Duncton Rising (10 page)

Drubbins, the only mole Pumpkin dared confide in, confirmed the fact, saying that the Acting Master had been downright rude to him when he dared remonstrate about the matter of the texts.

“I never did like Sturne much, I must say, but I’m afraid his elevation to his present position is a blow for the cause Master Stour made such plans for. These Newborns certainly know how to get at a mole, for good or ill, and they seem to have won him to their dogmatic side.”

For all the vigour of Drubbins” comment, there was something shaken about his voice that made Pumpkin look at him rather more closely. Why, if Pumpkin had not seen with his own eyes that there was not a mark, or scratch, or bruise on the venerable elder he might have thought he had been... assaulted. He had the same kind of distant and nervous vulnerability about him as he. Pumpkin, had displayed as a young mole when some large Westside youngsters had had a go at him.

“Are you quite all right, sir?” enquired Pumpkin, concerned.

“Me? All right? Of course, of course,” replied Drubbins unconvincingly. “But what we can do... I... just don’t know. Pumpkin. What’s worse than all of this is that I’m not sure that you should be seen talking to me. The Newborns might draw the wrong conclusion.”

“You mean the
right
conclusion,” said Pumpkin flippantly.

But the cheerful smile on his face faded as Drubbins turned his pained eyes to him and said, “Mole, these are dangerous times, more dangerous perhaps than any of us but wise Stour realized. They... questioned me yesterday. They asked me many things in confusing ways and their eyes were colder than any ice or blizzard wind. I was frightened. Pumpkin. I’m an old mole now, and my life has been lived through peaceful times. The fragile strength I have to offer bends and breaks before such winds as the Newborns bring.”

“Did they
hit
you, sir?” asked Pumpkin, scandalized.

“No, no, they are subtler than that, and nor are they yet sure of themselves. I do not think they know anything at all of Stour’s plans and I did not say anything to arouse their suspicion. And yet. Pumpkin, when those moles surrounded me, and their eyes bored into me, and I grew confused, I felt it might be easier to tell the truth. Pumpkin, forgive me, I... am not strong.”

To Pumpkin’s astonishment, old Drubbins, the most stable, balanced and wise elder he had ever known, or ever expected to know, suddenly lowered his head and wept in a frail and croaky way.

“Mole, you know the last thing I would ever do is say anything about the whereabouts or plans of my friend Stour.”

“Of course you wouldn’t, sir.”

“But after they had finished with me yesterday I feared that I might not withstand their pressure for long if they do that sort of thing often. I fear I may prefer to kill myself than suffer their tortures again.”

“Sir, you mustn’t say such a dreadful thing. Come and stay in my burrow for a time.”

“No, no, that’s just what I must not do. I do not think they suspect you, for their minds are caught up in hierarchy and they would not understand that Stour would have entrusted so much to you, a mere aide as they would see it.”

“No, sir,” said Pumpkin with a modest grin.

“So that may be your best protection. Be obedient, keep your snout low, and if you must pay lip service to the Newborn way then do so abjectly. I may not last much longer under their regime, and much may depend on you. Much. Now, leave me, and pray for me! And do not risk coming here again.”

“No, sir, I won’t, sir, and try to perk up a bit because... because whatever we may be suffering, the Master’s in retreat on our behalf, and those brave moles like Privet and the others are adventuring half across moledom to try to bring things to rights, or prevent them getting worse.”

How worried Pumpkin looked as he parted from Drubbins, and how hard it was to look cheerful for the old mole’s sake.

“Pumpkin!” Drubbins called after him, “good luck! The Stone be with you.”

“Good luck to
you,
sir!” cried out valiant Pumpkin, feeling most uneasy, as if Drubbins might really try to hurt himself. As he went through the Wood he felt that he was all alone now, without friendship or support. “Except for the Stone!” he muttered to himself as he neared his burrows. “Yes, that’s with me, as it has always been.”

Then, the thought still lingering as he thankfully stanced down in his cosy chamber, he said to himself, “And
you.
Rue, who once lived here, I know you’re with me. And your friends, and all those good moles who went back and forth this way, better moles than me, and stronger too. They’re with me, and they’ll help me if I call to them, starting with great Bracken himself, first mole in modern times to understand that it is the Silence we must strive to reach. Why, I’ve got a whole army of support to see me through the time ahead until things change!”

A short time after this, after some days of irritability and tiredness. Pumpkin awoke one morning with a fever, a runny snout, and a painful throat. He struggled molefully into the Library, did his work feeling increasingly ill and full of aches and pains, had to bear a public chastizing from Sturne for some misdemeanour or other – he was not sure what, since his ears buzzed, his eyes felt all swollen, and just listening made him feel tired – and he had gone home and retired to his nest.

When he next woke it was night and he knew he was not well at all; his snout was blocked, and every joint and talon in his body ached.

“Oh dear,” he whispered to himself, “I am not well. I am ill. I...” and he felt tears come to his painful eyes, and self-pity overcame him, and a sense almost too much to bear that he was alone in Duncton Wood and not a single mole cared for him.

Next morning he knew he could not go to the Library, not even to tell them he was going straight back to his tunnels again. No, he
was
ill, and in his burrow he would stay. So he did, bunged up, tired, confused and feeling thoroughly miserable, getting steadily worse for several days before, weak as a newborn pup, he felt his condition level out to one of general and all-consuming misery.

That day, or a few days later perhaps – he was not sure, the time drifted by – Acting Master Librarian Sturne thought to send another aide to his tunnels to find out what was wrong and, most unsympathetically, to suggest he get better as soon as he could, as his help was needed for “the reorganization”.

“Whad reoraniayshun?” asked Pumpkin as best he could.

“Of the Library, Pumpkin. They’re clearing so much out you wouldn’t believe it!”

“Argh!” said Pumpkin.

“It’s quite shocking. In my view. Perfectly good texts, and not all of them copied so far as I know, are being disposed of.”

“Ergh!” declared Pumpkin, wishing the aide would go away. A nice enough. mole, meant well, knew his job, but, oh dear “Attiishoo!” ejaculated Pumpkin.

“You’re not well, old fellow,” said the aide.

“Aaargh!” gulped Pumpkin.

The visit seemed to Pumpkin to have lasted far too long, and the painful conversation to have lasted even longer, and he was utterly exhausted at the end of it. The Library texts, and all the aides, and the Newborns, and the Stone, and all moledom itself could go and lose themselves as far as he was concerned. He just wanted to sleep, and for his head to clear, and for the pain behind his eyes to go.

“Pleague league me alogue!” said Pumpkin.

“Only doing my job, unlike some,” said the mole and left.

Or had he left?

When Pumpkin awoke again he was aware that a mole was near, and there was the scent of food, A not entirely welcome scent but it made him nauseous. He opened his eyes and saw that time had passed and day was nearly done.

“Who’s there?” he said, struggling to focus his aching eyes and see whatmole it was. For the first time in all the long years he had lived in those tunnels they felt... chill.

“Library Aide Pumpkin, I am sorry you are unwell.”

The voice was as acrid as the scent.

Pumpkin finally opened his eyes and stanced up on shaking paws, the chamber swimming about him. One mole? No, three moles. All close, all dark, all with shining eyes that stared at him and glittered and were cold as ice.

“We felt we should come to talk to you. Pumpkin,” said the mole.

“Wahd abow?” said Pumpkin, wincing at the ragged soreness of his throat.

We were wondering,” said the mole, eyeing the worm and then taking a delicate nibble at it and speaking as he tasted and chewed, “we were wondering...”

“Wammole are you?” asked Pumpkin, beginning to recover himself

“... we were wondering what you know about the death last evening of the mole Drubbins?” said Brother Fetter, Newborn Inquisitor, smoothly.

Chapter Five

“The journey westward”... How those words reverberate now in the minds of moles who know Whillan’s great text
*
describing how he, Privet and Maple made their trek from Duncton in time to take part in Thripp’s infamous Convocation of Caer Caradoc.

*
The Journey Westward
is the first of Whillan of Duncton’s now classic quartet of texts describing the journeys of his life. The other three are, of course.
The Long Way North, Eastward,
and the last text, only recently discovered.
The Journey Home.

It was the journey of three great moles into the final setting of the sun of innocence over a moledom much of which was already darkened by the advancing night of the Newborns. A journey which until its final part seems now almost miraculous in the way it avoided those coming shadows, so that those three moles might know, if only briefly, but remember for ever, a moledom where systems were welcoming to the traveller, and where faith and trust, openness and good humour, were the abiding qualities of the moles they met.

In telling her tale the night before they left, Privet had said truly that it is often only moleyears later that moles see that what they least understand and most resist is what in its wisdom the Stone knows is best for them. So now the Stone decreed that they had a time of quiet journeying to ready themselves for the harder times to come.

As Whillan himself later scribed, “It seemed we wandered through a land of contentment and goodness, where moles had the old virtues of friendliness and welcome, of wholesome curiosity mixed with an innate sense of our need for privacy; in system after system we found moles old and young, male and female, who held the Stone in reverence and regard, and who felt sure that moles who came as we had done from Duncton Wood, and were on a mission to Caer Caradoc at which matters of importance would be discussed, must be moles worthy of their confidence. There is nothing like having moles believe in you to make you believe in yourself and wish to live by the precepts of the Stone.

“When the darker times came, and come they eventually did, it was always of those modest moles, and simple, beautiful places in the Wolds, that I would think; and when I had to find courage to defend what I believed was right, or strength to conquer any weakness of mind or body that I felt, it was not theories that sustained me, but the memories I had of that journey among the moles of the High Wolds.”

That all this would be so could not have been at all obvious from the way the journey at first developed through the dull cold days that followed their parting from Fieldfare and Chater at the Swinford cross-over. It was long and hard, and each was lost in their own thoughts for days on end. But there came a new dawn when the day seemed warmer, and lighter, and they found they were ready to enjoy each other’s company again.

From that moment on their journey became a blessed thing as day after day they trekked north-west, ever higher into the Wolds, where the rocks are soft and golden, and the soil is warm and good, and all seems to conspire to keep the worst of winter at bay, or, if unable to do that, to turn its chills and frosts to something beautiful in the hills and high vales, copses and little woods, streamlets and forgotten ways.

Feeling themselves now well clear of Duncton, and unlikely to be quickly discovered even if they made themselves known to moles they met, it was not long before they ventured to contact communities whose territories their obscure route took them across – which was not hard, for most were out and about and busy clearing their lower runs and burrows for the winter soon to come. Privet had already decided that once they met other moles they would make no attempt to hide who they were, where they were from, or where they were going – though both Maple and Whillan would have preferred to be less open, thinking that by being vague they might put back the day when, as seemed inevitable, the Newborns would catch up with them, but they deferred to Privet’s wish.

“We are journeying in pursuit of truth, and to see that true words are spoken at Caradoc, and it does not help our cause, or the Stone’s, if we lie about who we are,” she said.

Chater had taught the rudiments of safe journeying to Whillan well, and in concert with Maple he led Privet on through those bright days, cautiously at first, but with increasing speed and efficiency as their confidence increased.

It was not long after this upturn in their mood that their circuitous route swung them northwards into the valley of the River Windrush, whose cheerful waters flowed past them in a south-easterly direction and would, had they turned that way, have led them back towards Duncton Wood. Instead they turned upstream and began that part of their journey which led them to the forgotten heart of old moledom. By Burford they went, and Great Barrington; to Sherborne and then up and on to the little system of Broadmoor, whose moles tell a merry tale and keep visitors lingering. But Bourton beckoned, and on to it they went, to meet the moles whose sturdy independence and simple cunning a century before had kept moles of the Word from proceeding further than this point into the Wolds. Here Maple was much in his element, glad to exchange views with moles whose ancestors had fought a good fight against the Word, and who continued to the present day to post watchers, on the look-out for threats against their freedom and integrity.