Tales from Watership Down (24 page)

On the following morning Bigwig unexpectedly came into the burrow, and at once recoiled from Stonecrop’s smell.

“Frith on a hrududu! Hazel,” he said, “I’d no idea it would be so strong. How can you stand it?”

“I hope you’ve come to give me some advice,” said
Hazel, who felt really glad to see him. “I’ve missed you this last day or two.”

“Well, I
will
give you some advice,” answered Bigwig, “but you won’t like it. Hazel-rah, the plain truth is that you can’t hope to get this rabbit accepted in the warren. It’s quite out of the question. Our rabbits simply won’t have him, not for any inducement you can offer. Peerton and his friends have already seen to that. But even without Peerton, I don’t believe they’d ever have accepted him. I mean, it’s flying in the face of Nature, Hazel. I don’t think El-ahrairah himself could get him accepted—and that’s assuming he wanted to, which I don’t believe he would. A rabbit who smells of Man has got to be killed, and that’s been the way of it everywhere, time out of mind.”

Hazel said nothing, and after a pause Bigwig went on: “But I’m afraid it’s more serious than that, Hazel. The plain truth is that your position as Chief Rabbit is in real danger. Your authority’s leaking away drop by drop as long as they don’t see you, as long as they know you’re holed up here with this accursed rabbit. Whatever you’re up to, you’ve got to drop it, or else you’ll be in bad trouble—worse than Flyairth, I reckon. You simply can’t afford to go on like this. For all our sakes, for the sake of the whole warren, give it up, now!”

Hazel still remained silent, and it was Fiver who spoke next.

“I’ll tell you the thing to do, Hazel. Take Stonecrop to the new warren and ask Groundsel to have him. That’s the answer, take it from me.”

“But that’s just plain stupid, Fiver,” said Bigwig impatiently. “Groundsel’s rabbits won’t have him any more than our rabbits here.”

“Yes, they will,” answered Fiver calmly.

“Why should they? What makes you think so?”

“I don’t know,” said Fiver. “All I know for a certainty is that if Stonecrop’s taken to Groundsel’s warren he’ll be all right. I haven’t been able to see any more.”

“Oh!” sneered Bigwig. “You’ve had a vision, I suppose, have you?”

Hazel spoke. “Wait a moment, Bigwig. Haven’t you learned yet to trust Fiver? Wasn’t he right about Cowslip’s warren and the snares? About our raid on the farm? And about the idea that he put into my head of leading the dog onto the Efrafans? Vervain too—he defeated him without striking a blow. Fiver, you’re sure about this, are you?”

“Yes, I’m sure enough that this is the thing to do, Hazel,” answered Fiver. “I can’t see how it’ll turn out; something violent, it feels like. But it’s what we must do, all right.”

“That’s good enough for me,” said Hazel. “We’ll start just before first light tomorrow—before any other rabbits are about. Bigwig, you’ll come, won’t you? I’d feel much better if I had you with us.”

Bigwig paused for some little time. At length, rather hesitantly, he said, “All right, I will. And Frith help you, Fiver, if you’re wrong.”

“Hyzenthlay will stay here and tell them tomorrow
that we’ve gone,” said Hazel. “I don’t know when we’ll be back, of course, but she’ll be Chief Rabbit on her own until we do.”

The three of them set off the next morning and by sunrise had already left Watership Down well behind them. Their progress soon grew slower, however, for Stonecrop, despite his size and strength, was quite unused to going any distance, and they were obliged to halt more and more frequently to let him rest. Bigwig was very patient and encouraged him in the most friendly way, but Hazel, who of course knew Bigwig through and through, could sense that he was not easy about the length of time that they were spending in the open, especially with a totally inexperienced rabbit who knew so little about ordinary rabbit ways and the innumerable small signals—mostly unconscious—with which rabbits communicate with one another on a journey.

As they were resting under a thick thornbush in the heat of the day, Stonecrop said to Bigwig, “I’m surprised that you both seem to be so much afraid of these elil, as you call them.”

“Never met any, have you?” replied Bigwig.

“No, but if I do I won’t run away; I’ll fight. I’ll fight any creature that tries to kill me.”

“You’ve got a lot to learn,” said Bigwig. “Some elil you can’t fight; they’re simply too much for any rabbit. Either you have to hide or else to run. I wouldn’t like to see you throw your life away for nothing.”

“Well, I don’t like the idea of running away from an
enemy,” said Stonecrop. “But of course I don’t want to argue with you, when you’re going to so much trouble to help me.”

“You’ll get on much better if you simply accept my advice,” said Bigwig. “For the time being, anyway. But if you’re rested enough now, we’d better be getting on. We’ve still got quite a long way to go.”

During the afternoon they were only able to go even more slowly, and it was early evening before they drew near to Groundsel’s warren. As they came within sight of it, both Hazel and Bigwig stopped sharply and sat up on their hind legs in alarm.

“There’s something wrong,” said Hazel.

“Yes, and badly wrong too!” exclaimed Bigwig. “What on earth can be happening? Look, it’s as though they were all running for their lives.”

As he spoke, they could see crowds of rabbits precipitately jumping from the holes in the bank and running away in all directions, plainly with no thought but escape. Hazel and Bigwig stared aghast.

“Look, there’s Groundsel himself, running like the rest,” said Hazel.

“I’ll stop him,” said Bigwig. “We’ve got to get to the bottom of this.”

Running to their left, he got in front of Groundsel, who seemed unable even to see him but blundered straight into him and almost knocked him down. Bigwig jumped on him and pinned him to the ground.

“What is it, Groundsel?” asked Hazel. “Whatever’s the matter?”

“Let me go, let me go!” squealed Groundsel. “Get off me, let me go!”

“Not until you’ve told us what the trouble is,” said Hazel. “Have you all gone mad? Come on, talk to us.”

“The weasels!” panted Groundsel. “Can’t you see them? They’re hunting through the warren. Let me go, damn you!”

Hazel and Bigwig stared down at the bank and its rabbit holes. There, sure enough, they could see the weasels—more than four in number—who were plainly hunting in a pack, from one end of the warren to the other. It was an appalling sight. They went racing from hole to hole and along the side of the bank, seemingly intensely excited. Like ants, they ran a little way very swiftly, then stopped and searched from side to side, before rejoining their companions to go on again in a straight line. The impression they gave was horribly systematic. Here and there one would thrust out its reddish head for a moment from a hole, then withdraw it and reappear from another. As they went they cried to one another in short, snappy sounds.

Hazel and Bigwig, affected by the panic no less than the other rabbits, were turning to run, when suddenly Stonecrop thrust them aside.

“I’m not afraid!” he cried. “I’m not afraid of those dirty little beasts, those elil or whatever you call them. Come on, follow me!”

With that he went forward, straight for the bank.

“Stonecrop, come back!” cried Bigwig. “Come back—they’ll kill you!”

“I’ll be damned if they will,” answered Stonecrop, and broke into a run which took him into the very midst of the weasels on the bank.

Hazel saw them turn to pull him down. But what was this? The two nearest to him suddenly recoiled, sniffing, and squeaking to the others in fear. Then all of them took up the squeaking in their nasty, shrill little voices: “Man! Man! Run! Man!”

All together they tumbled down the bank, picked themselves up at the foot and fled in a terrified gaggle into the copse beyond.

“You see?” said Stonecrop, as Hazel and Bigwig, still trembling, rejoined him at the foot of the bank. “Horrible little creatures! I’d soon have put paid to a few of them if they hadn’t all run away.”

Slowly, and one by one, the other rabbits returned, staring at Stonecrop as though at some supernatural being. Finally Groundsel returned, together with three or four of his Owsla, all of whom were badly shaken.

“I
saw
you!” said one of them to Stonecrop. “I
saw
you with my own eyes, chasing the weasels away! I still can’t believe what I saw!”

“Nothing to it,” replied Stonecrop. “Anyone could have done it. It’s just a matter of standing up to them, that’s all.”

“No,” said Hazel, giving Groundsel the prescribed
salute of one Chief Rabbit to another, “not quite all. It strikes me we turned up just in time. Groundsel-rah, may I explain who this rabbit is and how Bigwig and I come to be here with him?”

By this time a few more of the Owsla had come back, and Hazel, sitting down among them, told them everything about Stonecrop, about the trouble at Watership Down and about Fiver’s advice that they should bring him here and ask Groundsel to let him join.

“Let him join?” said Groundsel, when Hazel had finished. “Let you join?” he said, turning to Stonecrop. “You’ve saved the whole warren! You can stay for many, many years if you like! You can have your own personal burrow and choose any doe you fancy! And in return, all I ask is that you walk slowly round all the runs in the warren every morning and evening, to see they smell right.”

Hazel and Bigwig stayed a few days, as Groundsel’s guests. The weather remained perfect, and they had the satisfaction of seeing Stonecrop not only accepted but treated almost as a celebrity by the other rabbits.

“So Fiver was right,” said Bigwig one evening, as they were at silflay under a crimson sky.

“He’s always right,” replied Hazel. “It’s just as well for us, isn’t it?”

The weather remained fine, and Groundsel’s rabbits, having more or less got over the bad shock of the weasels’ attack, made good progress with their warren, which came to be known by the name of Vleflain. A good number, both from Watership and from Efrafa, were pregnant does, whose natural instinct is to dig burrows. The males busied themselves chiefly with internal runs linking together the various parts of the warren. Any human being who has gone ferreting in an old warren will know to what almost incredible distances internal runs can extend. However, the founders of Vleflain were not disturbed by ferrets or any other mustelidae, and it looked as though Groundsel’s anxiety about nearby stoats had been unjustified.

Hazel did not trouble himself to make another journey to Vleflain but rested content with now-and-then reports from Kehaar that all was going well. He had never himself
met Avens, the leader of the Efrafan party, but saw no reason to doubt Groundsel’s opinion that he was well up to the job.

Hazel’s veterans, who felt it a great improvement that numbers in the Watership warren had been reduced to a comfortable level, shared his view. “It’s a case of ‘no news is good news,’ Hazel-rah,” said Bigwig. “If they’d met with any kind of danger or trouble, they’d have let us know quick enough. Two or three more of our rabbits here have asked me whether they can go and join them. I ought really to have sent and asked Groundsel first, but I was sure it would be all right, and I just told them to ask Kehaar to show them the way.”

Summer was well advanced when, one fine evening, with everyone at silflay, no less a rabbit than Buckthorn turned up, with a message from Groundsel begging Hazel to come and advise him as soon as he could.

“Why? Is there trouble?” asked Hazel.

“Well, not exactly trouble,” replied Buckthorn. “At least, you could call it trouble, in a manner of speaking. We’re very worried about it, Hazel-rah. But I promised Groundsel that I’d leave it to him to tell you about it when you came. He said that if you needed persuading, I could tell you that it involved Efrafa.”

“Efrafa? Oh, confound it all!” said Hazel. “I thought we’d settled all that long ago. Well, I suppose Fiver and I had better go tomorrow, if the weather stays fine. If you don’t fancy making the journey back so soon, why don’t you
stay in my burrow for a few days, see some old friends, and go back when you’re ready? By the way,” he added, “why have I got to go down there? Why can’t Groundsel come up here, if he wants to see me?”

“Well, he’s arranging a meeting,” replied Buckthorn, “and I rather think Captain Campion’s coming.”

“Campion? Oh, great Frith, it must be something really awkward,” said Hazel. “Wherever
he
is, there’s trouble, or there always used to be. I’ve learned that, all right.”

He and Fiver set out for Vleflain the following morning, with protection, from time to time, from Kehaar. They arrived late in the afternoon and found Groundsel almost too effusively glad to welcome them. “Oh, we’ll be all right now you two are here,” he said. “Come and have a good rest in the sun and tell me all about friends back at home. How’s that wretched Sandwort getting on? Why don’t you send him along to us? The change’d do him good.”

“He’d never get here in his present state,” said Fiver.

“It’ll be quite a long time before he’s recovered. A lot of rabbits wouldn’t have survived what he went through.”

“Let’s have a run round your warren,” said Hazel. “I’d like to see what you’ve all made of it. You’re all comfortable, I hope?”

“Oh, very,” replied Groundsel. “Plenty of room here, you know, and that makes a lot of difference. I’ve even taken one or two more from Efrafa—friends I knew last year, when I was an Efrafan myself. As you’d expect, they say it’s much better there without Woundwort.”

Hazel and Fiver slept with Groundsel in his burrow and were woken early next morning by a young rabbit bringing a message. “Captain Campion’s here, Groundsel-rah,” he said, “and he says he’s ready to talk whenever you like.”

“Where’d you get that ‘Captain’ from?” snapped Groundsel. “He’s ‘Campion-rah’ to you, don’t you know that?”