By experimenting with the control knobs, Ace found what programs suited him and at what time of day. These generally were split into two parts: morning viewing and afternoon viewing. In between, he took a nice long nap, lying on the hearth rug. He had the sense not to attempt to get onto either of the armchairs.
For his morning watching—that is, between the hours of roughly 9 A.M. and 11 A.M.—he usually chose a program for schools called Daytime on Two, where there was a section called “Look and Read” and items on such things as science and mathematics. All of these Ace found fascinating, though on occasion he would switch to Channel Four’s Our World, which often had interesting information about food.
In the afternoon, say between 4 P.M. and 5:30 P.M., Ace enjoyed children’s TV. There were always plenty of animals, both live and in cartoons, and their antics amused him.
But though the afternoon’s viewing was for fun, the morning’s, because of his unique gift for understanding the human tongue, was, for Ace, highly educational, especially with regard to numbers and to language.
Quick to learn, Ace began to recognize simple words. There were, for instance, items about road safety, using diagrams with large lettering, and soon Ace, had he been called upon, could have distinguished a sign that said STOP from one that said GO.
Soon, too, he acquired a basic grasp of figures, becoming aware, for example, that he had one snout, one tail, two eyes, two ears, and four legs, and that the sum of himself and the other two animals was three.
At first Ace feared that Clarence and Megan might object to his generous use of the television set. By good fortune, however, he found that though in general they were not interested, certain items appeared that were popular with them.
Clarence enjoyed the cat food commercials, particularly one that showed a large white cat very much like himself fishing meat from a can with one paw in the most elegant manner.
As for Megan, luck had it that quite early on, BBC 1 showed a repeat of a program about the day-to-day life of the royal family. There were pictures of the queen and her husband and children and grandchildren at Buckingham Palace, at Windsor, at Sandringham, and at Balmoral, and everywhere she was surrounded by corgis.
The moment Ace heard the program announced, he woke Megan.
“Quickly, Your Lowness, quickly!” he cried. “The queen is in the magic box!” And sure enough, there she was, in the opening shot, walking in her garden with no less than six corgis.
Megan’s growl at being disturbed changed to an eager whine.
“Oh, there’s lovely, see!” she said excitedly. “Our aunt Olwen that is, by the queen’s feet, we’re nearly sure! And the one behind her looks ever so like our cousin Myfanwy!”
She watched spellbound as the program continued, silent except for an occasional yap at recognizing an uncle or a grandparent, and when it was all over she actually, for the first time, addressed the pig by his name.
“Our thanks to you, Ace,” she said graciously. “We shall be obliged if in the future you will draw our attention to any more pictures.”
“Of the royal family, you mean, ma’am?” said Ace.
“Of our royal family, yes. If the queen appears without them, don’t bother to wake us.”
—
None of Ace’s viewing bothered Ted Tubbs, for he was always busy around the farm. Like all farmers he could not treat Sunday as a day of rest. The cows still needed milking morning and evening, babies were born regardless of the day of the week, and all the animals needed bedding and food and water.
But Farmer Tubbs did treat Sunday differently in one way. He always tried to finish his morning’s work by eleven o’clock, and then he set about preparing and cooking himself a large traditional Sunday lunch.
It never varied. Roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, roast potatoes and green vegetables and lashings of thick gravy, followed by a jelly roll. While this was cooking, the farmer would pour himself a quart mug of cider and, sitting in the larger of the two armchairs with his feet up, would drink it slowly with much lip smacking and a belch or two for good measure.
But on the very first Sunday after he had discovered Ace watching the television, the scene in his living room was different.
Anyone looking in through the window would not have been surprised to observe the farmer in one chair and his dog in the other, but might well have been amazed to see, sitting at the farmer’s side, a sizable young pig, a white pig that bore on its left side a curious mark shaped like the ace of clubs. Farmer Tubbs took a gulp of his cider and addressed his house pig.
“Now then, Ace,” he said. “I been telling myself these last few days that maybe old Ted Tubbs is going daffy. You was sat in front of the telly when I come in t’other day, there’s no doubt of that. And the telly was switched on, there’s no doubt of that. But I must have left it running. I can’t believe ’twas you as switched it on.”
He took another drink, bracing himself for what he had to do.
“I got to find out for sure,” he said. “I don’t never have the thing on this time of a Sunday, so I don’t know what rubbish they be showing, but lunch won’t be ready for another half hour, so we might as well turn it on. Or rather you might as well turn it on, Ace. I hopes you can, for my peace of mind.”
He raised his mug, took a long swallow, and then, pointing at the television set, said in as firm a voice as he could manage, “Switch it on, Ace. Any channel will do.”
Later on, when Ace’s morning lessons had taught him to read what was written beneath the control knobs—the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and finally the word OFF—he might have selected a channel. As it was, with luck once again on his side, he simply walked over to the set and pushed the middle one, three.
“The time,” said the announcer as he swam into sight, “is exactly twelve thirty. Time for our regular Sunday program especially for those of you who earn their living from the land. Sit back, put your feet up, and for the next half hour enjoy West Country Farming, followed by The Farmers’ Weather Forecast.”
Ted Tubbs’s mouth fell open. He stared in wonderment at Ace.
“Well, I never!” he said. “Did you ever?”
A Pig in a Pickup
ON A SUNDAY evening some months later, Ace lay in the straw of the box stall telling Nanny, as he always did, about the day’s viewing.
No longer did he refer to the magic box. He had learned that what he was watching was a television set, which could show pictures of things that were happening all over the world and even from space. How the television did this remained to him, as it does to most humans, a mystery, but he did not worry his head about that. It was full enough already of ideas and impressions and newfound knowledge.
Much of what he told the old goat meant little or nothing to her. Her experience of life was, after all, very limited, for she had never moved a step outside Ted Tubbs’s farm. But she listened with interest to his stories of strange lands and peoples and customs and a host of other things shown on the educational programs.
Since it was Sunday, Ace and Ted had of course watched West Country Farming while the lunch was cooking, and now the pig could not wait to tell Nanny all about the program. It had upset him deeply.
Indeed he left half his supper untouched, and his voice trembled as he told her what he had seen.
“Oh, it was horrible, Nanny!” he said. “The first part wasn’t too bad. It was about a market. I used to think that my brothers and sisters had gone to a town called Market, but these were pictures of pigs, sheep, and cattle in pens, and people offering money for them. ‘Bidding,’ it’s called—the one who offers the most money gets the animals. I must say I’m glad I didn’t go to market, but at least all the beasts there were still alive and well. But the second half of the program—ugh!”
It wouldn’t be true to say that a shudder ran through Ace’s body. His flesh was too solid for that, but if he could have shuddered, he would have.
“Why?” said Nanny. “What was it about?”
<
br /> “An abattoir!” said Ace in a funereal voice. “A slaughterhouse, where animals are taken to be killed. They didn’t show that part, thank goodness, but they showed all the bodies. Rows and rows of them there were, all hanging head down, strung up by their back legs, cattle, sheep, and pigs.”
“Goats?” said Nanny.
“Don’t think so. The cattle and the sheep weren’t too dreadful because by then they were just sides of beef or carcasses of lamb, but the pigs still looked like pigs. Dozens of them were hanging there, all scrubbed and cold and still. I won’t sleep a wink tonight.”
“Humans have always killed animals,” said Nanny.
“Not only animals,” said Ace gloomily. “You should just watch the television. Humans spend a lot of time killing other humans.”
“Not for food, surely?” said Nanny.
“No, I don’t think so, but the news is nearly always about people getting killed. Sometimes they do it on purpose, with guns and bombs, and sometimes they get killed by mistake on trains or airplanes or on the roads. And as well as that, there are natural disasters like earthquakes and floods, and thousands of people die.”
“Sounds very depressing, watching television,” said Nanny.
“Oh, it isn’t all like that,” said Ace. “Sometimes it’s quite funny. There’s a program that Clarence especially likes called Tom and Jerry.”
“Who are they?”
“Tom’s a cat and Jerry’s a mouse.”
“Another program about sudden death?”
“No, because, you see, Tom is stupid and Jerry’s very smart, so Jerry always gets the best of things. Clarence likes the parts where Tom gets his tail caught in a door or gets beaten up by a bulldog, that sort of thing.”
“Don’t you ever feel,” said Nanny, “that you’d like to stay in and watch the evening programs? Or stay the night, perhaps? I mean, don’t think I’m trying to get rid of you—I love having you here—but there must be a lot of television you’ve never seen yet.”
“No, thank you,” said Ace. “I did stay a bit later than usual one evening—it was after Tom and Jerry and Clarence was telling me how he would deal with Jerry and what a dumb cat Tom was—and I found that it’s about then that Megan wakes up. She sleeps most of the day, but when it’s getting near her suppertime she comes to life, and oh, Nanny, she’s such a bore! On and on about all the champions in her pedigree and how her niece was presented at Court and what the Queen Mother is supposed to have said to her uncle Gareth. No wonder Clarence goes out every evening. No, daytime viewing is enough for me, and anyway, I like talking it over with you afterward. But I hope I don’t have nightmares tonight. Ugh! That slaughterhouse!”
“Look, Ace,” said Nanny. “I am a great deal older than you. Which doesn’t make me wiser, because you’ve already learned a whole host of things about the world that I had no idea of. But I do know one thing, which is this: Worrying does no one any good. Hundreds of thousands of pigs may get slaughtered, but you won’t. With a bit of luck you and I are both going to die quietly and peacefully in our beds of old age. I shall die before you, just because I am a great deal older, but I don’t worry about it. So finish your supper.”
“I think I will,” said Ace, and he did.
“Now then,” said Nanny, “you come and lie down.”
She settled herself near him, but not too close, for he had grown quite heavy.
“I won’t sleep,” said Ace.
“Try counting sheep,” said Nanny. “Live ones. That’ll send you off.”
“I don’t think it will,” said Ace, but it did.
—
Though Ace did not exactly have any nightmares, he did have a strange dream. He dreamed that he was riding in Farmer Tubbs’s pickup truck. The farmer was driving with Ace next to him on the passenger’s side, held there by some kind of arrangement of straps. Where they were going he did not know, but in the dream he was able to get his tongue around some of the words of the English language that he had come to recognize on the “Look and Read” program.
“Where are we going, Ted?” he asked, and the farmer replied, “To market.”
—
Two days later, a Tuesday, it was market day, and Ace stood in the yard, watching idly as Farmer Tubbs came out of a shed carrying a calf, which he put under the net in the back of the pickup. Then he looked at Ace. Then he said, “I be going to market, Ace. Want to come?”
Remembering his dream on Sunday night, Ace replied with a single explosive grunt, a very definite “No!”
But by now, after many months of communication with the pig, Farmer Tubbs was completely confident that Ace understood every single word he said, in a way that no dog, let alone Megan, ever could, not even the most intelligent dog in the world. Now he came up to Ace and fondled the roots of his big ears, something that he knew the pig greatly enjoyed.
“Now you listen here, my boy,” he said. “There ain’t no need for you to come if you don’t want to. I just said to myself, ‘Ted Tubbs,’ I said, ‘maybe Ace would enjoy the ride. And ’twould be company.’ Now, I reckon I know what’s worrying you. You think I might be going to sell you, isn’t that it?”
Two grunts.
“Never, Ace, never,” said Farmer Tubbs earnestly. “You got my solemn oath on it. I won’t never part with you and that’s a promise. You believe that, don’t you?”
Two grunts.
“That’s all right, then. Now then, time I was off,” said the farmer, and he opened the passenger door.
“You coming?” he said, and to his delight Ace, with a final couple of grunts, jumped into the truck and sat upright while Farmer Tubbs carefully fastened the seat belt around Ace’s fat stomach.
A Pig in a Pub
THE FIRST PAIR of eyes to see Ace as he rode along in the pickup truck were very shortsighted ones. They belonged to an elderly lady who was the village gossip. She lived with her sister in a cottage next to the road that led from the farm to the market town. All day she sat and peered out between her lace curtains, minding everyone else’s business.
“Quick!” she called as the pickup approached. “Look at this!” But by the time her sister arrived, the truck had passed.
“Oh, you’re too late!”
“What was it?”
“Ted Tubbs on his way to market—I recognized his truck. And what d’you think, he had a woman with him! He’s kept that quiet, hasn’t he? These old bachelors! You can’t trust them!”
“What did she look like?”
“Well, I couldn’t see her face too well, my sight’s not what it was, but I can tell you she was a big stout piece, and no beauty neither.”
A small boy playing in his front garden was the next to see Ace. The pig’s bulk hid the man from the child’s sight, and greatly excited, he ran indoors, crying, “Mommy, Mommy, I’ve just seen a pig driving a truck!”
“Don’t be silly,” said his mother.
“I did! I did!” yelled the boy angrily.
“Don’t tell lies,” said his mother, “and don’t you shout at me like that!”
A minor accident was the only other thing that happened on the journey to market. A driver approaching a traffic light suddenly caught sight of Farmer Tubbs’s passenger. Goggle-eyed, he turned his head to watch them pass and ran neatly into the back of the car ahead.
When Farmer Tubbs arrived in town and reached the market, he drove the pickup into the parking lot. This was close to the tavern, a pub called the Bull, used by all the farmers and dealers and truck drivers to quench their thirst on market days.
“Now,” said Farmer Tubbs to Ace, “I has to take this here calf in, and then I shall have a look around and see what the trade’s like. So will you be all right sitting here for a bit?” And when he received an affirmative answer, he undid Ace’s seat belt for greater comfort, shut the door, and went off with the calf.
Ace looked all around him with curiosity, but though he could hear a good deal of mooing and bleating and grunting, he
could not see much of interest through the windshield except lots of cars and trucks and Land-Rovers.
Presently, for something to do, he moved along the seat and arranged himself on the driver’s side. Often on Saturdays he had watched Formula One car-racing on Grandstand, and though the pickup was hardly a Grand Prix car, there were certain likenesses. It had a steering wheel, and a gearshift, and an instrument panel. Raising his front legs, Ace rested his trotters on the steering wheel and gave himself up to a daydream of being the world’s first Formula One pig racecar driver.
At that moment a red-faced man came rather unsteadily out of the Bull and began to weave his way across the parking lot.
“Why, if it isn’t old Ted Tubbs!” he cried as he neared the pickup, but then the color drained from his cheeks, leaving them as gray as cold porridge, and he staggered away murmuring to himself, “Never again! Not another drop!”
After an hour or so Farmer Tubbs returned. Though he had left the pickup’s windows open a little, he found Ace panting, for the metal cab was not the coolest of places on a warm day.
“You’m hot, Ace!” said the farmer. “You’m thirsty, too, I daresay?” And Ace assured him, in the normal way, that this was indeed the case.
“Tell you what,” said Farmer Tubbs. “I always has a drink in the Bull afore I goes home on market day. You come in along with me, and we’ll ask the pub manager for some water for you. I gotta bucket in the back.”
Thus it was that the patrons of the Bull were treated to the sight of Farmer Tubbs entering with a large pig at his heel.
“Now, now, Ted,” said the pub’s manager. “You can’t bring him in here. You seen the notice on the door.”
“I did, Bob,” said Ted Tubbs. “No dogs allowed, it says. This here’s a pig.”
“That’s true,” said the manager thoughtfully. “The usual for you, then? Half of scrumpy?”
“If you please,” said the farmer.
Ace Page 4
