The Willows in Winter (8 page)

“You weasels and stoats continue the search,”
Water Rat ordered, “and report to Mole’s Nephew what you find. Mr Badger and I
shall go to Toad Hall where —”

“—
where
,” said the
Badger very grimly indeed, “we shall requisition this — this
thing
of
Toad’s, and put it to proper use.

There was no more need of words or orders, for
the weasels and stoats were very subdued by what they had seen and the thought
that wise Mr Badger and bold Mr Rat might soon be part of it. ‘Without a
backward glance, the two determined animals set off resolutely for Toad Hall.

IV

Up and Away

Much as Toad revelled in speed, power and control, there was one thing
he liked even more: the opportunity to show off all three at once to his
friends. The more awe-struck, admiring, and amazed they were the better he
liked it, for though he never doubted that he was a clever Toad, he liked to
remind those who knew him how very clever he was.

It had therefore added considerably to the
excitements and pleasures of his first flight that fateful morning that as he
roared along a few feet above the river, at an ever increasing speed, who
should he see below him, and watching with what he imagined was the requisite
awe, envy and admiration in their eyes, but the Badger, the Water Rat, Mole’s
Nephew, and an assorted company of weasels and stoats.

As if this was not enough, his pride ballooned
even more when, moments after waving so regally to his earth-bound friends, he
saw the Otter and a large collection of rabbits on the other bank. The rabbits,
who
scattered in a satisfying way in all directions,
were of little account, but Otter’s face was the very picture of open-mouthed
amazement. This was most gratifying, and encouraged Toad to give him an extra
wave for good measure, before dismissing all else from his mind but the one
thing that really mattered, which was flying through the air as fast and loudly
as his flying machine would take him.

Or, more accurately, as his
pilot
would take him, Mr Toad having found it necessary, for this first flight at
least, to allow someone else to take the controls.
Yet, despite this, as the machine
roared up into the sky, leaving his friends so very far behind, Mr Toad could
allow himself to settle back and contemplate with pleasure the cunning and
stratagems that had so dramatically transformed his dull and trammelled life
into one that at last promised to be worthwhile once again.

The recent years had not been pleasant ones for
Toad, ever since, in fact, his infatuation with a motor-car (reasonable), the
subsequent trial for theft (grossly unfair), the long sentence in gaol
(horrible), and his escape (brilliant), after which the Badger and the others
had allowed him to keep his stolen liberty only on certain strict conditions,
the essence of which came to this: that he must be forever more be a Good Toad.

In the long and irksome years since then he had
lived quietly on his estate, and been kind and generous to those beneath him,
almost to a fault. Nothing had been too much trouble for this new and good
Toad, this reformed Toad, if it helped others and — well —
and lulled all
those around him, and especially those he was lucky enough to call his trusted
friends, into the false belief that his old ways were done, and he was
genuinely reformed!

There had been times when he had believed it
himself, for knowing Toad as they did, and being well aware of the silent
sacrifices and unspoken sufferings Toad must have endured to remain as sober
and good as he had for so long, his friends had been generous in their
continuing praise and flattery.

But in the dark of the night, when an animal
might be permitted the odd dream or two, Toad had imagined all the exciting
things he might do if only he did not need always to be good. Yes, he had
dreamed, and he had longed, and he had yearned, for all those things he had
given up — but even more for all those things he had never had time to try, or
even known about to try, before — before he had become Good.

He might still have been good, and have ever
continued to be so, had he not been sitting idly on his lawn one balmy day the
previous autumn, expanding on his favourite theme, which was himself, to the
Nephew.

Mole had sent to him for some education in the
better things of life, when, suddenly, far off in the eastern sky but
approaching with appealing speed, he had heard the drone of a machine.

“‘What’s that?” he had said aloud, his voice
tremulous with anticipation, his eyes widening even as he felt his pulse
quicken.

“Can it be what I think it is?” he muttered,
screwing up his eyes against the pale sky.

“Is it coming over here?” he whispered, pacing
back and forth and staring at the speck that grew bigger and louder by the
moment.

It was and it did: a red and yellow flying
machine which flew straight over the very lawn on which, but moments before, he
had been frittering his dull and fettered life away. It came, it flew, it
conquered; and it left in its noisy wake those firm resolutions to be good with
which he had wrestled so successfully for so long, all broken and disregarded.

“I must! I shall! I need! I long!” he had
cried, dancing about and waving his hands in exultation after the infernal
machine which had come from nowhere to titillate and tease him and leave him
knowing that he would be forever dissatisfied till he had one of his very own.

“You must what?” asked Mole’s Nephew, not
understanding at all the change that had come over the great Mr Toad, nor being
old or wise enough — as the Mole himself would have been — to see its dreadful
significance.

“What?!” said Toad.
“You
still here?
I had forgotten you were —” and realising immediately the
danger he was in, he feigned something like a fainting fit, and muttered, “What
must I do? I must not! I shall not! I need not! No, no, you young and
impressionable mole, seek not what you cannot have. Be content with the simple
blessings that life brings. I long for nothing, nothing at all, but peace and
quiet, and — and such
good
things —”

Toad had then subsided into his chair and
pretended the very opposite of what he felt and intended, for he knew it would
do him no good if Mole’s Nephew guessed what was in his mind. He relieved
himself of the youngster as soon as he could — claiming to feel ill, which was
something near the truth, for he was ill with desire and yearning.

From that day Toad had begun to plot to acquire
his own flying machine: first summoning those who knew about such things to
Toad Hall and then sneaking away saying he must visit an ageing relative when,
in fact, he went to the most exciting event of his life: an air show which
concluded with an air race. He returned addicted, and began to plot more
feverishly still, for he knew it would be no good simply to acquire a machine
and start flying it. No, he must plan!

Plan he had, brilliantly, as he perceived it.
His aged relative, now in terminal though lengthy decline, afforded him plenty
of excuse to visit that aerodrome whereon the machine he had set his heart upon
awaited him. There he had his first ecstatic flights as a passenger, and then,
O bliss!, his first lessons, till finally, though not yet competent to fly,
Toad acquired the wondrous machine, and arranged for it to be delivered to Toad
Hall in the depth of winter, when he knew that the animals along the river
would be in their miserable hovels and humble homes, and not interested in
prying into his exciting business.

The machine had arrived in parts, to be
assembled by a pilot-mechanic behind specially erected and camouflaged
hessian
baffles and shields in the greatest secrecy
Here
the engine had been fired, Toad’s pleasure in its
glorious noise marred only slightly by the possibility that the Badger and the
others would hear it. But they seemed not to have done, and his plans
progressed unimpeded by their interference.

He came upon his first real set-back when he
discovered that the wretched pilot-mechanic (as he now seemed to Toad)
resolutely and adamantly refused to allow him to fly the machine himself till
he had had more lessons.

“I order you to!” Toad said finally, after a
variety of pleas and threats.

“It would be more than my life is worth, Mr
Toad,
and yours as well, to let you,” was the reply.

“But — but — the
whole
point of having
it is that I, Toad of Toad Hall, should fly it and be seen to be flying it,”
spluttered the exasperated Toad.

“I appreciate that,” said the pilot, who had
dealt before with other customers like Toad who had more money than sense, and
knew just the right combination of firmness and flattery that was required, “I
understand
that, Your Honour, but —”

Toad softened just a little, for he enjoyed
very much being called “Your Honour”, though his brow began to furrow almost
immediately when he reflected that “Your Honour” was generally used for Judges,
and they were a species whose path he had crossed before, and wished never to
cross again.

“But can’t you make an exception’ purred Toad,
“seeing as I have very considerable experience with high-velocity motor-cars
and —The pilot slowly shook his head, and leant close to Toad, like a fellow
conspirator. “Look at it this way, Your Worship, if—”

Toad softened still more as the wise and
sensible pilot-mechanic, a sterling sort of fellow when it came down to it,
spoke those words “Your Worship” such as, Toad thought, might be applied to a
Lord Mayor or a Bishop, or some such personage of the kind with whom Toad could
very easily imagine himself mixing.

“If
— ?
” whispered Toad
almost gently.

“If, as you rightly say, My Lord, if—”

Toad’s head swam. Toad’s chest swelled. Toad’s
heart missed a beat as an extraordinary sensation came across him at those
potent and wonderful words, “My Lord”. No sooner were they uttered than Toad
fancied that they were true and that he was, he really was, Lord Toad of Toad
Hall, but — but he shivered the sensation away from himself.

Then he sighed, and he sank back into the more
sustainable dream that even if those magic words were not quite true, they were
almost so. A Lord he certainly was in spirit, just as he felt he had always
been. A Lord in all but name, and one day —

“— if,” continued the pilot—mechanic, “I were
to let you fly this machine without further instruction, and supposing, just
supposing, there was a regrettable occurrence, which is to say an accident,
then it would not reflect well on you at all. Accidents involving flying
machines tend to attract rather widespread, not to say national, interest. All
the more so if the personage who is the pilot is well known across the length
and the breadth, as you undoubtedly are. There would be —”Toad’s mind swam
again, and his hopes and spirits soared. Not so much at the notion of “length
and breadth” (precisely what length and which breadth the pilot wisely
refrained from saying) as from all the possibilities implicit in attracting the
“national interest”. Here then, before him, within his reach, though not yet
quite within his control, was a way of making rather more of an impression than
a merely local one on inconsequential animals such as the Badger, and the Water
Rat, and the Mole.