Availing of whatever cover he could find, Scavenger led the vixens along the water’s edge until they were opposite an island that was covered with trees and thick undergrowth. A quick look around to make sure they hadn’t been spotted, and they swam across.
In an oak tree on the far side of the lake, a racoon which had been watching them out of a corner of his eye, curled up and went back to sleep.
The noise of this strange collection of animals and birds was so loud now the vixens found it very frightening. Scavenger assured them this was just what they wanted. When they pounced on the ducks, no one would notice. He was right. No one did. One alert keeper looked out towards the lake thinking for a moment he saw a sudden movement, but dismissed it as another of the squabbles seagulls were always having as they swooped on pieces of floating food.
As the foxes settled down on the island to a supper of the most exotic duck they had ever tasted, the keepers went about the job of feeding the many animals and birds that couldn’t fend for themselves. At long last a contented silence descended on the lake. Animals rested on full stomachs and the only thing that disturbed the peace was the patter of rain on the water.
Because of the rain, the light was fading fast. There was no sign of the keepers, and Scavenger decided the moment had come to strike again. This time, however, he misjudged the situation. Hearing the commotion on the island as ducks and geese and many other lake birds scattered in panic, the keepers realised at once that a fox had got in. It wasn’t the first time it had happened, and knowing the damage a fox could do, they stopped what they were at and dashed down to the lake.
Realising his mistake, Scavenger told the vixens to stay where they were. Taking a tight grip on a duck he had just caught, he swam across to the far shore.
‘There he is,’ cried a keeper. ‘After him.’
This, of course, was what Scavenger wanted. As he ran back up towards the wooden fence where he had got in, She-la and Sinnéad swam the short distance from the other side of the island, and carried their ducks up towards the tall beech tree.
Away on the far side of the zoo, Scavenger slipped back out through the wooden fence before the keepers could catch him, and made a quick dash for the safety of the undergrowth beyond the green railings where Old Sage Brush and the others were waiting.
Meanwhile, She-la and Sinnéad, with Skulking Dog’s help had squeezed out through the wire fence. And so their flight from the lake went unnoticed. Unnoticed, that is, by anyone except a raccoon curled up in a ball of fur in an oak tree near the lake, and perhaps, just perhaps, a wide-eyed sharp-eared little mouse looking out from beneath a hollow log in the home of the grey squirrels. Nothing happened in that part of the zoo that they didn’t know about.
Thirteen
Under the Evergreens
Darkness came and with it the cold. The rain turned to sleet, and the sleet turned to snow. In a dry stone ditch in the grounds of the big house, the foxes curled up in the shelter of the ivy and tangled undergrowth and enjoyed the proceeds of their raid on the zoo.
Later, as the snow clouds cleared, and moonlight sparkled on the whitened fields beyond the trees, Scavenger could see that while the others dozed Vickey was restless, so he went over to her. As he settled down beside her, she thought he really was the skinniest, mangiest little dog fox she had ever seen. Cheeky too, but a likeable rogue.
‘We’ll be going soon now, Scavenger,’ she whispered. ‘Why don’t you come with us?’
Scavenger licked his lips and shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t know what to do. I mean, I’d be lost in the country, just the way you’re lost here.’
‘But surely you can’t enjoy living here — in man’s place.’
‘What makes you say that?’
Vickey shifted uncomfortably. She was afraid she might say something that would hurt his feelings. ‘Well, I mean, where will you go after this? You’ve had good hunting this time, but you can’t go back there for a while.’
‘True, but there are other places.’
‘With big animals?’
‘No, no. But there are other wooded places with small birds and frogs and rats, and I know where there’s another lake with lots of ducks. I go to a different place each night.
‘But how do you eat the disgusting stuff that man leaves out?’
‘I wish there was more of it.’
‘You mean you actually like it?’
‘Of course I do. You never know what you’re going to find. It beats hunting any time.’
‘What I can’t understand,’ said Vickey, ‘is how you stand the smell.’
Scavenger gave the funny little wheezy laugh that made his shoulders shake. ‘What smell? When I go down into man’s place the only thing I can smell is food.’
‘Maybe you’ve been here too long and don’t notice it.’
Scavenger smiled. ‘Maybe so, but things aren’t so bad that I have to leave it to learn the secret of survival.’
Vickey knew she had no answer to that. ‘Gloomglow’s here,’ she observed, changing the subject. ‘It’s time we were getting on back to Beech Paw. I just hope Old Sage Brush can make it. He’s not able for all this travelling you know.’
‘You worry too much,’ said Scavenger. ‘There’s plenty of life left in the old dog yet. Let him sleep for a while. Later, when it’s safe, I’ll take you all back out of man’s place and see you safely on your way to Beech Paw. And it might be a good idea if you got some sleep too while you can.’
‘Scavenger,’ mumbled Vickey before she dozed off.
‘What?’
‘You promised to tell us why man kills foxes the way he does.’
‘And so I will, when the time comes. Now go to sleep.’
The scattering of snow was crisp on the sparse grass as Scavenger led his country cousins back out through the green railings of the big house, across the flat field with the white posts, and into the small wood of birch trees. To their left they could see the silhouette of tall buildings, church spires, and two long chimneys gushing smoke into the night sky. It was still dark, but sounds from man’s place indicated a stirring of life, and so they hurried on. However, they didn’t leave by the small iron gate. Instead, Scavenger took them away along the high stone wall, and up through the park until they came to a massive double gate at the side of a roadway. Squeezing through, they crossed the road and a few minutes later found themselves at the river. They swam across at a point where the banks were flat and the flow of the water wasn’t too strong, and continued on up-river. By now the sounds of man had receded. Nothing disturbed the stillness, except the rushing water and the crackle of the snow on the grass as they trotted along.
Before leaving man’s place completely, however, Scavenger took them up through the fields to a cluster of houses. ‘Now,’ he whispered, ‘if you want to find out why man kills foxes, stay close and keep quiet.’
Creeping up to a gap in a wall, they peered out across the road. In the lighted window of a shop they could see three women. The women looked back at them with unseeing eyes and didn’t move. Feeling the others freeze, Old Sage Brush asked Black Tip what was wrong.
‘Fox furs,’ exclaimed Black Tip. ‘They’re wearing fox furs!’
It was a sight that rooted them to the spot. All they could do was stand and stare, wide-eyed, open-mouthed and unbelieving. The model in the centre was dressed in a coat of fox furs, and around her neck she wore a complete fox skin. The legs hung limply from her shoulders, and a fine head that once had been cunning and free was clasped lifeless across the base of the tail.
Vickey shivered and looked at her own fur. She hadn’t noticed before how tatty it had become with the onset of the breeding season. Now as she looked again at the hapless fox in the shop window, she felt uneasy. So did they all, and they thought to themselves that they much preferred to take their chances in the open countryside and leave man’s place with all its unpleasant sights and smells to man.
Scavenger led them farther along th
e river. Then, turning his back to it, he took them across the fields until they came to the canal where he had first met them. This seemed to form the edge of his territory, and in the fields beyond he wished them a safe journey back to the Land of Sinna — and Beech Paw.
‘Are you sure you won’t change your mind?’ asked Black Tip.
‘Yes do,’ urged Vickey. ‘Come with us.’
‘If you don’t,’ said She-la, ‘you might end up like that fox we saw around the woman’s neck.’
Scavenger laughed his wheezy little laugh until his shoulders shook, and looking down at his own mangy fur, told them: ‘Nobody would want this old coat to keep them warm. I can hardly keep warm in it myself.’
Old Sage Brush smiled. ‘Scavenger,’ he said, ‘take care of yourself. That fur of yours may not be worth much to man, but it’s worth a lot to us. Don’t let them catch you.’
The moon was casting a soft light across the hills and finding a faint reflection in the still waters of the lakes below. From a patch of gorse on the hillside where they lay, Vickey looked up at the stars. The running fox in the sky was almost directly above her head, and had now turned over on its back. It seemed to have stopped running and she knew that it would soon be time they stopped running too.
Not long after leaving man’s place, Old Sage Brush had called an unexpected halt, and Black Tip had led them to an earth in a dry bank. Behind the bank a plantation of evergreens stretched back across the hill like a carpet of Christmas trees. The badgers that had dug the earth had chosen well. It gave a good view of the hillside and any danger that came from there, while at the same time providing an escape route up through the trees at the back. The plantation and its undergrowth might also provide food.
Black Tip, his neck still sore from the choking hedge-trap, rolled over on his back so that he could also look up at the running fox in the sky.
‘What are you thinking?’ Vickey asked him.
‘It’s lying on its back, just like me.’
‘That’s what I was thinking,’ said Vickey. ‘It’s stopped running, and soon, so must we.’
Black Tip made no reply. He knew she was right. He also knew something else but couldn’t find it in his heart to tell her.
‘We never did find the Great White Fox,’ Vickey remarked. ‘I don’t understand it really’
Black Tip rolled back on his belly and looked at her. ‘There’s a lot we don’t understand,’ he told her. ‘But we will understand it all in time.’ He nudged her affectionately, and added: ‘Come on, let’s join the others.’
Hearing Black Tip and Vickey talking with Hop-along and She-la, Old Sage Brush came out the back tunnel into the plantation. He paused to stretch the aches of sleep from his body and joined them. Skulking Dog and Sinnéad came up out of the earth a few minutes later, and Fang who had been hunting among the evergreens, arrived shortly afterwards. They lay in a circle around the old fox, waiting to hear what he had to say. A thick layer of last year’s needles formed a soft brown carpet and provided them with a rare sense of comfort.
Apart from a wood pigeon cooing somewhere in the distance, the birds were still silent. Perhaps they were aware of the visitors, or perhaps they preferred other haunts. Whatever the reason, the foxes found the plantation very quiet and peaceful.
As they lay around Old Sage Brush, they listened to the wind and looked up at the tree-tops, tall and slim, swaying gently against the spreading dawn. Then they turned to the old fox expectantly. When he didn’t say anything, Sinnéad asked: ‘What worries you Sage Brush?’
‘There is much to worry all of us,’ he replied.
‘What?’ asked Vickey, sitting up with a start. ‘We’re on our way to Beech Paw. What is there to worry about?’
‘The fun dogs,’ Old Sage Brush reminded her. ‘They still lie between us and Beech Paw.’
‘But we can’t let them stand in our way,’ cried Vickey. ‘Not now.’
The old fox sighed. ‘Maybe I was wrong to think I could show you the secret of survival. Maybe we shouldn’t have left Beech Paw.’
‘Of course you weren’t wrong,’ Black Tip assured him. ‘Anyway, we asked you, remember?’
‘That’s right,’ said Fang. ‘It was our idea in the first place. And we have learned much.’
The others agreed.
‘But have we learned enough to get Vickey back to Beech Paw?’ the old fox asked. ‘If we press on, we’ll have to face the fun dogs, and we can’t hope to beat them again. If we stay here, there’s a danger we’ll get snowed in. Either way, we lose time, and time is something Vickey can’t afford.’
‘Maybe we should press on,’ suggested She-la. ‘The fun dogs might not see us.’
‘But I’ve seen them,’ said Black Tip. ‘Or at least their tracks, and sooner or later they’ll see ours.’
‘What are we to do then?’ asked Vickey anxiously.
Old Sage Brush shook his head.
‘Let me draw them off,’ urged Black Tip.
‘And me,’ said Skulking Dog.
Old Sage Brush shook his head again. ‘Your vixens need you.’
‘They don’t need me,’ said Fang. ‘I could go.’
‘Fang,’ said the old fox, ‘you have served me well. You have been my strength when I had none. You have been my courage when I was weak. But I cannot let you go out and draw the fun dogs upon yourself. You’d never out-run them.’
‘I could try,’ urged Fang. ‘I just might make it.’
‘No,’ said Old Sage Brush firmly. ‘I cannot let you risk your life again. We must think of some other way. In the meantime, we must eat.’
The old fox sent Black Tip and Skulking Dog out to hunt, and they hurried off through the evergreens, stopping every now and then to sniff the wind and listen for any sounds that might signal the approach of the fun dogs, or provide a promise of food.
The plantation gave them an entirely different feeling from the one they had in the wide open spaces of the fields. Somehow it gave them a feeling of isolation, and as they looked up at the brightness beyond the swaying tree-tops, a feeling of being surrounded by a bigness they couldn’t quite comprehend. It was a strange experience, even for foxes, to watch a stream and not hear it. They came across several such streams, flowing quietly across a bed of needles. There were also dry ditches in the plantation, and from one a large hare sprang out and sped away through the trees. They didn’t pursue it. It was going too fast, and anyway, they still hadn’t forgotten about Hop-along’s encounter with Lepus.
Although generally referred to as pine, the evergreens were in fact spruce, except for those around the edge of the plantation. There, a belt of larch trees shone bare and bright in the wintry sun. The larch looked dead, but it was just that they, of all the conifers, shed their foliage in winter, and Black Tip and Skulking Dog could see as they emerged from underneath their graceful branches, that they too were greening now with tiny tufts of neat new needles. It was another reminder that time was running out for Vickey, and they must hurry.
Suddenly they met a stream of young rabbits fleeing from a warren on the grassy bank at the edge of the plantation. The rabbits were terror-stricken and ran right into them. As they plucked two of them from their mad flight, a stoat emerged from the warren. The little hunter stood up on his hind legs, and seeing that the foxes had reaped the benefit of his efforts, bounded forward snarling and squeaking its annoyance. Black Tip and Skulking Dog didn’t stop to argue, but streaked off through the trees with their kill.
Having left the rabbits back at the earth for the others, the two resumed their hunting. This time they tried the fields alongside the plantation, but it soon became obvious that the activities of the stoat had driven most other wild life into cover.
Half a dozen magpies swooped on them as they made their way across the fields. They ignored them. The magpies, recognising natural enemies and never lacking courage in the presence of either dog or fox, swooped again. The two foxes continued on their way as if the magp
ies were no more than midges flitting around their ears. The magpies came in again, closer this time. The foxes turned and sprang at them. Black Tip caught one and the others retreated to the safety of a nearby ash tree. Black Tip smiled, and Skulking Dog guessed what he was thinking. As Old Sage Brush would say, courage was no substitute for cunning. The magpie tasted good — not as good as a chicken or a pheasant, remarked Skulking Dog, but enjoyable nevertheless.
Rising to survey the hillside below them, they could see a farmer glancing at the sky and turning his collar up against the wind. It had been a difficult year for farmers everywhere. Late frosts and continuing snow had brought heavy lambing losses, and they had been slow to sow their wheat. More snow was also the last thing they wanted.
Black Tip turned to go when a movement down at the farmhouse caught his eye. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘it’s a fox.’
‘But what is it doing there in broad daylight?’ wondered Skulking Dog. He thought of the narrow escape he himself had had at the chicken farm shortly after leaving Beech Paw, and added: ‘It’s asking for trouble.’
Black Tip nodded, and Skulking Dog continued: ‘It looks like … but it couldn’t be …’
Black Tip sprang forward, his body trembling. He too had sensed something familiar in the movement of the fox down at the farmhouse. It was Vickey.
Fourteen
Alone Against the Wind
A pair of dark brown eyes, sharper even than those of a fox watched Vickey enter the farmyard. They saw her approach the body of a stoat lying on the cement floor of an open barn. Unaware that she was being watched, she sniffed the stoat and turned it over with a nudge of her nose. She didn’t see or hear the ghostly white form that swooped on her, until its razor-sharp talons gave her a swift clout on the side of the head. She screamed in a mixture of pain and surprise, and turned her head to see the barn owl come to roost on a rafter.
Run with the Wind Page 12
