LITMIR.BIZ

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seriousness. ‘Leaving aside the threat of our extermination, if we don’t, in the next couple of days, find a safe, secluded place where we can all go to drink, we’re going to find ourselves in the worst kind of distress.’ He coughed huskily, already feeling his throat to be unusually dry. ‘This is why I’ve asked all of you to join me tonight. The greater the gathering, the better the chance we have of finding a solution to end our immediate danger. So I entreat you all: don’t be afraid to speak up. Size and strength have no bearing on anyone’s importance at an Assembly. The only important fact is that all of us live in Farthing Wood, and so we all need each other’s help.’

      The smaller animals seemed to receive some encouragement from Badger’s remarks, and began to murmur to each other and shake their heads in bewilderment. But none of them seemed to have any definite ideas.

      Badger looked at Tawny Owl, and then at Fox, but they were both scanning the circle of faces to see who was going to be the first to make a suggestion.

      ‘Surely you birds can help us?’ prompted Weasel. ‘You cover a wider stretch of country than we ground dwellers. Can any of you say where the nearest water is to be found outside our boundaries?’

      Pheasant’s dowdy mate shifted uncomfortably, as she felt many pairs of eyes turning towards her. ‘Say something, Pheasant,’ she whispered to him.

      ‘My mate and I don’t really venture outside the wood,’ he said hurriedly. ‘Being game birds, there is always the danger of being shot at.’ He thrust out his gaudy breast. ‘I’m told we’re considered to be a great culinary delicacy by all well-bred humans,’ he added, almost smugly.

      ‘Kestrel, can you offer a more worthwhile piece of information?’ Badger enquired, directing a withering glance at Pheasant. ‘Of all the birds present, you spend more time than any outside the wood.’

      Kestrel stopped preening and looked up with his habitual piercing glare. ‘Yes, I can,’ he said evenly. ‘But I doubt if it will be of any real use. There’s a sort of marshy pond on the enclosed army land on the other side of the trunk road. I haven’t hunted over there for some weeks – it’s never very rewarding at the best of times – and for all I know that, too, could have dried up. Apart from that, the most secluded expanse of water is a goldfish pond in a garden near the old church.’

      ‘But that’s in the old village, well over a mile away!’ exclaimed Badger. ‘Is there nowhere else?’

      ‘Oh yes,’ Kestrel replied without concern. ‘There’s a swimming-pool in one of the gardens on the new estate.’

      ‘How close?’

      ‘I suppose, for you, about fifteen minutes’ travelling.’

      ‘There’d be no cover: no cover at all,’ Fox warned.

      ‘I know,’ Badger answered worriedly. ‘But it’s nearer. The smaller animals could never walk as far as the church and then back again, all in one night.’

      ‘We could try!’ piped up one of the fieldmice.

      ‘Of course you could, and you would be very brave to do so,’ said Badger kindly. ‘But that would only be one journey. If this drought continues we’ll all have to make several journeys to drink what we need.’

      ‘The only suggestion I can make,’ said Hare, ‘is for the larger animals to carry the smaller – as many as we can manage.’

      ‘Yesss,’ drawled Adder. ‘I could carry several little mice and voles in my jaws, and I should be so gentle, they wouldn’t feel a thing.’ His tongue flickered excitedly. ‘I should so enjoy carrying the plump ones,’ he went on dreamily. ‘And Owl could manage a young rabbit or two in his talons, couldn’t you, Owl?’

      ‘You’re not looking at the situation in at all the right frame of mind, Adder,’ admonished Badger, looking with some sympathy at the smaller animals, who were huddling together as far away from Adder as they could manage without actually bolting into the tunnel. ‘You’re merely thinking, as usual,’ he went on, ‘of a way in which you can benefit personally from it. I know what you’re thinking, and it won’t do. It won’t do at all. We’re a community, facing a dangerous crisis. You know the Oath.’

      ‘Just a suggestion,’ hissed Adder, with a scarcely disguised leer. He was quite undismayed by the effect his words had had on the fieldmice and voles.

      ‘Now calm down, mice,’ soothed Badger. ‘Calm down, rabbits. You’ll come to no harm in my set.’

      When the Assembly appeared to be more relaxed again, one of the squirrels said, ‘Couldn’t we dig for water?’

      Badger looked towards Mole. The latter shook his black velvet head. ‘No, I don’t think it’s really possible,’ he said. ‘We’d only be wasting our energy, I’m afraid.’

      There was silence then, while every animal cudgelled his brains for a way out of the difficulty. The seconds ticked past.

      Suddenly, a voice was heard calling from the passage outside. ‘Hallo! Who’s there? Who’s there?’

      Weasel ran to the tunnel. ‘I can see something moving,’ he said. Then he called out, ‘This is Weasel! The other animals are here, too . . . Good Heavens, it’s Toad!’ he exclaimed.

      ‘I’ve been looking all over the place for everyone,’ said the newcomer, as he stumbled into the Chamber. ‘I’ve been so worried: I thought you’d all deserted the wood. Then I heard voices.’ He sat down to regain his breath. ‘And I noticed the lights.’

      ‘Toad, whatever happened to you?’ Badger cried, as all the animals gathered round him. ‘We’d given you up for lost. Wherever have you been? We haven’t seen you since last spring. And you’re so thin! My dear chap, tell us what has happened.’

      ‘I . . . I’ve been on a long journey,’ Toad said. ‘I’ll tell you all about it when I’ve got my breath back.’

      ‘Have you had anything to eat recently?’ Badger asked with concern.

      ‘Oh yes – I’m not hungry,’ he replied. ‘Just tired.’

      The heaving of his speckled chest gradually quietened as he recovered from his exertions. The other animals waited patiently for him to begin. He looked wearily round his audience.

      ‘I was captured, you know,’ he explained. ‘It happened last spring, at the pond. They . . . they took me a long way away – oh! miles away! I thought I would never see any of you again.’

      He paused, and some of the animals made soothing, sympathetic noises.

      ‘Eventually, though, I managed to escape,’ Toad went on. ‘I was lucky. Of course, I knew I had to make my way back here – to the pond where I was born. So I started out that very day. And ever since, except during the winter months, I’ve managed to get a little nearer: little by little, mile by mile, covering as much ground as I was able to each day.’

      Fox looked at Badger, and Badger nodded sadly.

      ‘Toad, old fellow, I . . . I’m afraid there’s bad news for you,’ Fox said with difficulty. ‘Very bad news.’

      Toad looked up quickly. ‘What . . . what is it?’ he faltered.

      ‘Your pond has gone. They’ve filled it in!’

      3

      Toad’s story

      Toad looked at Fox with an expression of disbelieving horror. ‘But . . . but . . . they couldn’t!’ he whispered. ‘I was born there. My parents were born there . . . and all my relatives, and acquaintances. And every spring we have a reunion. Toads all around leave their land homes and make for their birthplace. They couldn’t take that away from us!’ He looked pathetically from one sad face to another, almost compelling someone to deny this awful piece of information; but he received no answer.

      ‘Filled

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