The Golden Flight (The Dorset Squirrels)

by Michael Tod

  ‘If I could fly like a swan,’ Acorn had said to himself, ‘I would fly up to the Sun and tell it what a mistake it had made creating winters and summers, when all we squirrels need are springs and autumns.

  ‘Acorn picked up the two longest feathers and held them out, waving them up and down, pretending to be a swan. He would go and tell the Sun. He would. He would. He closed his eyes and flapped as hard as he could.

  ‘When he opened his eyes again, the ground was far below him and he could see the river winding backwards and forwards, looking like a snake does from high on a tree.

  ‘He was so surprised that he forgot to keep his paws, which were holding the feathers, moving up and down and he was falling towards the river. He started to flap the feathers again even faster than before.

  ‘The Sun had been watching all this, smiling warmly to see that one of its little creatures was beginning to think for himself, but had not yet come to rely on the wisdom that it had given to the females.

  ‘The Sun decided to teach Acorn a gentle lesson. By now he was flying out over the sea so the Sun decided to drop Acorn into the water and let him swim to the shore because, as you all know, squirrels, excepting my Rowan, don’t like swimming. He loves it and used to swim a lot when he lived all alone on this Eyeland two years ago.’

  Meadowsweet smiled at her life-mate who was watching the far bank.

  ‘Where was I? Oh yes. The Sun had decided to drop Acorn into the sea as a lesson. The Sun never acts directly in these things, it needs to seem impartial and uncaring, but if you look very closely at things you will see that in some way it influences and directs everything we do. It will arrange things to achieve what it wants. So the Sun made a swallow swoop close beneath Acorn, brushing under his forearm with its wing-tip as it flew by chasing flies. Acorn was so ticklish that he let go of one of the feathers and started to fall. The feather floated away out of his reach, twisting and spinning like a sycamore seed.

  ‘Acorn clung on to the other feather as he fell. He could see that he was going to splash into the sea and would have to swim all the way to the shore – and he did not like the thought of that!

  ‘Now, males often think quickly in emergencies like this, and he did still have one feather. He reached up and caught the tip with his free paw and found that he was not falling quite as fast. Then he found that, by twisting the feather, he could go in any direction he liked. He swung round to glide towards the land, intending to come down without even getting his feet wet.

  ‘The Sun was watching this clever little squirrel outwit it, and thought that would never do. So it made an updraught where the wind blew against the cliff; we used to watch the butterflies tossing about in this when we lived near the sea.

  ‘The Sun let Acorn float up again on the rising air, but he soon learned how to twist the feather to take advantage of the updraught and began to glide in towards the soft cliff-top grass. He was starting to think that he had again outwitted the Sun. Clever Acorn, he was thinking.

  ‘The Sun though, was playing with him, and as Acorn had chosen a good place to land and was steering towards it, the Sun reached down a gigantic paw and scooped out a hollow just ahead of him. The hollow was right on the edge of the sea and water rushed in through the gap, foaming and bubbling and soaking Acorn who had to swim ashore – just as the Sun had planned all along.

  ‘When Dandelion told me this story, she said the hollow cove is still here, full of the sea.’

  ‘What happened to the scoop of land, Meadowsweet-Ma?’ asked Bluebell.

  ‘The Sun looked at it and thought, Where could I have another hill? And seeing that the Great Heath was perhaps just a little too big, dropped it on the south side of that.

  ‘If you climb the tree behind you and look that way you can see it. It’s where the barn owls live – Screech Hill.’

  On Screech Hill itself, Sumac was worried. Word had just reached him on the colonists’ woodbine, that a party of Reds were being hunted to the death, over near the Blue Pool.

  The only Reds he knew of there were the Teachers – Rowan, Meadowsweet, Spindle and Wood Anemone, with their youngsters. Surely no one was hunting them? They were doing a tremendous and worthy job, teaching all the Silvers how to live successfully and peacefully in New America. They were wonderful squirrels and had taught him to be a Sun-squirrel, though it was not something one spoke about too openly. One day, when there was a Sun-squirrel in the Oval Drey perhaps, but not now.

  If it was his friends and teachers who were being hunted, he ought to be doing something to help them. He told his life-mate Tumbleweed, that he had to be away for a few days and slipped off towards the Blue Pool without further explanation. She still harboured some of the old prejudices, even though she had been taught in the same class as he had. She was not yet ready to become a Sun-squirrel.

  Skirting around the edge of the Tanglewood he caught the scent of Obsidian and Silica and crept up on them cautiously, then seeing their apparent age and condition, called to them.

  ‘Do you know anything about some natives being chased?’ he asked.

  ‘Who are you?’ Silica called back.

  ‘A friend of the Teachers. Is it them?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Obsidian, but before he could say any more, Sumac was off in a flash of grey fur heading for the Blue Pool.

  He ran as fast as he could across the Great Heath and through the woods to New Massachusetts, hardly pausing for breath even when he reached the pool itself. Human visitors looked up as he frantic grey squirrel passed overhead on its way to the North-east Wood.

  Here everything was eerily silent. The dreytels were unoccupied and the whole wood empty of any squirrel activity. Sumac snuffled around among the confusing scents, then followed the strongest towards the Dogleg Field.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Marguerite knew that things were now seriously wrong on Ourland. Instead of peace and prosperity bringing pleasure and happiness to the island, the virtually unlimited leisure time was undermining, if not destroying, the whole culture of the squirrels.

  She has retired to one of the palm trees in the sheltered valley, to think. Few humans came here and very few squirrels. Not that she disliked humans, they had never threatened her, but she just could not understand them.

  They still celebrated their Sun-days every seventh day which seemed rather too often to her. The squirrels’ Sun-days were the Longest Day and the Longest Night, the Coming of Spring and the Harvest Safely In. However, the humans did seem to have special Sun-days for the last three of these, as Marguerite, who loved to listen to the humans singing in the island church, had noticed extra activity at those times.

  The squirrels’ Longest Day celebrations had not gone well that summer. There had been plenty of youngsters romping and playing, but very few of the older generation came along to organise the fun and chases, or to tell stories.

  Dandelion had told one of Marguerite’s favourite tales about the squirrel who was beaten and then saved by humans, but the youngsters had been inattentive and fidgety.

  Marguerite recalled how she had always listened in silence when she had been young but this year…

  Dandelion had started as always, ‘Once upon a time…’

  ‘… A squirrel went down from Bloxworth to Wolvesbarrow. Some boys, as humans call their young males, set upon this squirrel and threw stones at him. They chased him with sticks, beating and hitting him until he saw the sky go black and blood ran from his nose. Then the boys kicked the poor thing into the grass on the side of a roadway and ran off, laughing.

  ‘All day the squirrel lay there, bothered by flies and afraid that a fox or dog might come and kill and eat him, but he was too stiff and sore and sick to move.

  ‘Several times squirrels passed in the trees overhead and saw the injured one lying below. The first squirrel was in a hurry and pretended not to see him.

  ‘The second one did not want to get involved. It was none of her business, and, anyway, it was the injured
squirrel’s own fault if he had got himself into trouble.

  ‘The third came down the tree and went a little closer to look. When he saw that the squirrel was a stranger he passed by on the other side.

  ‘Then a human came, saw the creature lying in the grass and took pity on him. He took it to a clean white place where he lived with other sick animals. Here other humans nursed him back to health and then released him where he had been found.

  ‘That injured squirrel was my dear grandfather, and he often told this story as a warning that you must not expect all of one kind to behave in the same way – especially humans.

  ‘My grandfather could never understand how humans could care so much for their pet dogs and cats and for sick creatures, then go out and kill free animals and birds just to have fun.’

  Dandelion had looked around expecting to see the nods and tail-flicks of appreciation that usually followed her story-telling and was upset when Sycamore said, ‘You’re always going on at us with your silly stories. I’m off.’ He turned his tail on Dandelion and leapt for a tree trunk, displaying insolence in his every movement. Other youngsters had followed him.

  What could be done? Marguerite wondered. Every generation thinks the older ones are stick-on-the-grounds. She could remember having such thoughts herself, but her year-mates wouldn’t have dared behave like that. Perhaps it had been better here when there was a king to impose some authority – perhaps an island needed that. Maybe the Mainland ways would not work here where life was so easy and without any threat of danger. Maybe…

  She decided to seek out Chip. It was unlikely that his Bark-rush would have the answers, but Chip himself had a good brain and always seemed glad to talk with her.

  At the Zwamp she found him crossly searching through the undergrowth.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ she asked.

  ‘Someone’s broken my Bark-rush and thrown all the rings away,’ he said gruffly. ‘I’ve only found about seven. Can you help me look, please.’

  ‘Did a human do that?’ she asked.

  ‘No, it was squirrels, young ones. Their scent was all around here. Sycamore’s and his hoppos I think. Sun-damn him!’

  ‘Chip,’ said Marguerite sternly. ‘You know I don’t like that kind of language.’

  She helped him find the rest of the bark-rings and left him threading them on new rush-stems. She had found a number of sloe stones in the bushes and suspected that they had come from the leaf-pile where sloes were left each autumn by Caterpillar, to ruddle in the heat. She went to the pile to see if there were any more there.

  Lying next to the steaming leaves was Caterpillar himself, groaning and trying to rub his back with his paws. Ruddled, she thought, ruddled old fool, and was about to pass him on the other side of the pile, when she remembered Dandelion’s story and went over to him.

  ‘Are you all right?’ She asked.

  ‘Uz’ve got thiz awful pain in uz back. Can yew vetch Voxglove or Cowzlip to zee me.’ He groaned again and a dribble of urine dropped on to a dead leaf. It was bright red.

  ‘I’ll get them at once,’ she told him and hurried off to the drey set aside for sick squirrels. Voxglove was there and Marguerite told her about Caterpillar.

  ‘Painz in the back and blood in hiz piddle – that’z zervantz’ zickness. Too many ruddled zloez!’

  They hurried back together but were too late. Caterpillar was Sun-gone, but they were in time to drive away a magpie that was about to peck out his eyes.

  While Voxglove went to fetch other squirrels to help bury the ex-zervant’z body, Marguerite stayed near in case the magpie returned. Next to the leafpile was the blackthorn bush that was already laden with the dark green berries that would soon turn a dusky black as they ripened. She thought hard and could think of no other such bush on the island, though they were plentiful on the Mainland.

  A daring idea came into her head. It was contrary to all that she had ever learned, especially the Kernel which old Burdock, her grandmother, had taught her.

  Squirrels protect trees,

  They have enough enemies,

  Treat them as your friends.

  She looked round guiltily then, sure that she was not being observed, hopped over to the blackthorn and bit away a ring of the bark all round the base. I may be killing a tree, she told herself, but I am saving many squirrels.

  The exposed wood gleamed accusingly white so she rubbed soil into the raw wood until it was hardly noticeable, then brushed the dirt from her paws.

  With the squirrels who had come to bury Caterpillar was Marguerite’s daughter, Burdock the News-squirrel. She greeted her mother coolly then went and prodded caterpillar’s body. ‘How long has he been dead?’ she asked.

  Later, when they were scratching leaves over his grave and saying the Farewell Kernel, Marguerite noticed Burdock looking closely at the base of the blackthorn bush. The news was swiftly carried around the island.

  DYING SQUIRREL KILLS THE TREE HE LOVED

  Caterpillar, known for his fondness for ruddled sloes,

  took a last final revenge on the tree that led to his death…

  In the concern over Caterpillar, Chip’s annoyance at the damage to his gadget seemed minor, but there was another case of wilful damage reported the next day. All the little Woodstocks, so lovingly trained around the hazel saplings by Chestnut and Heather, were uprooted and left to die. Sycamore was blamed and called before the Council.

  He sat there sullenly, his body radiating contempt.

  ‘It has been reported,’ Clover the Tagger said, ‘that you have wilfully destroyed trees despite knowing the Kernel:

  Squirrels protect trees,

  They have enough enemies,

  Treat them as your friends.

  ‘What have you to say for yourself?’

  Marguerite felt very uncomfortable. Was what Sycamore had allegedly done been so very different from what she had done herself only the day before? At least she had a motive. Perhaps Sycamore did too. Should she be trying to find out? With no further thought she spoke out.

  ‘I would like to suggest that this meeting is suspended while Sycamore and I talk about his reasons in private. I know it is against custom but please trust me. I am sure I can help.’

  Clover said, ‘It is against custom, but so many things that are happening now are against our customs. I value Marguerite’s judgement. Unless any squirrel is against, we will wait for Marguerite’s report. Sycamore the Ruddled, you will do exactly what Marguerite tells you and answer all her questions. We meet again here in seven days.’ Marguerite signalled to Sycamore to follow her and the two left together.

  ‘I want to know why you do all these things,’ she told him. ‘But don’t answer now, I want you to think carefully before you tell me. I want the real reason, not whatever comes into your head – that’s too easy. First though, we will go and apologise to Chip and see if he needs help remaking his Bark-rush.’

  Chip was not happy to see Marguerite with Sycamore. A tinge of jealousy stabbed him and he ignored he proffered apologies, turning away and scratching at a flea bite so vigorously that a trace of blood showed on his fur.

  ‘Chip!’ Marguerite said sternly, ‘behave yourself. I look to you to set an example.’

  Chip looked contrite and mumbled his apology. Marguerite was staring at the blood on his fur, her mind obviously far away.

  ‘Not bleeding – breeding!’ she said out loud.

  ‘Woodlouse knows how the mushrooms of the moon control breeding. That’s what Thizle was trying to tell me.’

  Then her face fell. Her dear friend Woodlouse (now called Wood Anemone), who appeared to hold the future of the Ourland squirrels in her paws, was out of reach. She had stayed on the Mainland to help with the teaching of the Greys.

  Marguerite knew she must find a way to get a message to her

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The stern-faced scoutmaster called his boy scouts together and instructed them to sit on the grass. He was not
looking forward to what he had to say.

  It was a pity. The camp had gone well so far. The boys had made bridges, rafts and bivouac shelters. They had all worked well together and played exciting wide-games and learned about stalking and concealment. Now this had happened to spoil it.

  His knees were burning. Unaccustomed to short trousers, the last two sunny days had left their bright red mark. He wondered briefly if what he was going to have to announce was unfair but then decided crossly that the little blighters must be taught a lesson.

  ‘I do feel that one or more of you have let the side down,’ he said. ‘This troop was selected from all the scouts in Dorset to camp here on Brownsea Island on the very place where Baden-Powell held the first ever scout camp nearly sixty years ago. That was a real privilege for our troop. Now someone has chopped a tree about so that it looks like a squirrel. I had to promise the wardens that all axe-work would be strictly supervised. I want the person who is responsible to own up.’

  He waited but no one spoke.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Someone must have done it.’

  ‘Perhaps it was a squirrel done it,’ a young scout ventured.

  The other scouts laughed nervously and the scoutmaster glowered.

  ‘If no one owns up by lunch-time none of you will go to help launch the hot-air balloon this afternoon. Dismiss.’

  The scoutmaster went angrily back to his tent to rub calamine lotion on to his sunburnt knees. If none of the little blighters owned up he would have to miss seeing the flight himself.

  Away from his hoppos, and with no access to the ruddled sloes, Sycamore was really pleasant company. After his apology to Chip he seemed eager to learn numbers from Marguerite and find out what the Bark-rush could be used for. She told him of her concern about the possibility of the island becoming overpopulated by squirrels and she reminded him of the dreadful plague that had virtually wiped out the rabbits earlier in the year. Then Chip, at first reluctantly, taught him how to calculate using the bark rings. Marguerite sat apart from them, trying to think of a way to get a message to Wood Anemone.