Lord Morgan's Cannon (6 page)

Bear curled back his paw and lifted it off the herring gull’s body. The bird looked at him with mad, confused eyes. It struggled to flip itself on to its chest. It then ran down the gully between the hedge and field desperately trying to make its wings work, and flee this strange hairy monster with a long nose.

The shaken budgie and anteater watched the seagull fly away.

“Stay low Bessie. Stay with me,” said Bear.

He stuck out ten inches of tongue and licked Bessie’s dishevelled feathers, realising it was his turn to comfort her as she had him the previous day.

She hopped upon his back and Bear surveyed the terrain. He would use his nose to retrace his steps back through the yellow field and find the track that led to the meadow and circus.

The anteater and budgie emerged from the oil seed rape without being seen by another creature. The gate to the track was still open, so the two animals meandered through. Bessie had gained her bearings and became excited at the thought of seeing the circus wagon she had glimpsed before being attacked.

Down the path they walked, expecting each corner to reveal a throng of dressed-down clowns and circus boys and girls, all escorting the horse-drawn wagons as Whyte and Wingate’s Big Top rolled on to tomorrow’s pitch.

But the track was quiet. Bear put his nose to the ground, sniffing for the scent of his cage, for Doris and Edward, for the whip even. He sighted markings in the dried mud, lines of them matching the gauge of the wagons he’d spent much of his adult life riding. He cantered along the track, reaching the gate through which he’d passed the night before. He saw the sign advertising a fire-juggling monkey and ran into the field, hoping to see Doris in a harness, pulling tall the burned and deflated Big Top. But the meadow was empty.

“They’ve gone,” he heard Bessie chirp. “They’ve all gone.”

“Where?” asked Bear.

He pulled his spectacles over his eyes, hoping they would help.

“They were all here,” said Bessie. “Right here. I saw them this morning. The Ring Master was on his back, the strongman trying to pick him up. I told them I’d find you and return. I told them we’d save the circus. I saw the wagon from the yellow field. But they’ve all gone.”

“Where is Doris? And Edward?” asked Bear.

“I don’t know,” Bessie said. “I’ll fly off and find them,” she suddenly said, excitedly.

“No. Don’t do that. It’s dangerous out here,” said Bear.

For the first time, the English countryside, with its tracks and fields, hedges and coppices, green forests, grey rivers and sodden skies, scared him. He was used to seeing it pass on by from the sanctity of his cage. When he was let out to sample it directly, he always had Doris and the humans about him for company. Now he just had a tiny bird upon his back.

He felt the wind pick up and his small eyes registered the light fading. He moved his spectacles back off his face and felt his day’s work in his legs. He knew the night was coming.

“We should get out of this meadow,” he said, “and sleep in the trees. It’ll be warmer and safer.”

Bessie gripped his black hair as the anteater once more put his head to the ground. He walked through the meadow, uphill, away from the gate and track. He headed for the line of trees on the horizon, hoping they stood more than ten trunks deep.

He reached the edge of what appeared to be a small wood. Running along its edge, he examined the soil and roots.

“What are you looking for?” Bessie asked.

“Ants’ nests,” he said. “We’ve got to eat something.”

Bessie hadn’t thought of eating ants before.

“Do they bite or sting?”

“The big ones do,” said Bear. “Avoid those. And don’t let them crawl into your eyes. My mother told me ants can blind you if you let them get into your eyes.”

Bessie considered Bear’s advice and decided to look for berries instead.

“Here,” said Bear, as he found a sweet-smelling ant trail that led into the dark, damp understory.

Under cover, Bessie felt brave enough to fly again. She took to the trees as Bear searched the floor of the wood like a pig hunting truffles.

Then Bear saw it. A huge footprint in the ground, next to a young hazel tree trying to compete with the ash and oak. He placed his own paw within, but it didn’t fill the print. He counted four rounded indentations, above a much larger circle. He instantly knew this was a print made by the rear leg of an Indian elephant, a giant pad and four nailed toes evenly distributing Doris’s weight.

He called to Bessie, who flew down and excitedly bobbed along the path, finding more prints, all leading towards a small clearing filled with wildflowers.

As Bear and Bessie reached the clearing, they saw Doris standing under an old oak. She was pulling at grass that was more clumpy and green than in the meadow. They shouted to her and she answered them with a giant trumpet.

The three animals met in the middle of the clearing, so happy to be reunited. They began to share their stories, animatedly describing last evening’s performance, the rampaging old leopard and dog, and how scary it had all become.

Doris explained that it was easy for an elephant to hide among the trees. All she had to do was stand still. Such guile had saved her family in India many times, she said, though it had been difficult to get Edward to also stay quiet.

Edward appeared on cue, his bad hearing never seeming to matter when his name was called. He dropped down from the oak and ran to his friends, still wearing his red waistcoat and bowler. He chided Doris for being so naked, her shawl and hat long lost to last night’s journey into the trees. The animals talked until dusk, until Bear thought to ask the obvious question.

“So where is the circus then?” he said.

He expected Doris and Edward to know. But the elephant and monkey expected the anteater and budgie to know it instead.

“So where are we?” he then asked, hoping it would help.

“Some of these are pollard trees,” said Edward, unhelpfully.

Edward didn’t like it when the other animals, especially the less gifted ones, such as the anteater, led the conversation.

“What is a pollard tree?” asked Bear.

Edward ran up a nearby tree and along a high branch. He pulled at its end, bending back the branch to reveal a neat cut.

“Pollard trees are trees that the humans cut for firewood,” answered Edward, boldly.

“How do you know that?” pushed Bear.

“I’m a monkey,” said Edward proudly. “Monkeys know all about trees.”

Bear thought about it a while, then reasoned that Edward had to be right.

“So that means that humans come into this wood?” he inquired.

“Of course they do,” replied Edward. “The cleverest creatures use the forest.”

He was mocking Bear now. The anteater looked at the floor and stopped speaking.

“Oh that’s fabulous,” said Doris. “If we find the humans, we can find the Ring Master. And then we can find the circus.”

“You can’t have a proper circus without the animals,” suggested Bessie. “I heard the Ring Master. He said you can’t have a proper circus without the animals.”

“You can’t have a proper circus without the animals,” Doris agreed, though she hadn’t considered whether that was her own thought, or whether she echoed the words of the Ring Master to comfort herself.

The leopard had slept soundly the night before. Escaping from the Big Top he’d used the dark as cover, and found a hedgerow running alongside the meadow’s edge. He’d followed the hedge up the hill, passing a pungent field of yellow and fixed upon a stand of trees.

Entering the coppice, he’d tried to claw at a tree’s bark, but he had nothing to grip with. So he ran his old frame up an oak tree, grateful to reach a strong branch.

After failing to strike Lord Morgan in the tent, he then took great pleasure in watching from the meadow’s edge as the circus fell. He crossed his paws and licked them as the humans way down in the field ran for their lives and carriages. He kept a particular eye out for the outline of Lord Morgan’s hat, and noticed his prey standing to one side of the circus, taking in the pandemonium. He was annoyed to see Lord Morgan’s dog at his master’s feet, seemingly unhurt. But then he had a better thought.

He knew guns were for killing. But the gunshot fired inside the tent signalled a new life for him, he reasoned. He would see out his days in these woods and fields. He’d already spent years watching the clumsy sheep the humans raised. He’d registered the black and white sheepdogs that nipped at the sheep’s heels, driving them past the circus wagons on the tracks, but also that few farmers used dogs to guard their flocks. He’d spotted the fragile fences around the chicken and duck pens and the houses for pigs. He reasoned he could let the circus go and live out in the wild. Like a leopard. Like a king.

Up in that tree, he slowly blinked as the tent burned, and the circus hands in the meadow took to the bottle. He rested his chin upon his front legs and went to sleep in the tree. He dreamed of entering the dreams of all the children living nearby. He would live like a leopard king. He would become a beast and find a moor to haunt. He’d take the odd human, just for fun, and as a reminder to them all.

He was woken that morning by the chatterings of a monkey and elephant in the trees behind him. He was annoyed they too had escaped the circus and had taken up residence in his wood.

He wanted to be alone, to enjoy his freedom. So head-first, he quietly slid down the trunk of the tree and into the grass at the meadow’s edge. He was not yet confident in his spots, so he moved towards the field of yellow knowing he could lose himself within. He looked back at the meadow and rejected the travelling life forever. Apart from the nervy lions, cats weren’t supposed to live and hunt as a team.

He moved through the rape and caught the whiff of an anteater’s tail. He hurried along, jogging, his lower jaw dropping to allow him to breathe better. He started to run and didn’t stop for the whole morning, covering at least a mile and another after that. The field of rape gave way to a succession of orchards. The leopard wasn’t used to organised trees, and disliked the smell of tart apples. He leaped a stone wall and noticed some hills in the distance. High ground. A good vantage point to survey his kingdom.

By late afternoon the cleaner, better kept fields gave way to muddier expanses of grass, bound by fences. He realised he had to be careful and his pace slowed. He picked his way through the open spaces, his back and tail low, often sinking his body into the vegetation. He’d already travelled farther than he’d ever been allowed, under his own power, in this cold country at least. He reached the foot of the hills and could see much of the slopes were covered by taller conifers. He found a path used by ponies and followed it, the trail leading to the trees. He started to run, in part to stay warm, the English spring days still too cool for his liking. But he also moved because he had developed that unmistakable sense that he was being followed.

Inside the dark forest, the leopard became confused. The trees were too straight and tall to climb, their branches too thin to rest upon. There was little cover underfoot and the pine needles pricked at his feet. He spotted the tracks of a small boar and considered it for dinner. But then he was startled by the loud wailing of a horn. It was a sound he had not heard before, yet it immediately frightened him. It was a metallic calling, like a long drawn out laugh of a hyena. It was a call to arms, to a pack of something. He moved back to the edge of the dark forest and peered down into the valley he’d traversed. In the distance, he saw three humans, in red coats, riding three large horses.

The red coats looked like those worn by the circus performers. The circus used horses too. But these were different, neat and formal, with saddles upon their backs and riders with small whips in their hands. He heard the horn again, a longer wail drifting across the valley. And then he saw the dogs, hundreds of them, moving as one across the landscape. Even at this distance, he could see these dogs were larger than the fox-terrier owned by Lord Morgan. They had longer legs and ran more easily. Many had their noses to the floor. They were tracking something. The old leopard knew what a hunt looked like. They were tracking him. They were hunting him.

He calculated how long it would take for the dogs to reach him. He had plenty of time. Then he considered his options. To run or hide? He became confused again. Where was the long grass to hide in? Where was the safe tree to climb? His legs and feet felt sore. He knew he had to run, so he turned into the forest and headed for its heart.

As he ran, he tried to switch his mind, to take everything he knew about the chase, and invert it. He was the prey now, where should he go, what should he do? He hadn’t seen the dogs up close, but he knew he couldn’t outrun a horse. As he darted between the trees, he was confident he’d not been seen. So they were tracking his scent, he reasoned. He needed to get to water, and break the trail.

The horn wailed again, louder this time. Adrenaline surged through the leopard’s muscles. He climbed higher, knowing that rivers started on hills, and jumped an old log festering on the forest floor. There! He saw water flowing down between some boulders and he ran to it, leaping into the channel, the cold invigorating his feet. He turned ninety degrees and picked his way down the flow, as it widened into a small stream. He heard the dogs barking now. He lowered his frame again, gaining yard after yard as he headed for a small pond in a dip. He made it to the water. Without making a ripple, he slid into it, submerging himself apart from his eyes and nose. He saw the hounds at the top of the river. They stopped in their tracks as others piled into their rear. The dogs looked about themselves, with some putting their noses to the forest floor once more, following the scent back towards the horses. Soon a rider appeared, pulling hard on the reins. The human too surveyed the forest as his horse stomped into the dirt. He waved his arm and rode back towards the forest’s edge, the dogs following him.

The old leopard watched from the water as the last dog left. He noted how similar they all looked, with black, tan and white coats like Lord Morgan’s terrier. But their hair was short and smooth, like his own. Their ears flopped and their tails incessantly wagged. He knew he hated them and the humans driving them forward. He didn’t like this forest. He decided that tomorrow he would take a cow, and be wasteful.