The Tale of Oat Cake Crag

by Susan Wittig Albert

  “Excuse me?” cried the owl, pushing out from under the dragon’s sheltering wing. “If yooou don’t have a plan, what are we doooing out here? It is wet and cold and excessively windy. My feathers are about tooo be blown right off my back. If yooou are just going tooo sit on this crag and stare across the lake through those binoculars, I’m going tooo fly back tooo my beech tree and see what there is in the larder.”

  “Go right ahead,” the dragon said. “Nobody’szs keeping you. Anyway, I don’t know what you’re making such a fusszs about. It’s a perfectly pleasant evening, if a bit windy.” Of course, it is easy for the dragon to talk. He has a built-in belly-fire to keep himself warm, and his wings and scales are an impervious cloak against the rain and wind. Sitting on this exposed point, buffeted by the wind and rain, Thorvaald is just as comfy and toasty as if he were basking beside the Briar Bank fire .

  The owl seriously considered leaving, for he had (if he remembered correctly) a bit of leftover Vole à la Chateaubriand on his shelf. But somehow he felt that he had an investment in whatever sort of scheme the dragon was hatching. He gritted his beak and muttered, “I’ll wait. But don’t be toooo long about it.”

  “I’ll try,” said the dragon. He began to hum softly and in a minor key, an odd little melody that coiled and curled around his head like a wisp of smoke until the wind heard it, liked it, and made off with it. After a little while he said, “I think I have it.”

  “Have what?” asked the owl.

  “Have a plan. Would you like to ride along?”

  The owl was alarmed. “Ride?”

  “Well, yeszs. Unlesszs you want to fly, that is.”

  “Fly where?”

  The dragon pointed across the lake. “Why, over there, of course.”

  “Over . . . there?” The owl gulped. “Tonight?”

  Now, the lake at this point—at the foot of Oat Cake Crag—is less than five miles wide. But the wind was wild and growing wilder, and the owl (while he is certainly large as tawny owls go) was understandably nervous about venturing too far from shore on such a night. Out there, in the unprotected middle of the longest lake in England, the wind could toss him around as easily as if he were a hummingbird or a dragonfly. He was a very brave owl—but not that brave.

  “That’szs why I’m offering you a ride,” said the dragon in a kindly tone. “I suggest that you climb aboard and hang on to my neck, and we’ll fly acrosszs the lake. It’szs not at all difficult for me, for I am heavy and air-worthy enough to resist being tumbled about by that frisky wind. But I should think it would be a bit breathtaking for you, if you attempted to wing it on your own.”

  Frisky was not the word the owl would have chosen to describe the wind. “But why are we going ooover there?” he asked, rather desperately. “What in the world dooo yooou think yooou can dooo?”

  “Why, deszstroy the aeroplane, of course,” said the dragon. “It iszs an ill wind that blowszs nobody any good.”

  The owl was taken aback. “Destroy the—But how? The Bird is very large, you know, much larger than yooou are.” (The Professor was quite right to say this, for our dragon is only twelve or thirteen centuries old and not very large, as dragons go.) “The aeroplane is also quite heavy, and anyway, it’s probably chained down, so you can’t possibly lift it. And if you break intooo the hangar and try tooo damage the plane, I’m sure the guard will stop you. He probably has a gun, not tooo mention—”

  “If you’re coming,” the dragon interrupted impatiently, “please climb aboard. I’m ready to take off.” To demonstrate how ready he was, he lifted his wings and puffed smoke out of his nostrils.

  The owl was in a quandary. He much preferred to return to his beech tree. But as the senior owl in the district, he had a responsibility to the animals who lived there. If the dragon thought he could rid them of Water Bird, he felt obliged to go along and help. If the dragon couldn’t, if he failed—well, somebody ought to be there to document the debacle. And to tell the truth, the owl was becoming rather fond of Thorvaald, who, in spite of his impulsive and somewhat thoughtless nature, was a likable beast. He would be sorry if something happened to Thorvaald and nobody was around to notice.

  “All right,” the owl replied bravely, although a voice within him (the voice of the not-so-brave owl) was crying, “This is a terrible mistake!” Summoning all his courage, he clambered onto the dragon’s shoulder, dug in his claws, and threw his wings around the dragon’s neck.

  “Hang on,” said the dragon. With a hiss of live steam, the dragon (don’t ask me how he did this, for it is a trade secret known only to dragons) lifted himself off the flat rocky top of the crag and straight up into the air. Once they were airborne, he began to flap his leathery wings. They were off.

  The dragon was heavy and airworthy, as he said, but it was clear from the beginning that this was not going to be an ordinary flight. When the wind discovered that someone other than her wild and willful self was out and about in the sky that blustery night, she took it as a personal affront and attacked, from all sides at once, and above and below. She hissed and screeched and wailed at the dragon and his passenger, churning the clouds and the water in the most astonishing tumult. She pushed and shoved and clawed and buffeted the fliers and bellowed in their ears, lobbing lightning bolts all around and dropping great thuds of thunder directly in their path. The dragon flew on as steadily as he could, although even he had considerable difficulty maintaining his course through the mushrooms of updrafts and downdrafts the wind planted in front of him. By the time they got to mid-lake, the owl was feeling airsick and giddy (it’s one thing to fly, and another to be flown), as well as terribly frightened. He wished mightily that he had obeyed his first instinct and flown home to the comfort and safety of his beech tree, or that at the very least he had insisted on a parachute or water wings.

  But there was no going back now, for back was farther away than forward, and anyway, the dragon was clearly concentrating on getting to the other side of the lake. So he squeezed his owl-eyes tight, clamped his beak shut, and hung on as hard as he could until at last they reached the other side of the lake and the dragon landed with a bump on the shingly shore next to the Water Bird’s hangar.

  The minute the dragon set foot on earth, the owl opened his eyes, flew into the nearest tree, and shut his eyes again. He stayed there, breathing heavily, clutching his branch, and wondering if he was actually going to be sick. By the time he decided he wasn’t and ventured to open his eyes, the dragon had already gone to work.

  Thorvaald was glad to see that the guard who had been patrolling the building had taken his lantern and sought shelter indoors, probably thinking that no self-respecting thief or vandal would be out on such a wild night. He flew twice around the aeroplane hangar, studying the construction of the roof and thinking that this wasn’t going to be as easy as he had hoped. In fact, now that he was here, he wasn’t sure he could do what he had come to do—and if he could, whether it would work out the way he hoped. But there was nothing to do except try.

  He flapped his wings and flew high into the air, then headed about a half-mile north, upwind of the hangar. He turned and hovered for a moment or two, judging the strength of the gale at his back and inviting the wind to give him some help. She considered this, decided it might be an amusing game to try, and gave him an extra hard blast. When it came, he rode it as a boat might ride a cresting wave, skidding downward on the wild rush of air. As he reached the edge of the roof, he snatched it with his talons and peeled it off, just as you might peel the hat off your head. The entire roof came off in one piece. The dragon carried it a little distance, then released it. Freed to take off on its own, it sailed across Cockshott Point like a huge sheet of cardboard, turning and tumbling, until it crashed into the ferry’s loading dock and splintered into a thousand pieces.

  Having unzipped the roof, so to speak, all the dragon had to do was turn and watch, and the wind did the rest. Peering down into the roofless hangar, she saw to her enormou
s delight that someone had left a light, flimsy aeroplane, which struck her as the perfect toy. She picked it up and turned it over curiously once or twice to see how it worked and what it was made of. Then, because she thought it might make an interesting kite, she tossed it into the air. The Bird didn’t stay up long, of course. When it landed hard on the shingle, it was upside down, one wing was broken off, the tail had splintered, the propeller was smashed, and the center float had split open like a pea pod.

  When she saw that her new toy had broken into bits, the wind was so annoyed that she blew in all four walls of the hangar, one after the other. Luckily, the guard had taken shelter under a sturdy table when the dragon peeled the roof off. He crawled out of the wreckage of the hangar, very shaken up but without injury. Nobody would ever believe him, of course, if he said that he had seen a small green dragon with leathery wings peel the roof off, just before the wind picked up the Water Bird and began tossing it around. He didn’t believe it, either, and went off to the nearest pub for a stiff one.

  The wind, who as you know is entirely amoral and has no conscience or any sense of consequence, found a great many toys to play with in the neighborhood of Cockshott Point that night. She blew down the Presbyterian Church steeple in Bowness, snatched the roof off a stable and the school in the town of Windermere, turned over several wagons at the lumber mill, and shoved the ferry onto its loading ramp, seriously damaging the hull. Farther afield, she pulled up any number of trees, flooded fields, and set a house and a haystack afire with lightning bolts. Altogether, she had a very entertaining evening for herself, and when she finally got tired and went home, she could think back on her games with a great deal of pleasure.

  As for the dragon and the owl, they waited until the wind left and then flew back across the lake. The owl went straight to the drinks pantry in his beech tree and poured himself a double shot of elderberry wine. The dragon flew on to Briar Bank, where he crawled under the covers of his bed and slept for a whole twelve hours before he woke up, to find that Bailey and Thackeray were having bacon and eggs (borrowed from Mrs. Crook’s chickens) for lunch, along with fresh-baked bread, butter, and strawberry jam. Thorvaald had second helpings of everything.

  25

  In Which We Tie Up All the Loose Ends—But One

  The days after the storm were filled, as you might expect, with plenty of work for everyone, as people in the Land Between the Lakes repaired the shingles and slates on their houses and barns and sheds, picked up the broken branches, sawed the fallen trees into firewood, swept up the flood debris, and got things back to normal again.

  But there was to be no return to normal for the Water Bird, which was damaged beyond repair. Oscar Wyatt went to his new investor to ask for money to rebuild it, but she turned him down flat. She? Yes, indeed. The investor who had taken Mr. Baum’s place, believe it or not, was Lady Longford. It was one thing, she said, to invest in a going project that had every chance of success. It was quite another to invest in an aeroplane that had to be rebuilt after every storm.

  If you’re surprised to learn that it was Lady Longford who promised money for the hydroplane—in spite of the way all the villagers felt about it—perhaps you might recall some of her earlier actions. When she heard that Miss Potter wanted to buy Castle Farm, she tried to buy it first, and it was only with Mr. Heelis’ help that Miss Potter was able to get it. It was also Lady Longford who insisted on closing the footpath across Applebeck Orchard, which caused the villagers no end of grief before it was reopened. So even though she sometimes changes her mind and makes things right again, her ladyship’s first impulse is always to cause somebody some sort of trouble.

  With Lady Longford out of the picture and Mr. Baum no longer able to provide funds, nothing more was heard about the hydroplane for some time. This did not make Winston Churchill happy, of course, but the First Lord of the Admiralty had other fish to fry and other aeroplanes to look at, and before long he had found one that he liked even better than the Bird. He did not, however, end his association with Oscar Wyatt, who was assigned to teach him to fly. Churchill’s wife, Clementine, was much alarmed about this and tried to make him stop. He refused. She prevailed, however, when his teacher flew an aeroplane into the ground and killed himself, which was the end of Oscar Wyatt.

  The destruction of the Water Bird might have been mourned by the men who were directly involved with it, but it was a great cause for rejoicing among the denizens of the Land Between the Lakes. They could now do their work with the great silence of the moors and fells ringing in their ears, and with nothing but the soft bleating of sheep and the sweet calls of the birds to keep them company. The men of the village could stop plotting ways to destroy the enterprise, Miss Potter could work in her garden without irritation, Henry Stubbs could pilot his newly-repaired ferry without fear of frightened animals causing the ramshackle boat to turn turtle, and the birds, sheep, badgers, and owls could go about their business without fear of being eaten by a large mechanical monster.

  Other people went back to their business, too. Caroline Longford said goodbye to her grandmother and returned to her classes at the Royal Academy, where she continued to excel. Of course, her young heart was broken, for she truly loved Jeremy, or thought she did, which (as Jeremy says) amounts to the same thing. But Caroline was not quite ready to love anybody but herself, and needed a few more years of growing up before she began to think seriously of a husband and children, since these require that a wife and mother allow them to be real people and not just figments of her rich imagination.

  Mrs. Lythecoe went forward with her wedding plans with a much happier heart, now that she knew that there wouldn’t be any more ugly letters put through her mail slot. She could also look forward to saying a cordial goodbye to “dear, dear Mrs. Thompson,” who had served Vicar Sackett so long and faithfully and who was going home to care for her mother. She even began to think that it might be nice to give Mrs. Thompson a proper farewell tea—as long as Mrs. Belcher baked the scones.

  Jeremy and Deirdre were going forward with their wedding plans, too, although poor Mrs. Sutton had already begun to be sorry that she allowed Deirdre to marry. Who was going to help her care for the ninth little Sutton, who was going to make his or her appearance at about the time Deirdre moved into Slatestone Cottage? However, everyone in the village wished the young people all the happiness in the world, not least because they all agreed that Jeremy was the very best teacher that Sawrey School had ever had and they hoped he would stay in that position forever.

  And eventually, even poor Mr. Baum recovered from his injuries. One morning he woke up and demanded coffee and The Times, just as Dr. Butters had said. The next day he was sitting up in a chair beside his bed, with his broken leg propped on a cushion. As soon as he could, he returned to Lakeshore Manor, with one of Dimity’s housemaids to cook for him and make him comfortable. He couldn’t afford any more than that, for he had invested almost all of his fortune in the aeroplane and wasn’t going to get a shilling out of it. In my opinion, he was the biggest loser of the lot, although he rather asked for it, allowing Oscar Wyatt to talk him into putting all his money into an aeroplane.

  As to how Mr. Baum came to tumble down from the top of Oat Cake Crag, the answer was exceedingly simple. He had gone up there to spy on the aeroplane hangar on the other side of the lake. He dropped his telescope, tried to retrieve it before it went over the edge, missed his footing, and fell. There had been no foul play, and no one else—not Oscar Wyatt nor Paddy Pratt nor any other person—had been there with him. The fall that had nearly killed him was entirely accidental.

  It was a good thing that the dragon did not aspire to fame and fortune in return for destroying the Water Bird, for he didn’t get either. He had done the daring deed at night, in the middle of a tremendous storm, and no one knew that he was responsible. None of the Big Folk, that is. The animals knew about it, though. They learned about it from the Professor, who was only too glad to tell the tale to anyone who wo
uld listen—emphasizing, of course, his own role in the night’s events and embroidering them just a little. Bosworth Badger wrote the whole story down in the History, and it came to be a favorite tale for telling around The Brockery fire and at Briar Bank on a chilly winter’s night.

  In fact, the owl was so inspired by his participation in the adventure that he decided to use it as the basis for his own motto and emblem, which (as perhaps you will remember) had been suggested to him by Bosworth and Parsley. The Professor rather liked the dragon’s family motto, Alta pete (Aim at high things), but since that one was taken, he searched through dictionaries and old documents and found another he liked just as much: Alis aspicit astra, “Flying, he looks to the stars.” Since the owl was both learned in astronomical studies and a superb flier, it seemed to him to fit perfectly. For his emblem, he took his friends’ advice: an owl on a branch, a scroll in one claw, a telescope in the other, and a laurel wreath on his head, with the moon, a few stars, and a dragon—yes, a dragon—in the background. He asked Fritz to paint it for him in rich shades of red, blue, and gold, and when it was done, he mounted it proudly above his door.

  But the dragon did earn something very important from his night’s heroic efforts. He had Bosworth copy the passage recorded in the History and took it with him when he flew to the next meeting of the Grand Assembly of Dragons. When it came time for him to make his report, he simply submitted the paragraphs from the History, signed and accompanied by a certificate of authenticity by Bosworth. The Clerk of Dragons read the paragraphs aloud to the Assembly, who listened, spellbound, to the entire account. When it was concluded, the Grandest Dragon arose and pronounced that Thorvaald the Remarkable, son of the magnificent Thunnor, son of the splendid Snurrt, son of the celebrated Sniggle, had now been released from his assignment to the census and promoted to second lieutenant in the Dragon Corp.