The Farthing Wood Collection 1 (10 page)

Meanwhile Farthing Wood held its breath. Nervous Squirrel’s agitated cries of ‘S-strangers in the Wood’ were heard more frequently. The tranquillity of the woodland was disturbed regularly by the cold, calculating humans whom Sage Hedgehog had first witnessed. They took a particular interest in the grassland surrounding the Wood, returning to it at intervals, and giving the appearance that they were in their clever way taking its measure.

‘Too close for comfort,’ Jay screamed as he flew overhead. And the Wood’s inhabitants trod warily and quietly until they were left alone again.

Lean Fox said to his vixen, ‘The Wood is uneasy.
Every creature is on tenterhooks. Sickness is rife and men come spying. Things were less fraught when the otters were here.’

‘How can you say that?’ Lean Vixen rounded on him. ‘There was constant friction. At least these men don’t steal our food. We’re of no interest to them at all.’

‘I think you’re mistaken,’ Lean Fox said quietly. ‘If we’re of no interest, why do they continue to return here?’

‘Who knows? Who cares? As long as we can hunt and keep our cubs free from sickness, that’s all we need to concern ourselves about.’

The sickness was spreading, claiming more victims. Quick Weasel and Wily Stoat had died and other animals throughout the Wood were now suffering. For some creatures it became increasingly difficult to know where to hunt and what areas to shun.

Stout Vixen, whose cubs would soon be born, saw her mate arrive from his foraging with nothing.

‘How can you come into our earth carrying nothing?’ she berated him. ‘This is the second occasion. Perhaps I should hunt for myself?’

‘You certainly have the greater skill,’ Stout Fox replied magnanimously. ‘Believe me, I’ve tried everywhere. The rabbits are becoming much more wary and you know I don’t like settling for other prey. It’s particularly risky with some of them carrying disease.’

‘I understand your motives,’ the vixen said. ‘But what are we to do? If you can no longer catch a rabbit, then you must look elsewhere.’

‘I’ve done so,’ he replied. ‘Would you want me to bring you beetles and moths?’

‘Well, I must eat,’ Stout Vixen said. ‘Fasting at a time like this is unacceptable.’ She stood up. ‘Is the Wood quiet?’

‘Quiet and still.’

‘I’ll find something, I’ve no doubt,’ she declared with confidence.

Stout Fox followed her through the exit hole. A shower of rain pattered through the leafy trees.

‘I’ll go alone,’ Stout Vixen told him. ‘Perhaps I’ll find something.’

Stout Fox said admiringly, ‘If anyone can,
you
will do so.’

Stout Vixen trotted beneath the trees towards the stream. She had a feeling that some kind of quarry might be sheltering there, enjoying a period of prosperity in the otters’ absence. ‘How many have hunted here’ she wondered to herself, ‘since those animals left?’ Almost at once she flushed a water-vole from the bank. It plopped into the water, but the vixen’s eager jaws snatched it and crushed it in one swift lunge.

‘There are more of you around somewhere,’ she said after she had eaten. She paddled into the stream, nosing her way amongst the reeds. A pair of coots scuttled out of her reach, calling in alarm and leaving their neat nest exposed with four unhatched eggs just waiting to be devoured.

‘Haven’t tasted eggs in an age,’ Stout Vixen murmured to herself. She cracked one open with her strong teeth and licked at the succulent contents. She chuckled to herself. ‘It doesn’t seem right, all this for me while my mate goes hungry.’ She smacked her lips and broke another egg. ‘They really are delicious.’ When there was only one left, her conscience smote her. ‘I’ll carry this back for the fox,’ she murmured.
‘He’s faithfully tried his best on my behalf.’ She picked it up carefully and set off.

On the edge of the woodland she surprised a bank vole. Instinct got the better of her. She dropped the egg, which broke, and pursued the rodent. She was keen to prove to herself she had lost none of her speed. She cornered the vole, killed it, then checked herself.

‘Do I eat it?’ she wondered. She sniffed at the body. ‘Hm. Nothing wrong with
that
. Can’t afford to waste anything.’ She gobbled it down, then noticed the broken egg. ‘Ah well, as I said …’

‘
Stop
!’

She turned, startled. Stout Fox, who had been searching for her, had seen the kill and was anxious no vole should be eaten in that quarter.

‘You?’ Stout Vixen said. ‘Why did you cry out? It’s only an egg.’

‘You can eat that and welcome to it. Where’s your kill?’

Stout Vixen was puzzled. ‘Kill?’

‘The vole!’

‘You saw me? Was I fast?’

‘Yes, as fast as ever. Where
is
it?’

‘Well, I’ve eaten it, of course.’

Stout Fox slumped. ‘How could you? After all I’ve said? I’ve been so careful, taken such pains …’

‘All right, all right,’ she told him, but now a little worried. ‘There was nothing wrong with it. It smelt good.’

‘Smelt?’ he repeated faintly. ‘How on earth did you think it would smell? You can’t tell by their odour.’

Stout Vixen gaped. Her stomach lurched. ‘It looked healthy.’

‘How can we be sure?’ Stout Fox demanded. ‘Wouldn’t it be better to avoid this kind of prey until we know it’s safe?’

The vixen felt some relief. ‘So you’re not sure either,’ she retorted. ‘Why do you try to scare me?’

‘I don’t wish to. I’m only concerned for your well-being. And for your litter.’

Stout Vixen softened. ‘You’re a good partner. I’ve grown used to you and I like your company. Look – I was carrying this egg for you. Won’t you try it?’

‘Of course I’ll try it,’ Stout Fox grunted. ‘I’ve eaten nothing at all!’ He quickly demolished the egg’s contents. ‘Are there more?’ He looked at her with hungry eyes.

‘Er – no. I don’t think so,’ the vixen answered evasively. ‘Are you going to hunt again?’

‘I’ll see what I can pick up for myself.’

‘Good. I shall return to the den. And I feel perfectly all right, so don’t vex yourself about that vole.’

Far away from Farthing Wood, Sleek Otter was feeling very alone. From the drainage ditch she had travelled swiftly and always directly away from the place where she had dived for cover from the humans. She knew that wherever she found to rest at the end of that day, for the first time she would have no company. It was a chilling thought, but she had made her choice and there was no going back.

The dark hours were kind to her. There were no further alarms. When daylight came she looked around in amazement. The entire countryside seemed to have been swallowed up by forbidding patterns of brick, stone, metal and asphalt. These spread before her in a bewildering mosaic which puzzled and frightened
her. Behind her was the countryside through which she had just run. She knew she had to go forward, but where? And how?

‘This can be no home,’ she acknowledged to herself. ‘I can’t hide in there.’ A sudden noise made her jump. An aeroplane droned across the sky, high up, like a monstrous silver bee. A starling flitted over the house-tops and perched on a television aerial. Sleek Otter was impressed by the bird’s adaptibility. ‘Perhaps there is some shelter somewhere for me after all,’ she sighed.

She crossed an empty road and padded along a pavement, looking for an opening between the looming buildings. A cat sitting on a wall arched its back and hissed at the strange beast. The cat was just as strange to the otter and she scampered away. In the distance a milk-float approached with a rattle of milk-crates and clinking of bottles. Sleek Otter was bombarded by new sounds and crushed by an unyielding environment. There were no trees, no streams, no rushes, no reeds. And no food. The town was a nightmare for a vulnerable, solitary and ravenous wild creature.

‘I’ve no chance here,’ Sleek Otter told herself. ‘I might as well have been taken by the humans.’ Then suddenly she saw a gap. As the milkman came nearer she bolted down an alley between two blocks of flats. There was no greenery, no plant growth to hide in. It was a cul de sac, leading to a row of garages. Sleek Otter found she was in a dead end. One garage, however, had been opened. The door had been pushed up and the garage’s dark interior seemed her only refuge. She ran inside. It was dusty and dry, but in one corner a clutter of cartons offered some protection. She tried
to hide herself amongst them and, thoroughly weary, fell asleep.

Later in the morning there was much activity. Many people were collecting their cars to drive to work or to take children to school. Sleek Otter awoke to the din of revving engines, slamming doors and loud human voices. She dared not move. Yet as car after car rumbled past her place of concealment, she caught the acrid smell of petrol fumes which steadily threatened to choke her. At last she couldn’t remain still. She dashed from the garage, almost colliding with some schoolchildren.

‘Look, Daddy! What’s that? It’s … it’s …’

‘An otter!’ cried the father. ‘How on earth …?’

The children rushed at the animal, eager to save it from danger. But Sleek Otter slipped past them and, in sheer terror, bolted for the alley. As she neared it a car, reversing from the first garage in the block, hit her and rolled backwards over her. The children screamed out but it was too late. Their father grabbed them as they tried to run forward.

‘It’s no good, children. We can’t do anything,’ he told them regretfully. ‘Poor creature. Wherever could it have come from? It must have been someone’s pet.’

The driver of the vehicle had felt a bump and got out to investigate. It was a young woman who was really distressed by what she found.

‘Oh no, not another one,’ she wailed. ‘They seem to be bent on destroying themselves.’

The father asked her to explain.

‘Haven’t you heard? There has been a spate of accidents recently involving otters. They’ve been run over, drowned, killed by dogs. It’s all very strange and very upsetting. Such lovely animals too …’

‘How sad,’ the man commented. ‘They must be rarities in these parts.’

Stout Vixen was certain she had suffered no ill effects from eating the vole. She felt no different.

‘You were lucky,’ her mate told her.

‘No, I don’t think so. Probably all the voles with disease have perished or been accounted for by now.’

‘Maybe. But don’t forget – it only takes one.’

Stout Vixen thought her mate was being over-cautious. She determined that, if he couldn’t feed her properly in these last crucial days, she would supplement her diet from the banned area where now no fox nor other predator hunted. ‘But I shan’t tell him,’ she chuckled to herself. ‘He gets in such a stew about it.’

Farthing Wood and all it represented was drawing Lame Otter and Long-Whiskers steadily towards it. They had eaten well by the pond and were in good spirits as they continued homewards.

‘Do you think we can reach our stream easily?’ Long-Whiskers asked her companion who now, also, had become her mate. ‘Or will we always be in danger?’

‘We must take every precaution,’ the dog otter
replied. ‘And, regretfully, my company will make the journey slower and seem longer than it would be if you were on your own.’

‘But I wouldn’t be making it on my own,’ she assured him gently.

‘Well then, we are content.’ Lame Otter limped by her side. He tried not to think about what would happen to the other if one of them met with an accident. ‘We must aim for the Metal Ponds where we caught all those fish. If we find our way there without trouble, we should be over the worst.’

‘Do you ever think about the foxes?’ Long-Whiskers asked.

‘Sometimes. I have cause enough,’ Lame Otter answered, remembering the fight that had disabled him.

‘Perhaps if we steal into our holt by the stream quietly, no-one will know we’re there.’

‘Did you have a den?’

‘Yes. Where I was born.’

‘Are you attached to it?’

‘I suppose so. Did you have a different plan?’

‘No. I shall be happy where you’re happy. And your comfort must be paramount.’

‘Thank you. My holt is a snug home for cubs.’

They fell silent, full of thoughts of a new generation of Farthing Wood otters. They didn’t reach the trout farm that night. Lame Otter’s leg was painful and Long-Whiskers persuaded him to rest. They took shelter in a rabbit burrow, intending to move on the next night. The rabbits panicked as the otters entered the warren. Most of them took flight, but Long-Whiskers pounced on a youngster who hesitated, and she and her mate enjoyed a feast.

‘Will we ever eat fish again?’ Long-Whiskers sighed.

The same thought had occurred to Lame Otter. But he said, ‘As long as we eat. That’s all we can hope for at present.’

They slept during the daylight hours and at dusk the next day, fully refreshed, they set off again. Lame Otter’s spirits were buoyant. ‘You know, I’ve had a feeling of confidence since we made our decision,’ he told his companion. ‘I’m sure everything is going to work out for us. It’s as though we have earned our right to survive because we’re the last Farthing Wood otters. We
have
to do so for the sake of the rest of them.’

Long-Whiskers was encouraged by his words. Neither of them had spoken of Sleek Otter. Now Long-Whiskers said, ‘You really believe we are the last now?’