Duncton Wood (10 page)

T
HERE
were far fewer moles there, and after several visits, getting higher each time, he began to see that he would have to explore in a different way. For one thing, the higher he got, the more he found the mixed oaks and elms and safe undergrowth he had been used to giving way to open beech wood with its disconcerting layer of rustling beech leaves, which gave away every movement if a mole wanted to travel fast. The burrows and tunnels in this borderland had a curious, derelict air that, at first, Bracken found depressing. Tunnel after tunnel would be abandoned and dusty, or taken over by weasels or voles, though only for a short way past their entrances. Or he would find a system that had recently been lived in, for scraps of worms remained, or the entrances weren’t grown over, or he could smell the demarcation marks left by their occupants, faint but discernible. But rarely any moles.

Then there were large areas where no mole seemed to have burrowed, though quite why, he couldn’t work out. When he was there, he began to feel he would never see anymole here at all, and even found himself talking to himself on occasion, almost as if he missed company.

All this meant that he found the slopes wearing and at first could only take a short while of them, scampering back to the westside as quickly as he could – running down communal tunnels where they helped him and over the surface if a tunnel route meant a confrontation he preferred to avoid. It was so tiring placating moles!

May slid into June and he was no longer a pup. Root and Wheatear were nearly adult in size and tried more and more to behave like them, too, which meant they would ignore him totally, attack him, or push him out of the way. If he found worms when they had none, for example, they would simply take them from him, talons raised above his vulnerable snout as a warning that they meant business.

He sensed his time in the burrow was running out, so to try to extend it he exaggerated yet further his juvenile pose, going about in the defensive stance of a timid, placatory mole. Burrhead began to call him “young Bracken,” as a way of differentiating him from Root and Wheatear, who seemed in his terms to be growing up normally. Bracken, he was beginning to think, was in some way backward and hardly worth getting into a lather about any more. He obviously wasn’t going to last long once the summer came and the new generation started its search for territory.

“He won’t stand a chance against this spring’s lot,” Burrhead told Aspen one day at the end of May. “But every litter has its wrongun’s.” Aspen nodded, but she was not so sure. Bracken was a disappointment and yet, well, “He’s not so stupid as he sometimes seems, you know – he knows much more about the system than either of the other two – in fact he knows more than I do.” But this was just a disguise for her true feelings about Bracken, which were those of many a female for the weakest of her litter: compassion mixed with hope that they might turn out better in the. end. And he did like her stories, which was more than she could say for Root and Wheat-ear, for all their stolid, moleworthy qualities.

But she didn’t say any of this to Burrhead because it just wasn’t worth it, and she was losing interest in them all. The litter would be gone soon and they had the summer to get through, when she’d be on her own much more, and she was looking forward to it. Sensing these things. Bracken spent more and more time away from the home burrow and began to consider carefully where he might go when he finally left it. He had no desire to compete with the likes of Root for a place in the westside. He wasn’t crazy I

Nor did he know enough about the north or the east-side yet to make plans in that direction. So increasingly he began to think the slopes were a possibility – they might be worm-scarce but they were also mole-scarce, which was a major attraction. He had seen enough to think he might make a living there, giving himself breathing space to consider what to do next.

With these ideas in his mind, he decided to make a trek to the slopes one day and explore them further, perhaps staying away from his home burrow for a day or two. He slipped away one quiet June morning, when everymole was asleep or preoccupied, and took a mainly surface route up toward the slopes. He didn’t know it, but he was never to live in the westside again.

It took him until late in the morning before he reached his first beech tree, at a point he already knew where he could find some worms. Then he pressed on along what he called the beech-oak borderland until at last he was into new territory. And then on and on eastward, progressing along a contour line for a while, and then up for a bit.

He saw a lot of life – birds, a couple of voles, several squirrels, a possible fox – but no moles. By the early afternoon he was tired and stopped for food. He had never been so far in one day and knew he would be spending the night in a strange burrow, or perhaps one he must make for himself.

In search of worms he found an old, disused tunnel and went down it, snout aquiver, but not a whiff or sign of a mole. So he blocked one end of it to make a temporary burrow and, putting his back against it, crouched facing the entrance above and the continuation of the tunnel beyond. Safe, snug and just the place to crunch the worms he had found. He closed his eyes and settled down, heart thumping from the day’s journey. But he was not asleep, and when there was a scratching at the earth block he had made and a warning vibration along the tunnel wall, he was awake and ready, still as a root. Moles feel safe in their own tunnels and make quite a lot of noise, and this one was no exception. Indeed, he was chatting to himself in a busy kind of way, interspersing it with snatches of a familiar worming song:

Now we dig and we scratch and we wedge and we pull

Now we wedge and we dig and...

Mmm. This shouldn’t have happened, not in my tunnel. Mind you, its a long time since I was here. Too long. I’m hungry. Worms, that’s what I want.

Worms, worms, worms

Lots of lovely worms.

Bracken relaxed when he heard all this, for the mole sounded old and good-humored and unlikely to cause him harm. Still, feeling it is better to be safe than sorry, he took advantage of the noise the mole was making to sneak out quietly onto the surface again to wait and see who would come.

The muttering and humming continued and an occasional heavy breathing of exertion, as the mole burrowed his way through Bracken’s block, until finally a snout appeared at the entrance, sniffing about the warm evening air.

“Somemole’s here,” he said loudly. “I can smell it.” At which the snout disappeared back into the tunnel and there fell a deep silence. Bracken held his breath, waited for several minutes, and finally could stand it no longer. “Hello. I’m here,” he said as cheerfully as he could muster, “a youngster from the westside.” Silence.

“I got lost.” Silence. “I’m very sorry, really I am, but I thought your tunnel was deserted.” Snuffling. Finally the mole spoke out from the dark tunnel.

“It
was
deserted. I’ve not had time to come here for months. It’s merest chance” (at this point the snout poked out of the tunnel again) “that I happened along at this particular moment.”

The mole’s head appeared – the head of the oldest mole Bracken had ever seen. “At least I think it was merest chance. I’m not sure that chance exists any more.”

The mole emerged completely from the entrance and stood on spindly paws peering in Bracken’s direction. “By which I mean that I’m not
any more
sure... if you see what I mean. Haven’t got a worm or two, have you?” he asked abruptly, settling down with slow dignity and not saying another word.

Bracken, half hidden behind a fallen branch, came out a little and crouched down himself. The old mole evidently gave up hope of a worm from Bracken and asked the questions moles traditionally ask of others on their territory: “Who are you and where do you come from?” He asked it in a singsong, almost as if he wasn’t thinking about what it meant or expecting a reply. But he got one, all the same. “I’m Bracken from the westside, exploring.” “Mmm, exploring! Very good.” He dropped his voice a little and in a stage whisper that Bracken thought might be sarcastic, said “Haven’t explored out any of my worms, have you?”

“Well, I...,” Bracken stuttered, because he didn’t like to admit he had done just that, yet didn’t want to tell a lie somehow. “Well, I could find you some worms in no time, I expect,” he offered at last.

The old mole said nothing, but chomped his jaws together appreciatively and started to hum again. Bracken ran off busily to look for worms, pleased without knowing it to be doing something for another mole, even if the impulse was born of the fact that he had stolen some of the old mole’s worms. He rummaged happily under fallen branches and down an old tunnel he had seen, half dug and abandoned. He sensed that the other mole was not aggressive; indeed, he seemed positively friendly, and obviously wanted to have a chat. And that would be nice, thought Bracken: he might know something about the slopes that he wants to tell me. And the Stone.

Soon he had got six or seven worms together, enough for them both. He deposited four by the old mole and, as a mark of respect, bit their heads off so they could not escape, and sat down again. The old mole thanked him and crouched in silence, looking at the worms as if he was pondering something. Then he said:

“Be with us Stone at the start of our feast

Be with us Stone at the close of our meal

Let no mole adown our bodies

That may hurt our sorrowing souls

Oh no mole adown our bodies

That may hurt our sorrowing souls.”

The simple grace was over almost before it began and it so awed Bracken, so filled him with wonder, that he was shaken with silence. He had never heard a prayer before. He had never heard the Stone spoken to as if he were a friend at a mole’s side.

The evening fell about them and they ate their worms in silence, in great peace with each other. When the mole had finished the four worms, which he ate with slow relish, he stopped and cleaned his face and licked his paws.

“That’s
better. I
am
grateful,” he said. “My name’s Hulver, by the way, and if I’m not much mistaken, your father is Burrhead from the westside.”

“Yes, that’s right. How did you know?” asked Bracken.

“He’s an elder, like me,” explained Hulver, “and he’s mentioned you once or twice.” Hulver leaned forward like a fellow conspirator and whispered, “He’s not pleased with your progress. You’re not nasty enough!” Hulver laughed and Bracken decided he rather liked him, but still didn’t know what to say. He was in the presence of an elder he had heard of as the wisest in the system, so what
could
he say? Hulver fell into silence again, snout quivering in the blue evening light, slowly lowering down onto outstretched paws, contemplating the fall of night.

Bracken’s mind was in a whirl – the prayer had left him feeling very strange and, as far as he was concerned, it hung magically in the air about them, making everything beyond it seem dim and unclear. He felt lost in his thoughts, literally lost, for he couldn’t find where among them he actually was. The old mole crouched before him as if he were one of the trees, or a plant growing or the soil, part of the whole thing that seemed around him contained in the prayer. He was finally dragged – that’s what it felt like – out of these thoughts by Hulver, who asked him in a gentle voice, “Why have you come over to the slopes, can you tell me that?” Bracken started to tell him, explaining how he was interested in the system, liked exploring and... and soon he was telling Hulver everything.

Talking on and on into the night, telling Hulver things he hardly knew about himself, complaining bitterly about his life, criticizing Burrhead, saying finally that he hated him, expressing his contempt for Root, telling about Aspen’s stories, admitting his fear about leaving the home burrow to find his own territory. Now and again Hulver would nod encouragingly, but never said more than two or three words or passed a judgment, making Bracken freer to say what he felt.

He was stopped finally by an ominous owl hoot somewhere high above and the sudden realization, as he looked up and saw the shining crescent of a moon dimmed by clouds, that it was late, and getting later. He was tired, and felt he had never talked so much in his life. Hulver yawned, looked about him, and said “Time for the burrow, my lad, time for sleep.”

“Now you are welcome to use this tunnel, though perhaps I should say
continue
to use it. But I’m going down to my burrow, which is a little way off, because it’s so much quieter.” And with that he ran off into the night.

Bracken following his course by sound until he went down an entrance and his sound was lost.

For a while Bracken crouched in the night alone, wondering about Hulver and enjoying the unusual calm and peace he felt. A snatch of the grace Hulver had spoken came back to him and he let its words run through his tired mind like the sound of the breeze in the long grass by the edge of the wood:

Let no mole adown our bodies

That may hurt our sorrowing souls.

He changed the “our” to “my” the second time round, not knowing that Hulver, in his graciousness, had himself modified the words to take account of Bracken’s presence, for it was a prayer he often said for himself over his solitary meals. Bracken couldn’t remember all the words and promised himself that he would ask Hulver to repeat them so he could learn it; then he climbed down into the tunnel, carefully reblocked it again, and fell into a deep sleep.