The Tale of Holly How (24 page)

32

We Few, We Band of Brothers

At midsummer, in the Lake District, darkness does not fall until well after ten o’clock, so Will Heelis and Miles Woodcock, with Miss Woodcock, played three-handed bridge and discussed the events of the day.

At ten o’clock, as previously arranged, Constable Braithwaite appeared. Miss Woodcock excused herself, and the three men held a quiet but intense consultation. Having received his instructions, the constable left, and fifteen minutes later, there was a tap at the side entry and Charlie appeared, looking just as seedy as he had the day before, and with the same rank odor of ale, garlic, and onions hanging about him like a malodorous cloud.

They exchanged a few words, and then Will and the captain followed Charlie through the back gate and around the shrubbery. As they reached the narrow footpath that led through the meadows to Far Sawrey, some half-mile away, the constable fell in behind at some considerable distance, keeping the trio just in sight. They walked single file, without saying a word and with no lantern. The moon had risen, casting just enough light for them to see where they were going, and they had no wish to call attention to themselves.

The captain’s small group was not the only little band moving furtively through the darkness toward Far Sawrey. Dozens of men from the twin hamlets and the outlying farms and cottages had been looking forward to the night’s entertainment, and they were on their way to the event in comradly groups of twos and threes. Lanterns danced like drunken fireflies through the silent dark and bottles of home-brewed beer and ale clinked pleasantly in pockets, as shadowy shapes met and came together and separated, at last converging on the stable at the rear of the Sawrey Hotel.

For the most part, the little bands kept voices low and talk to a minimum. The men knew very well that what they were doing was illegal and that the local Justice of the Peace had done everything he could to suppress such revelries. They also knew, however, that this was a special occasion, deliberately planned for a night when both Captain Woodcock and Constable Braithwaite would be miles away in Kendal, attending a meeting of the Law Enforcement Officers Guild.

There would be no interference from the authorities to mar the merriment.

From a farther distance and a different direction, another, rather more diverse band was making its way toward the stable behind the hotel. In response to the summons passed by word of mouth through field and fellside, a large number of animals had gathered on Holly How, just outside the front door of The Brockery. They listened attentively as Bosworth Badger, standing on a heap of stones, told them why they had been called together, where they were going, and what they aimed to do.

“ ’Pon my word,”
drawled a fat, aristocratic-looking vole, curling his tail around his forepaws.
“Sounds a rawther dang’rous thing to do.”

“Of course it’s dangerous,”
snarled a fox, who, under other circumstances, would have made a quick meal of the vole. However, animals are capable of setting certain instincts aside when the good of the community is at stake—and the urgent need to defend the community was certainly reflected in the curious coalition of predator and prey that gathered in the darkness on Holly How that night. An observer might have counted a half-dozen lazy, lay-about voles; a dozen brown field rats from the Holly How rat patrol; a trio of twittering red squirrels with flashing eyes and nervous tails; a pair of foxes; several hedgehogs; an orange guinea pig; three moles; the badger (of course); a very shy pine marten, who kept invisibly to the shadows; a noisy and undisciplined rabble of stoats and weasels wielding large clubs; and Fritz the Ferret, who had come all the way up from the stone bridge on Kendal Road to join the expedition. The owl was there, too, of course, perched on a small tree that sagged under his professorial substance.

As might be expected, the members of this peculiar coalition were not entirely comfortable with one another. The smaller animals tended to huddle together, out of the way of the larger, and the largest tended put out their elbows and take up more than their fair share of the space. Feelings were frayed and nerves were taut and there was a great deal of pushing and shoving and snapping and muttered warnings of
“Mind how you go,”
and
“Have a care of my tail, if you please, sir!”
and
“Hold it just there, not an inch more!”

The badger raised his stick for silence.
“It is dangerous,”
he agreed gravely.
“Any time we must go amongst men, we are in danger—and some of us may feel endangered by others in this very group. But it is time to put our fears aside. We cannot sit on our tails with our paws folded and let criminals kidnap and make a cruel show of murder. If we allow this shameful event to take place tonight, the shame is on
us,
my friends, forever and ever! We will not be fit to bear the honored name of ANIMAL!”

“Hear, hear!”
cried the small orange guinea pig, and then hastily shut up, feeling himself at a disadvantage as to size and strength, and thinking that he should leave the cheering to those who were larger and had more experience of this sort of thing.

“Ah,”
said the vole thoughtfully. He smoothed his sleek gray fur, examined one paw, and said,
“I’m afraid you must excuse me, gentlemen. I have just remembered something pressing that I must do at home.”

The vole’s departure became an exodus when he was followed by every single one of the other voles (all of whom had remembered equally urgent matters to which they had to attend), two or three of the older rabbits, a squirrel affecting a sprained ankle, and a mole who claimed to be suffering from a very painful toothache.

Bosworth, reminding himself of the Fourth Rule of Thumb concerning departures without leave, turned his head and took no notice. The professor, however, did not feel obliged to observe badger etiquette, and gave several mocking hoots as the cowards skulked away. Following his lead, the other animals joined in, jeering and shouting taunts after the departing animals, delivering such remarks as
“See if we ever do anything good for you lot,”
and
“Don’t come crying to us when you get into trouble and need a hand.”

When the last one had gone, the badger called for silence again.
“Professor Galileo Newton Owl has a few words he would like to share with you,”
he said.

There was a round of polite applause, a respectful
“Let’s hear it from the professor!”
and two or three raucous comments from the weasels and stoats, who usually stayed on the rabble-rousing fringe.

“Thank you,”
said the professor, and lifted his wings.
“Friends, Romans,
countrymen,
”
he cried,
“lend me your ears.”
This caused some dark muttering amongst the ranks, and several of the animals were heard to object that they were neither Romans nor countrymen and what did this have to do with anything?

But all fell still as the professor began to recite, with his best Shakespearean intonation, admirable fervor, and a few regrettable revisions, King Henry’s famous speech before Agincourt:

This night shall e’er be called the Night of Holly How:
He that outlives this fight, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this night is named,
And rouse him at the name of Holly How.
He that shall live this night, and see old age,
Will yearly on this vigil feast his neighbors,
And say, Tooonight is the Night of Holly How:
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say, These wounds I had on the Night of Holly How.
This story shall all gooood animals teach their sons;
Nooo winter’s night beside the fire shall e’er gooo by,
From this day tooo the ending of the world,
Without our story told, and we in it remembered:
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he tonight that sheds his blooood, whatever kind
Of animal he be, shall be my brother!

By the time the professor was half the way through this stirring speech, a great many hankies had come out of waist-coat pockets and were being applied to wet eyes. And when he had completely finished, he took a deep breath and cried,
“Whooo is with us? Raise your voices, lads!”

At that, all the animals gave such a mighty shout—a chorus of squeaks, squeals, growls, barks, yips, and snorts—that their clamor might have been heard as far away as Sawrey, if any of the villagers had been listening. They shook paws and thumped each other’s backs, and congratulated each other on their great bravery, and danced and sang and chanted war cries and generally worked themselves into a fever pitch, the way people do when they’re preparing to go to war, until at last Badger raised his stick and shouted,
“Well, then, boys! Let’s be off!”

So at last this motley crew proceeded down the hill in a southward direction, through briar and bramble and over tumbled rocks and across burbling becks and under the ominous shadow of Cuckoo Brow Wood. Bosworth Badger led them, followed by the rat patrol, keeping cadence. The pine marten brought up the rear, and the troops were accompanied by Professor Galileo Newton Owl, who flew above their heads shouting such encouraging messages as
“Goood show!”
and
“Give it a gooo, boys!”
and
“We few, we band of brothers!”

Despite the professor’s exhortations, it was all Tuppenny could do to keep up the pace, for his legs were shorter by a good bit than the legs of any of the other animals, and he found himself sliding and stumbling and falling over the rocks and tumbling into whatever puddles happened to be in his way. By the time the band of brothers had reached the wooded hill to the north of the hotel yard, poor Tuppenny was scraped and scratched, one ear was badly nicked, one paw was cut to the bone, and his orange fur was wet, matted, snarled with burrs, and disgracefully bedraggled.

But although he was very small, Tuppenny had a very large heart, and he—like the other animals—was appalled at what was to take place that night. So he doubled and redoubled his efforts, manfully doing his very best to keep up. And at long last the company arrived on the dark hill above the stable, stopped to catch their breaths, and peered through the open doors of the building some ten yards away.

33

The Badger-Baiting

And what they saw was, in truth, appalling, a sight no animal should ever have to look upon. A circular area some eight feet in diameter had been inscribed on the dirt floor of the stable, and a temporary wooden fence, about three feet high, erected around the perimeter. Lanterns were hung on poles around this pit, flooding the circle with a garish light and casting flickering shadows on the stable walls.

The pit was surrounded by a throng of laughing, jeering, jostling men, some of them standing on wooden benches they had dragged into the stable for a better view. By their dress, most of the men seemed to be farmers and villagers, but a few—judging from their shiny hats and gentlemen’s frock coats and ties—were travelers staying at the Sawrey Hotel. A pair of waiters had come out of the bar and circulated through the crowd with loud cries of “What’ll ye have t’ drink, gentl’men? Orders, if ye please! Orders!” Other men called for wagers and took money, and still others carried small dogs, or jerked them along by ropes tied around their necks, or shouldered rusty wire cages filled with dark, heaving masses of rats. For whilst the badger-baiting was to be the piéce de rèsistance of the evening’s entertainment, it was preceded by several rat-and-dog matches.

While Tuppenny looked on with horror, scarcely able to believe his eyes, a cage full of rats was tipped into the pit and a ferocious-looking bull terrier poised over the fence in his owner’s arms. At Tuppenny’s side, the commander of the rat patrol sucked in his breath and put out a restraining paw to keep one of his troopers from leaping forward.

“Hold hard,”
the commander muttered in a gritty voice.
“Our turn will come.”

“But they’ll be killed!”
the trooper cried despairingly.

“We’ll have our revenge,”
the commander said.
“Hold hard, I say!”

The man in charge took out a large stopwatch. “What’s t’ name of thi dog?” he inquired.

“Butcher,” said the dog’s owner, who was obviously having trouble holding the animal. “He’s a fierce ’un, Jack Ogden. He’ll make short work o’ this lot.”

“Chuck ’im over t’ fence, then,” said Jack Ogden. “We’ll see how fierce t’ beast is.” He clicked the stopwatch. “Go!”

To a loud cheer from the spectators in the stable, over the fence went Butcher. In an instant the frantic rats were racing around the circumference of the pit, or trying to push through the gaps between the boards. But Butcher was indeed fierce and knew his work, and in exactly one minute, fourteen rats were lying bleeding and kicking in the dirt. Tuppenny could hear the horrified gasps of the rat patrol, and it was all the commander could do to restrain his troops.

Down in the stable, the dead rats were picked up by their tails and flung into a basket, and pots of ale and glasses of wine were handed round. There was a brief and noisy intermission whilst Butcher’s health was drunk, the winning bets were paid, and wagers laid on the main bout, which was next.

But other things had been going on in the shadowy corners of the stable, unseen either by the band of brothers on the hill or by the spectators whose attention was fixed on the ugly business in the pit. Will Heelis, Miles Woodcock, and the constable had taken up their positions, and stood quietly, waiting for the next event.

Will had his eyes on Jack Ogden, a heavyset, bearded man in a brown shirt buttoned up to the neck, a clay pipe stuck between his teeth. Ogden’s massive shoulders and square, hard hands testified to his work as a wall-builder who traveled around the Lake District, constructing the dry stone walls that marked the field boundaries. It was known that he was an expert waller, and he was always in great demand. It was also known that he dug badgers as a sideline, and farmers summoned him when they wanted to be rid of badgers on their property. But there was something else of interest about Jack Ogden, for in the press of people, Will had deliberately got close enough to the man to get a good whiff of the tobacco he was smoking. It was cherry-flavored, without a doubt. And his clay pipe had been made (unless Will missed his guess) by Hiram Swift.

“Gentlemen, attention, please!” cried Jack Ogden loudly. “Tha’s all come t’ see tonight’s chief attraction, and it’s near time for t’ show to begin! What we have here is a fine, fat badger sow, just dug out of ’er sett. It was close by to t’ village, and she was no doubt raidin’ all thi wives’ gardens. And to make t’ match e’en fiercer, we’ll throw in ’er cub. And for t’ dog—” He held up his hands for silence. “And for t’ dog, we have Black Mack, t’ terror of t’ Lake District!”

“Black Mack!” A cheer went up. “Black Mack!”

Will pressed his lips together, as a cage was brought and two badgers, one large and one quite small, were dumped out of the cage and into the pit. The larger badger, fangs bared and the fur standing up in a ridge along its back, crouched defensively in front of the cub, which squealed and cowered in fright against the wall. Somebody shouted, “Here’s Black Mack!” and a large black dog, snapping and snarling on a heavy chain, was produced out of the crowd.

“Go for ’t, Black Mack!” a man cried, and Jack Ogden bent over to pick up the dog and toss it into the pit.

This was the moment Miles Woodcock was waiting for. He signaled to Constable Braithwaite, who stepped out of the darkness and blew a shrill blast on his police whistle. All sound ceased, and the captain and the constable went forward into the sudden silence.

“Tha’s under arrest, Jack Ogden!” Constable Braithwaite said roughly. “Tha’s been warned a-fore ’bout this bus’ness. Tha knows ’tis a crim’nal offense to bait badgers.”

“Aw, hell,” Ogden said disgustedly.

With that, pandemonium broke loose. The sudden and unwelcome appearance of the constable and the Justice of the Peace panicked the spectators, waiters, and bookies. They turned and broke for the stable doors, pushing and shoving to get out, abandoning their dogs and rat cages and flattening the walls of the pit in their flight. But to this mad disorder was added another, for an extraordinary stampede of animals suddenly charged out of the darkness and through the double doors at the rear of the stable, snapping and yapping and yipping and yelping at the heels of the fleeing crowd with an unearthly, ear-piercing cacophony. To an amazed Will Heelis, it was as if some sort of fantastic zoo wagon had stopped just outside and discharged its passengers, a seemingly infinite horde of brown field rats, squirrels, foxes, moles, stoats, weasels, a badger, and—

He blinked. And an orange guinea pig, which stood on its hind legs, blinking and bobbing its head in confusion, bewildered by the shouting, swirling chaos of men and animals. Without thought, Will bent over and scooped up the little creature and dropped it into the pocket of his jacket.

This madness went on for only a minute or two, and when it was over, the stable was completely empty of spectators—and of animals, too. The two badgers had vanished from the wreckage of the pit, and even the caged rats had somehow managed to escape. As far as Will could see, the only creature left was an enormous tawny owl, perched high in the shadowy rafters, regarding the scene below with a steady, unblinking gaze.

Jack Ogden glared at Captain Woodcock. “Well, now tha’s done it,” he growled, folding his arms with a surly look. “We was only havin’ a bit o’ fun, nae harm to nobody. Tha’s t’ only justice of t’ peace in t’ whole Lake District that gives a damn ’bout badger-baitin’. And there’s nae point in chargin’ me, neither. T’ magistrate will only let me off with a warnin’, same as he’s done a-fore.”

“Not this time,” the captain said gravely. He held something out. “I believe these are yours, are they not?”

“Hey!” Jack Ogden took the tongs he was handed. “Oh, aye. These’re my badger tongs. See there?” He pointed with a thick finger. “That’s my mark. J.O. Jack Ogden.” He grinned, showing a broken tooth. “’Tis nae crime t’ dig badgers, tha knows, Captain.”

“Yes, I know,” the captain said quietly. “These tongs, however, were found on Holly How, at the place where Ben Hornby fell to his death, and they fit the welt that marks Ben’s shoulders.” He paused. “And what’s more, Ben was holding a tobacco pipe, Jack. A Hiram Swift clay pipe.” He glanced at Will, who nodded firmly. “That pipe had your tobacco in it. Brown Twist, Number Four, cherry-flavored.” He leaned forward and pulled a half-full tobacco sack out of the pocket of Ogden’s brown shirt. He held it up, displaying the Gawith label. “An uncommon tobacco, Jack. There aren’t many who prefer cherry.”

“Hey!” Jack Ogden’s mouth opened wide in alarm. “I didn’t have nothing to do with that business! You can’t tangle me in—”

“We shall see whether I can or not,” the captain said. “The handcuffs, Constable Braithwaite. Our friend Mr. Ogden is going to spend the night in the Hawkshead jail. When he is arraigned in the morning, perhaps he will have reflected on the advantages of telling the truth.”

Will stood watching as the constable handcuffed the protesting man, took him by the collar, and dragged him out of the stable.

“Well,” said the captain, dusting his hands with satisfaction, “that’s that. A good night’s work, eh, Will?”

“A good night’s work,” echoed Will. He looked around, frowning. “I don’t understand those animals.”

“What animals?”

“Why, didn’t you see them, Miles? Foxes, weasels, rats—a whole army. Charged right in here and—”

The captain shook his head. “Didn’t notice, I’m afraid. My attention was focused on Ogden.” He grinned widely. “Did you see his face when I held up those tongs, Will? He had no idea what was coming next. Took him completely by surprise, we did.”

Will shook his head, perplexed. “You didn’t see the animals?” he repeated incredulously. “They were underfoot, everywhere, yipping and squealing. And if I’m not mistaken, they emptied the rat cages and made off with that pair of badgers.”

“Emptied the rat cages?” The captain gave a hearty chuckle. “Made off with the badgers? You’re seeing things, Will Heelis!”

“Is that right?” Will asked grimly. He reached into his coat pocket. “What’s this, then?” And he pulled out a wet and bedraggled orange guinea pig.

“Doesn’t look like a fox or a weasel to me,” said the captain, with a quick glance. “More like a fuzzy orange rat, except that he’s missing his tail. Anyway, I doubt he’s big enough to make off with a couple of badgers.” He clapped his friend on the shoulder. “Come on, old chap, I’ll buy you a drink.”

When the two men had left the stable, another shadow began to stir and in a moment a boy climbed down the wooden ladder out of the loft, a gray cotton sack slung over one shoulder. He stood in the stable doorway, looking out onto the moonlit hill, first one way and then the other, obviously puzzled. At that moment, on his perch high in the rafters, the owl raised his wings, flapped them twice, and sailed into the starry sky, heading north.

The boy looked up at the owl, smiled, and then began to follow.