"All right," he said. "I knew you wouldn't let me go. I'm not the right fellow anyway--Holly is. He knows everything about moving in the open and he'll be able to talk well when he gets there."

No one contradicted this. Holly was the obvious choice, but to select his companions was less easy. Everyone was ready to go, but the business was so important that at last they considered each rabbit in turn, discussing who would be the most likely to survive the long journey, to arrive in good shape and to go down well in a strange warren. Bigwig, rejected on the grounds that he might quarrel in strange company, was inclined to be sulky at first, but came round when he remembered that he could go on looking after Kehaar. Holly himself wanted to take Bluebell but, as Blackberry said, one funny joke at the expense of the Chief Rabbit might ruin everything. Finally they chose Silver, Buckthorn and Strawberry. Strawberry said little, but was obviously very much pleased. He had suffered a good deal to show that he was no coward and now he had the satisfaction of knowing that he was worth something to his new friends.

They started early in the morning, in the gray light. Kehaar had undertaken to fly out later in the day, to make sure they were going in the right direction and bring back news of their progress. Hazel and Bigwig went with them to the southern end of the hanger and watched as they slipped away, heading to the west of the distant farm. Holly seemed confident and the other three were in high spirits. Soon they were lost to sight in the gra.s.s and Hazel and Bigwig turned back into the wood.

"Well, we've done the best we can," said Hazel. "The rest's up to them and to El-ahrairah now. But surely it ought to be all right?"

"Not a doubt of it," said Bigwig. "Let's hope they're back soon. I'm looking forward to a nice doe and a litter of kittens in my burrow. Lots of little Bigwigs, Hazel! Think of that, and tremble!"

24. Nuthanger Farm

When Robyn came to Notyngham, Sertenly withouten layn, He prayed to G.o.d and myld Mary To bryng hym out save agayn.

Beside him stod a gret-hedid munke, I pray to G.o.d woo he be!

Fful sone he knew G.o.de Robyn, As sone as he hym se.

Robin Hood and the Monk (Child's (Child's Ballads Ballads, No. 119) Hazel sat on the bank in the midsummer night There had been no more than five hours' darkness and that of a pallid, twilit quality which kept him wakeful and restless. Everything was going well. Kehaar had found Holly during the afternoon and corrected his line a little to the west He had left him in the shelter of a thick hedge, sure of his course for the big warren. It seemed certain now that two days would be enough for the journey. Bigwig and some of the other rabbits had already begun enlarging their burrows in preparation for Holly's return. Kehaar had had a violent quarrel with a kestrel, screaming insults in a voice fit to startle a Cornish harbor: and although it had ended inconclusively, the kestrel seemed likely to regard the neighborhood of the hanger with healthy respect for the future. Things had not looked better since they had first set out from Sandleford.

A spirit of happy mischief entered into Hazel. He felt as he had on the morning when they crossed the Enborne and he had set out alone and found the beanfield. He was confident and ready for adventure. But what adventure? Something worth telling to Holly and Silver on their return. Something to--well, not to diminish what they were going to do. No, of course not--but just to show them that their Chief Rabbit was up to anything that they were up to. He thought it over as he hopped down the bank and sniffed out a patch of salad burnet in the gra.s.s. What, now, would be likely to give them just a little, not unpleasant shock? Suddenly he thought, "Suppose, when they got back, that there were one or two does here already?" And in the same moment he remembered what Kehaar had said about a box full of rabbits at the farm. What sort of rabbits could they be? Did they ever come out of their box? Had they ever seen a wild rabbit? Kehaar had said that the farm was not far from the foot of the down, on a little hill. So it could easily be reached in the early morning, before its men were about. Any dogs would probably be chained, but the cats would be loose. A rabbit could outrun a cat as long as he kept in the open and saw it coming first. The important thing was not to be stalked unawares. He should be able to move along the hedgerows without attracting elil, unless he was very unlucky.

But what did he intend to do, exactly? Why was he going to the farm? Hazel finished the last of the burnet and answered himself in the starlight. "I'll just have a look round," he said, "and if I can find those box rabbits I'll try to talk to them; nothing more than that. I'm not going to take any risks--well, not real risks--not until I see whether it's worth it, anyway."

Should he go alone? It would be safer and more pleasant to take a companion; but not more than one. They must not attract attention. Who would be best? Bigwig? Dandelion? Hazel rejected them. He needed someone who would do as he was told and not start having ideas of his own. At once he thought of Pipkin. Pipkin would follow him without question and do anything he asked. At this moment he was probably asleep in the burrow which he shared with Bluebell and Acorn, down a short run leading off the Honeycomb.

Hazel was lucky. He found Pipkin close to the mouth of the burrow and already awake. He brought him out without disturbing the other two rabbits and led him up by the run that gave on the bank. Pipkin looked about him uncertainly, bewildered and half expecting some danger.

"It's all right, Hlao-roo," said Hazel. "There's nothing to be afraid of. I want you to come down the hill and help me to find a farm I've heard about. We're just going to have a look round it."

"Round a farm, Hazel-rah? What for? Won't it be dangerous? Cats and dogs and--"

"No, you'll be quite all right with me. Just you and me--I don't want anyone else. I've got a secret plan; you mustn't tell the others--for the time being, anyway. I particularly want you to come and no one else will do."

This had exactly the effect that Hazel intended. Pipkin needed no further persuasion and they set off together, over the gra.s.s track, across the turf beyond and down the escarpment. They went through the narrow belt of trees and came into the field where Holly had called Bigwig in the dark. Here Hazel paused, sniffing and listening. It was the time before dawn when owls return, usually hunting as they go. Although a full-grown rabbit is not really in danger from owls, there are few who take no account of them. Stoats and foxes might be abroad also, but the night was still and damp and Hazel, secure in his mood of gay confidence, felt sure that he would either smell or hear any hunter on four feet.

Wherever the farm might be, it must lie beyond the road that ran along the opposite edge of the field. He set off at an easy pace, with Pipkin close behind. Moving quietly in and out of the hedgerow up which Holly and Bluebell had come and pa.s.sing, on their way, under the cables humming faintly in the darkness above, they took only a few minutes to reach the road.

There are times when we know for a certainty that all is well. A batsman who has played a fine innings will say afterward that he felt he could not miss the ball, and a speaker or an actor, on his lucky day, can sense his audience carrying him as though he were swimming in miraculous, buoyant water. Hazel had this feeling now. All round him was the quiet summer night, luminous with starlight but paling to dawn on one side. There was nothing to fear and he felt ready to skip through a thousand farmyards one after the other. As he sat with Pipkin on the bank above the tar-smelling road, it did not strike him as particularly lucky when he saw a young rat scuttle across from the opposite hedge and disappear into a clump of fading st.i.tchwort below them. He had known that some guide or other would turn up. He scrambled quickly down the bank and found the rat nosing in the ditch.

"The farm," said Hazel, "where's the farm--near here, on a little hill?"

The rat stared at him with twitching whiskers. It had no particular reason to be friendly, but there was something in Hazel's look that made a civil answer natural.

"Over road. Up lane."

The sky was growing lighter each moment. Hazel crossed the road without waiting for Pipkin, who caught him up under the hedge bordering the near side of the little lane. From here, after another listening pause, they began to make their way up the slope toward the northern skyline.

Nuthanger is like a farm in an old tale. Between Ecchinswell and the foot of Watership Down and about half a mile from each, there is a broad knoll, steeper on the north side but falling gently on the south--like the down ridge itself. Narrow lanes climb both slopes and come together in a great ring of elm trees which encircles the flat summit. Any wind--even the lightest--draws from the height of the elms a rushing sound, multifoliate and powerful. Within this ring stands the farmhouse, with its barns and outbuildings. The house may be two hundred years old or it may be older, built of brick, with a stone-faced front looking south toward the down. On the east side, in front of the house, a barn stands clear of the ground on staddle stones; and opposite is the cow byre.

As Hazel and Pipkin reached the top of the slope, the first light showed clearly the farmyard and buildings. The birds singing all about them were those to which they had been accustomed in former days. A robin on a low branch twittered a phrase and listened for another that answered him from beyond the farmhouse. A chaffinch gave its little falling song and further off, high in an elm, a chiffchaff began to call. Hazel stopped and then sat up, the better to scent the air. Powerful smells of straw and cow dung mingled with those of elm leaves, ashes and cattle feed. Fainter traces came to his nose as the overtones of a bell sound in a trained ear. Tobacco, naturally: a good deal of cat and rather less dog and then, suddenly and beyond doubt, rabbit. He looked at Pipkin and saw that he, too, had caught it.

While these scents reached them they were also listening. But beyond the light movements of birds and the first buzzing of the flies immediately around them, they could hear nothing but the continual susurration of the trees. Under the northern steep of the down the air had been still, but here the southerly breeze was magnified by the elms, with their myriads of small, fluttering leaves, just as the effect of sunlight on a garden is magnified by dew. The sound, coming from the topmost branches, disturbed Hazel because it suggested some huge approach--an approach that was never completed: and he and Pipkin remained still for some time, listening tensely to this loud yet meaningless vehemence high overhead.

They saw no cat, but near the house stood a flat-roofed dog kennel. They could just glimpse the dog asleep inside--a large, smooth-haired, black dog, with head on paws. Hazel could not see a chain; but then, after a moment, he noticed the line of a thin rope that came out through the kennel door and ended in some sort of fastening on the roof. "Why a rope?" he wondered and then thought, "Because a restless dog cannot rattle it in the night."

The two rabbits began to wander among the outbuildings. At first they took care to remain in cover and continually on the watch for cats. But they saw none and soon grew bolder, crossing open s.p.a.ces and even stopping to nibble at dandelions in the patches of weeds and rough gra.s.s. Guided by scent, Hazel made his way to a low-roofed shed. The door was half open and he went through it with scarcely a pause at the brick threshold. Immediately opposite the door, on a broad wooden shelf--a kind of platform--stood a wire-fronted hutch. Through the mesh he could see a brown bowl, some greenstuff and the ears of two or three rabbits. As he stared, one of the rabbits came close to the wire, looked out and saw him.

Beside the platform, on the near side, was an up-ended bale of straw. Hazel jumped lightly on it and from there to the thick planks, which were old and soft-surfaced, dusty and covered with chaff. Then he turned back to Pipkin, waiting just inside the door.

"Hlao-roo," he said, "there's only one way out of this place. You'll have to keep watching for cats or we may be trapped. Stay at the door and if you see a cat outside, tell me at once."

"Right, Hazel-rah," said Pipkin. "It's all clear at the moment."

Hazel went up to the side of the hutch. The wired front projected over the edge of the shelf so that he could neither reach it nor look in, but there was a knothole in one of the boards facing him and on the far side he could see a twitching nose.

"I am Hazel-rah," he said. "I have come to talk to you. Can you understand me?"

The answer was in slightly strange but perfectly intelligible Lapine.

"Yes, we understand you. My name is Boxwood. Where do you come from?"

"From the hills. My friends and I live as we please, without men. We eat the gra.s.s, lie in the sun and sleep underground. How many are you?"

"Four. Bucks and does."

"Do you ever come out?"

"Yes, sometimes. A child takes us out and puts us in a pen on the gra.s.s."

"I have come to tell you about my warren. We need more rabbits. We want you to run away from the farm and join us."

"There's a wire door at the back of this hutch," said Boxwood. "Come down there: we can talk more easily."

The door was made of wire netting on a wooden frame, with two leather hinges nailed to the uprights and a hasp and staple fastened with a twist of wire. Four rabbits were crowded against the wire, pressing their noses through the mesh. Two--Laurel and Clover--were short-haired black Angoras. The others, Boxwood and his doe Haystack, were black-and-white Himalayans.

Hazel began to speak about the life of the downs and the excitement and freedom enjoyed by wild rabbits. In his usual straightforward way he told about the predicament of his warren in having no does and how he had come to look for some. "But," he said, "we don't want to steal your does. All four of you are welcome to join us, bucks and does alike. There's plenty for everyone on the hills." He went on to talk of the evening feed in the sunset and of early morning in the long gra.s.s.

The hutch rabbits seemed at once bewildered and fascinated. Clover, the Angora doe--a strong, active rabbit--was clearly excited by Hazel's description and asked several questions about the warren and the downs. It became plain that they thought of their life in the hutch as dull but safe. They had learned a good deal about elil from some source or other and seemed sure that few wild rabbits survived for long. Hazel realized that although they were glad to talk to him and welcomed his visit because it brought a little excitement and change into their monotonous life, it was not within their capacity to take a decision and act on it. They did not know how to make up their minds. To him and his companions, sensing and acting was second nature; but these rabbits had never had to act to save their lives or even to find a meal. If he was going to get any of them as far as the down, they would have to be urged. He sat quiet for a little, nibbling a patch of bran spilled on the boards outside the hutch. Then he said, "I must go back now to my friends in the hills: but we shall return. We shall come one night, and when we do, believe me, we shall open your hutch as easily as the farmer does: and then, any of you who wish will be free to come with us."

Boxwood was about to reply when suddenly Pipkin spoke from the floor. "Hazel, there's a cat in the yard outside!"

"We're not afraid of cats," said Hazel to Boxwood, "as long as we're in the open." Trying to appear unhurried, he went back to the floor by way of the straw bale and crossed over to the door. Pipkin was looking through the hinge. He was plainly frightened.

"I think it's smelled us, Hazel," he said. "I'm afraid it knows where we are."

"Don't stay there, then," said Hazel. "Follow me close and run when I do." Without waiting to look out through the hinge, he went round the half-open door of the shed and stopped on the threshold.

The cat, a tabby with white chest and paws, was at the further end of the little yard, walking slowly and deliberately along the side of a pile of logs. When Hazel appeared in the doorway it saw him at once and stood stock still, with staring eyes and twitching tail. Hazel hopped slowly across the threshold and stopped again. Already sunlight was slanting across the yard, and in the stillness the flies buzzed about a patch of dung a few feet away. There was a smell of straw and dust and hawthorn.

"You look hungry," said Hazel to the cat. "Rats getting too clever, I suppose?"

The cat made no reply. Hazel sat blinking in the sunshine. The cat crouched almost flat on the ground, thrusting its head forward between its front paws. Close behind, Pipkin fidgeted and Hazel, never taking his eyes from the cat, could sense that he was trembling.

"Don't be frightened, Hlao-roo," he whispered, "I'll get you away, but you must wait till it comes for us. Keep still."

The cat began to lash its tail. Its hindquarters lifted and wagged from side to side in mounting excitement.

"Can you run?" said Hazel. "I think not. Why, you pop-eyed, back-door saucer-sc.r.a.per--"

The cat flung itself across the yard and the two rabbits leaped into flight with great thrusts of their hind legs. The cat came very fast indeed and although both of them had been braced ready to move on the instant, they were barely out of the yard in time. Racing up the side of the long barn, they heard the Labrador barking in excitement as it ran to the full extent of its rope. A man's voice shouted to it. From the cover of the hedge beside the lane they turned and looked back. The cat had stopped short and was licking one paw with a pretense of nonchalance.

"They hate to look silly," said Hazel. "It won't give us any more trouble. If it hadn't charged at us like that, it would have followed us much further and probably called up another as well. And somehow you can't make a dash unless they do it first. It's a good thing you saw it coming, Hlao-roo."

"I'm glad if I helped, Hazel. But what were we up to, and why did you talk to the rabbits in the box?"

"I'll tell you all about it later on. Let's go into the field now and feed; then we can make our way home as slowly as you like."

25. The Raid

He went consenting, or else he was no king. ... It was no one's place to say to him, "It is time to make the offering."

Mary Renault, The King Must Die The King Must Die As things turned out, Hazel and Pipkin did not come back to the Honeycomb until the evening. They were still feeding in the field when it came on to rain, with a cold wind, and they took shelter first in the nearby ditch and then--since the ditch was on a slope and had a fair flow of rainwater in about ten minutes--among some sheds halfway down the lane. They burrowed into a thick pile of straw and for some time remained listening for rats. But all was quiet and they grew drowsy and fell asleep, while outside the rain settled in for the morning. When they woke it was mid-afternoon and still drizzling. It seemed to Hazel that there was no particular hurry. The going would be troublesome in the wet, and anyway no self-respecting rabbit could leave without a forage round the sheds. A pile of mangels and swedes occupied them for some time and they set out only when the light was beginning to fade. They took their time and reached the hanger a little before dark, with nothing worse to trouble them than the discomfort of soaking-wet fur. Only two or three of the rabbits were out to a rather subdued silflay in the wet. No one remarked on their absence and Hazel went underground at once, telling Pipkin to say nothing about their adventure for the time being. He found his burrow empty, lay down and fell asleep.

Waking, he found Fiver beside him as usual. It was some time before dawn. The earth floor felt pleasantly dry and snug and he was about to go back to sleep when Fiver spoke.

"You've been wet through, Hazel."

"Well, what about it? The gra.s.s is wet, you know."

"You didn't get so wet on silflay. You were soaked. You weren't here at all yesterday, were you?"

"Oh, I went foraging down the hill."

"Eating swedes: and your feet smell of farmyard--hens' droppings and bran. But there's some other funny thing besides--something I can't can't smell. What happened?" smell. What happened?"

"Well, I had a bit of a brush with a cat, but why worry?"

"Because you're concealing something, Hazel. Something dangerous."

"It's Holly that's in danger, not I. Why bother about me?"

"Holly?" replied Fiver in surprise. "But Holly and the others reached the big warren early yesterday evening. Kehaar told us. Do you mean to say you didn't know?"

Hazel felt fairly caught out. "Well, I know now," he replied. "I'm glad to hear it."

"So it comes to this," said Fiver. "You went to a farm yesterday and escaped from a cat. And whatever you were up to, it was so much on your mind that you forgot to ask about Holly last night."

"Well, all right, Fiver--I'll tell you all about it. I took Pipkin and went to that farm that Kehaar told us about where there are rabbits in a hutch. I found the rabbits and talked to them and I've taken a notion to go back one night and get them out, to come and join us here."

"What for?"

"Well, two of them are does, that's what for."

"But if Holly's successful we shall soon have plenty of does: and from all I've ever heard of hutch rabbits, they don't take easily to wild life. The truth is, you're just a silly show-off."

"A silly show-off?" said Hazel. "Well, we'll just see whether Bigwig and Blackberry think so."

"Risking your life and other rabbits' lives for something that's of little or no value to us," said Fiver. "Oh, yes, of course the others will go with you. You're their Chief Rabbit. You're supposed to decide what's sensible and they trust you. Persuading them will prove nothing, but three or four dead rabbits will prove you're a fool, when it's too late."

"Oh, be quiet," answered Hazel. "I'm going to sleep."

During silflay next morning, with Pipkin for a respectful chorus, he told the others about his visit to the farm. As he had expected, Bigwig jumped at the idea of a raid to free the hutch rabbits.

"It can't go wrong," he said. "It's a splendid idea, Hazel! I don't know how you open a hutch, but Blackberry will see to that. What annoys me is to think you ran from that cat. A good rabbit's a match for a cat, any day. My mother went for one once and she fairly gave it something to remember, I can tell you: scratched its fur out like willow herb in autumn! Just leave the farm cats to me and one or two of the others!"

Blackberry took a little more convincing: but he, like Bigwig and Hazel himself, was secretly disappointed not to have gone on the expedition with Holly: and when the other two pointed out that they were relying on him to tell them how to get the hutch open, he agreed to come.

"Do we need to take everyone?" he asked. "You say the dog's tied up and I suppose there can't be more than three cats. Too many rabbits will only be a nuisance in the dark: someone will get lost and we shall have to spend time looking for him."

"Well, Dandelion, Speedwell and Hawkbit, then," said Bigwig, "and leave the others behind. Do you mean to go tonight, Hazel-rah?"

"Yes, the sooner the better," said Hazel. "Get hold of those three and tell them. Pity it's going to be dark--we could have taken Kehaar: he'd have enjoyed it."

However, their hopes for that night were disappointed, for the rain returned before dusk, settling in on a northwest wind and carrying up the hill the sweet-sour smell of flowering privet from cottage hedges below. Hazel sat on the bank until the light had quite faded. At last, when it was clear that the rain was going to stay for the night, he joined the others in the Honeycomb. They had persuaded Kehaar to come down out of the wind and wet, and one of Dandelion's tales of El-ahrairah was followed by an extraordinary story that left everyone mystified but fascinated, about a time when Frith had to go away on a journey, leaving the whole world to be covered with rain. But a man built a great floating hutch that held all the animals and birds until Frith returned and let them out.

"It won't happen tonight, will it, Hazel-rah?" asked Pipkin, listening to the rain in the beech leaves outside. "There's no hutch here."

"Kehaar'll fly you up to the moon, Hlao-roo," said Bluebell, "and you can come down on Bigwig's head like a birch branch in the frost. But there's time to go to sleep first."

Before Fiver slept, however, he talked again to Hazel about the raid.

"I suppose it's no good asking you not to go?" he said.

"Look here," answered Hazel, "have you got one of your bad turns about the farm? If you have, why not say so straight out? Then we'd all know where we were."

"I've no feelings about the farm one way or the other," said Fiver. "But that doesn't necessarily mean it's all right. The feelings come when they will--they don't always come. Not for the lendri, not for the crow. If it comes to that, I've no idea what's happening to Holly and the others. It might be good or bad. But there's something that frightens me about you yourself, Hazel: just you, not any of the others. You're all alone, sharp and clear, like a dead branch against the sky."