and talk to the men who ran the factory, Kurt or one of the others went with him. Whenever he climbed into his shiny new car to drive into town, a Doberman sat beside him in the passenger seat. Agnes never seemed to come out of the house any more, but once Ralph caught a glimpse of her standing at an upstairs window. She was dressed in her nightgown and her lank grey hair looked as though it had not been combed in weeks. She was staring blankly, as if trying to comprehend what was going on in the world beyond her bedroom. Ralph felt terribly sorry for her. It seemed to him that she had done nothing to deserve any of the terrible things that had happened to her. He remembered the letter she had shown him and hoped that she had managed to post it out into the world. He could only hope that it had been read by somebody who could help.

  The sheep were being neglected. There was nobody to take them from the fold, up to the high pasture and back, and clearly, the Dobermans were not prepared to undertake such a menial task. Ralph was not surprised when one day he saw a couple of huge trucks driving up the road to the sheepfold. As he watched, the entire flock was shepherded into the trucks and Farmer Morton, flanked by his ever-watchful guards, came over to talk to the drivers. He signed some papers and the sheep were driven away, leaving the field completely empty. Ralph could hardly believe that Farmer Morton had done as he had threatened. He had sold the flock. Now nothing stood between him and his desire to process more chickens and make more money.

  After watching the farm for a while, Ralph would return to Leah and the cubs. She never asked him where he had been and what he had learned. She seemed to understand that it was just something he needed to do and she let him get on with it. Only once did she say something that made him think.

  ‘What’s wrong with everyone down at that farm?’ she asked him. ‘If a sheepdog and a fox can live together in peace, why can’t everyone?’

  It was a good question and one that Ralph was completely unable to answer.

  *

  Then one day, several weeks after his escape from the Dobermans, he was watching from his high vantage point, when something unexpected happened. A car pulled up in the farmyard: a white car with an orange stripe along the side of it. Two men in black uniforms got out and walked up to the door of the house. They knocked, and after a short while Farmer Morton came to the door and started talking to the men. They kept pointing towards the factory and handed him an envelope.

  There was an argument then and Kurt and Manfred came out of the house and stood by Farmer Morton, growling at the men in unifo
rm. Farmer Morton opened the envelope they had given him and looked at the sheets of paper inside. He seemed to lose his temper. He tore up the sheets of paper and threw the scraps onto the ground. Kurt and Manfred began to advance upon the uniformed men and they backed away and hurried to their car, jumping inside and slamming the doors. They drove quickly away. After they were gone, Farmer Morton stood in the yard, talking to Kurt and Manfred. Ralph could see that they were all in a state of agitation. He felt a little flutter of hope within him and thought again of the letter that Agnes had shown him. He wondered if perhaps something was finally going to be done about the factory. Perhaps people on the outside were beginning to take notice of what was happening there.

  There were more occasions over the next few weeks when uniformed strangers came to the farm and always the result was the same. There would be an argument and the Dobermans would come out and herd the strangers back to their cars and then there would be a row between Farmer Morton and the Dobermans. Although Ralph didn’t exactly understand what was happening, he was sure that the strangers wanted to look inside the factory, but were being denied the chance to do so.

  Finally, one fine summer day, when Kurt and Leah were playing with the cubs in a secluded glade, a noise rent the air, making Ralph jump bolt upright and prick his ears. It was a loud wailing sound, not the cry of an animal, but some kind of machine. It was distant as yet, but getting closer all the time. Without a word, Ralph turned and ran through the forest to his familiar vantage point and as he ran, he felt a powerful surge of hope rising within him. He reached his lookout point and saw a whole series of vehicles racing along the road to the farm: a couple of white cars, two big black vans and several smaller ones. Lights were flashing on top of the white cars and Ralph realised that the wailing sound was coming from them.