by Tor Seidler
Wendy looked up, too. It really was about the most beautiful moon she’d ever seen. “No, I’m not,” she said, a little less coldly.
“Yes, you are!” Zeke insisted. “You’re twice as pretty. Three times!”
“You really think so?”
“Do I!” He squeezed her paw. “You’ll think about it?”
“About the moon?”
“No! About marrying me.”
“Oh,” she said. “Well . . .”
“Well?”
It was impossible not to admire his fine white belly in the moonlight. “I’ll tell you what,” she said. “I’ll think about marrying you if you’ll think about letting me lead.”
Zeke made a face. So she made one back and turned away. But before she could get far, he grabbed one of her paws and spun her back to him.
“It’s a deal,” he said—and then, before she could protest, he gave her a kiss, right on the snout.
BEST WEASEL
By July the heat had sunk down even into the Double B, making egg duty harder work than ever. But Zeke and his brothers still volunteered three or four mornings a week. The only weasel who volunteered for more egg duty than they did that summer was Bagley. Bagley rolled eggs every single morning. It helped take his mind off Bridget. In spite of meeting her kids, he just couldn’t seem to get her out of his head, or his heart.
When the eggs were rolled up out of the tunnel, at sunrise, a representative of each weasel household would come and collect one or two. When the Whitebellys worked, they often took three, which they richly deserved. One morning, in the middle of July, Zeke told his brothers to roll their eggs home without him.
“Think I’ll go along with Bagley,” he said, wiping his brow, “and take a dunk in the brook.”
In fact, he wanted to speak to Bagley privately. As the two of them trudged off through the dusty woods, he told Bagley he had some remarkable news.
“What’s that?” Bagley said, figuring Zeke was finally going to marry Wendy.
“You’re not going to believe this, Bagley boy, but . . . Well, Wendy and I are going to get hitched up!”
“Really!” Bagley said, trying to look surprised. “Congratulations.”
“Thanks, buddy.”
“When’s the big day?”
“A week from Saturday. Wedding at three, under the pines, then the reception. The Blackishes are putting it on. We’ll be dancing till dawn!”
“Sounds terrific.”
“Yeah. Except, I got kind of a problem about my best weasel. If I ask Ben, Bill’ll be mad as a hornet. If I ask Bill, Ben’ll be mad as a wet hen. And if I ask the twins—you know, like a double best weasel—Bill and Ben’ll both have their snouts out of joint. So it hit me. If I ask you, maybe nobody’ll get riled. I can just say it’s because of how you . . . you know, got us together.”
“A week from Saturday,” Bagley said. “I’d be honored.”
“Great!” Zeke said, slapping him on the back.
Egg rolling was dusty work these days. The slap knocked such a cloud off Bagley’s back that Zeke had a little coughing fit.
“You know, I like it hot,” he said when he caught his breath. “But I wish it would rain once before the wedding. You get so darn dusty these days, dancing. It comes right up through the pine needles.”
“It can’t go on like this forever,” Bagley predicted. “It’s bound to rain before long.”
But it didn’t. The sunny days continued to march along one after the next, and the only clouds were the clouds of dust that rose off the dry earth. The Saturday of the wedding arrived without a drop of rain having fallen.
None of the Whitebellys rolled eggs that morning, naturally. However, Bagley did. Once he got home from the Double B, he went through his usual routine of collecting bugs. But while storing the bugs in his den, he realized the wedding created a problem. As best weasel, how could he leave before the end of the reception? And now that the crickets were playing their violins all night, he supposed the weasels really would dance till dawn. So he wouldn’t be able to drop his bugs at the usual time. If he dropped them before he left for the wedding, they would reach the pond so early that some other creature would snap them up before Bridget even had a chance. It was a silly thing to worry about, of course. She probably never got them anyway. But the hope that she did was the one spark in his life.
Bagley sat thinking on the bank of the brook. Every weasel in Wainscott would be at the wedding, but there might be some other creature who would drop the bugs in for him at the appointed time. Who? Rabbits were silly and skittish—harebrained, really, never remembering anything from one minute to the next. Squirrels weren’t reliable either. Half the time they couldn’t even remember where they’d hidden their nuts. As for birds, they’d just eat the bugs themselves.
When a shiny green frog’s head popped out of the brook, right below where he was sitting, it seemed like fate. Frogs were intelligent creatures. But then he remembered that frogs, too, were partial to bugs.
“Mr. Brown?” the frog said in a familiar deep voice.
“Is that you, Paddy?”
“It sure is. Hope I find you in good health, Mr. Brown.”
“I’m okay. But please, call me Bagley. What are you doing way up here?”
“Looking for you.”
“Really? Why?”
“Because . . .” The bullfrog paused to clear a frog out of his throat. “Do you remember how I met someone that night in the moonlight?”
“I certainly do. You swam off with her. Lily, if memory serves me.”
Paddy smiled. “Well, Lily turned out to be just the frog for me. A few weeks back, we had a batch of tadpoles.”
“Congratulations.” Bagley smiled back, but as on the night of Zeke and Wendy’s visit, it wasn’t easy. It was beginning to seem as if he was the only creature on the whole South Fork who wasn’t happily mated. “How many kids do you have?”
“Fourteen.”
“All healthy, I hope?”
“For the time being. That’s what I came about, partly. They’re getting bigger every day—and more reckless. Natural, of course. But considering what’s happening, we’re worried sick.”
“What’s happening, Paddy?”
“You don’t know?”
“I haven’t been to the pond since, er, well, only once since the night we met. That was in the morning, and I didn’t stay long. What’s happening?”
“Well, maybe you better come see for yourself.”
“I promised Bridget I wouldn’t.”
“Oh,” the bullfrog said, disappointed. “That’s how I was going to get you to help us. I figured you’d want to help Bridge.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I mentioned you to this old possum I know, and he recognized your name. Said your old dad was about the smartest creature that ever lived. So I figured you might be able to think up some way to help us. We’re at our wits’ end.”
Bagley stood up. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s the pond. It’s—well, you’ll see if you come.”
“Are you telling me Bridget’s in some kind of trouble?”
The frog’s big mouth now turned down in a frown. “We all are,” he said.
THE POOR POND
Bagley didn’t wait to hear more. He dashed away, his promise and Bridget’s children equally forgotten. Of course, he wasn’t clever like his father, but if Bridget was in trouble, he would do everything in his power to help her.
At the edge of the woods he checked the sky, then sprinted for the hedge. But just before reaching it, he remembered the greeneyed cat and changed his course for the potato field that lay to the south.
The potato plants were in flower, but even they were dry. Their leaves crackled in the breeze as Bagley scurried along under them. His furrow was particularly choppy, so he hopped over to another, but when he did, frantic squawks erupted all around him. He’d landed right in a covey of snoozing bobwhite quail: father, mot
her, and six children. The little ones would have been nice and tender—a tasty breakfast—but he let them all flap away.
The potato field ended by the dunes. At the foot of the dunes was a line of shrubs: wild roses, mostly, with some Queen Anne’s lace mixed in, both droopy from too much sun. The wildrose bushes were excellent cover, good and thick, but the thorns made the going so slow and painful that in the end Bagley climbed to the top of the dunes.
The dune grass was only soso cover, and as he scampered along, bloodcurdling shrieks filled the sky over his head. It was his worst nightmare come true! And there wasn’t just one bird diving at him, there were three—four—five—all pale as death. He had nowhere to hide. All he could do was throw himself onto the ground and wait for the claws to pierce his rib cage.
But while the shrieking got louder and louder, Bagley didn’t feel any pain. He peered up. The pale birds were still zooming down on him, but at the last second they swerved away. It was always hard to judge the size of things at a distance with only one eye, but now he could see that the birds weren’t actually very big. They must, he decided, be terns. His father had once told him about terns, how they build their nests in the dunes and, if you get too close, divebomb you to scare you away.
Bagley was only too happy to be scared away. And once he’d put a good distance between himself and the nesting area, the terns called off the aerial attack.
Stopping to catch his breath, he surveyed the beach through the waving dune grass. As far as he could see, there were only three species of animal down there: two kinds of shorebird—sea gulls and sandpipers—and a few human beings. It was too early in the morning for human beings to be lying in the sun. These were standing in the backwash with long fishing poles. They cast their shiny lures out over the waves, reeled in, then cast again.
Bagley continued on, and after a while a nearly empty parking lot came into view to his right. He climbed off the dunes, skirted the lot, and headed inland along the edge of the road. It was the road he always had to cross to get to the pond. When he came to the place where the hedge ended, he dashed over to the other side and dove in among the reeds and cattails. The stalks rattled as he brushed against them, browner and drier than he’d ever known them. When he came out onto the shore of the pond, he was stunned. The narrow strip of sand was narrow no longer. It stretched out ahead of him for two hundred feet. The hollow log was high and dry. It looked like a big bone bleaching in the sun. The heat had shriveled up the pond to half its former size.
Over the middle of what remained of the poor pond, the osprey was hovering in the breeze. As Bagley watched, the bird dove straight down, smacked into the water with a splash, and vanished. After a second underwater, he resurfaced and flapped awkwardly back into the air, a goodsized fish dangling from his talons.
Bagley’s fur crept. The vision that had haunted his nights was real.
THE SWANS
On his way down the road, Bagley had passed the secondtolast telephone pole. But since he hadn’t been thinking of the osprey he hadn’t checked the nest. Now he watched the ruthless bird carry the unlucky fish straight to it.
Once the osprey landed, Bagley couldn’t see him any more. Crouched in the shade of the hollow log, he didn’t have a good angle. But it wasn’t hard to figure out that the bird was eating his breakfast: fresh fish.
Only now, as he looked from the big nest back to the dryingup pond, did Bagley understand the remark Bridget had made on that silvery night in the spring: Then let’s hope we get some rain. As long ago as that, she’d been worried about the shrinking of the pond. For when a pond gets smaller it also gets shallower, and in shallow waters fish are much easier to spot and catch from above. Picking them off would be as easy for the osprey as getting eggs was for the Wainscott weasels. Bagley’s eye flicked back to the nest. Could that have been Bridget he’d just seen? Or had the osprey—heaven forbid!—made a meal of her already?
After a while he heard a croak. The bullfrog hopped out of the dry reeds.
“Paddy! That was quick.”
“Coming downstream’s a breeze,” Paddy said. “Quite a change around here, huh?”
“The osprey just caught a big fish and took it back to his nest,” Bagley said, his voice shaking a bit. “It may have been Bridget.”
“I doubt that. Bridge is pretty smart, you know. There’s still one deep place left, and she stays there with her kids. But they’ve got to feed sometime. And the pond’s getting shallower every day.”
The bullfrog’s opinion of Bridget’s intelligence lifted Bagley’s spirits a bit. She just had to be alive. But still, he couldn’t imagine what he could do to help. What was needed was a big rainstorm. Though he’d never been much of a dancer, he knew most of the weasels’ dances, and there wasn’t a rain dance among them.
“Is there some way to get the ocean to fill up the pond?” he said, thinking aloud.
Paddy shook his head. “When the pond gets full, the human beings dig a cut to drain it out. That’s how some of the fish go out to sea. But it doesn’t work the other way around. The pond bed’s above sea level.”
“So it is,” Bagley said sadly. “You know, Paddy, there’s more shade over here.”
The bullfrog was squatting by the rock he used to sit on. “Thanks, Bagley,” he said. “But this is fine.”
“You don’t think I’d hurt you, do you?”
“Well, not really. But a weasel got a second cousin of mine once, and . . . well, instincts are instincts. I’ve met several charming flies, but it’s hard as the dickens for me not to eat them. I hope you’re not offended.”
“No, I understand.” Bagley stared out dismally at the pond again. “I wish I could think of something.”
“I know. That osprey’s too big and mean to fight. I just thought maybe, since your dad was so brilliant, you might be a chip off the old block.”
Bagley sighed, wishing he was—though, of course, if he had been, he would have fallen in love with a weasel, not a fish.
“I’m afraid the only thing I have in common with my father is our name.”
“Hey. Don’t feel bad. It was a long shot. I just thought if you checked things out . . . anyway, it was nice of you to come.”
Bagley surveyed the pond once more. He scratched his head. “There’s something else different. Other than its being so much smaller.”
“The reeds are drying up. It’s murder on us frogs. We like to play in the reeds.”
“No, something else.”
“The nasty smell? It’s the algae and everything from the old pond bottom rotting in the sun.”
“No, not that.” Bagley tried to picture the pond as it had been last time. And then he remembered. “The swans. What’s become of the swans? Surely an osprey couldn’t eat a swan!”
“No, the swans just left. The place was getting too small for them.”
“Where did they go?”
“I heard one of the youngsters bragging about how they were flying to a bigger pond, a couple of miles west of here.”
“Hm,” Bagley said thoughtfully. He squinted up at the nest on the telephone pole. “Does one fish a day satisfy that osprey?”
“Well, yes and no. It used to. But now that the pickings are so easy, he eats two or three a day. I think he only eats the parts he likes best and tosses the rest out.”
“When does he go out hunting again?”
“Usually around two in the afternoon. He likes a late lunch.”
Bagley thought some more and then said: “Listen. I have an idea. But it’ll take time.” He pointed straight up. “Do you think you could meet me back here when the sun’s about there?”
“You really have an idea?” Paddy said, hopping forwards.
“Please don’t get your hopes up. But it’s possible.”
“Oh, but that’s wonderful! I knew we could count on you!”
In his enthusiasm Paddy jumped right up and offered one of his short front legs to shake. Bagley took it.
&nbs
p; “In the meantime you can check on your family, Paddy. And, perhaps, if you have the chance, you could check on Bridget?”
Paddy couldn’t speak. What was he doing, shaking hands with a weasel!
“Back here, at midday?” Bagley asked, releasing the frog.
Paddy just nodded. But as the weasel headed for the reeds the bullfrog found his deep voice.
“Good luck, Bagley Brown!” he croaked.
THE BEACH
Bagley retraced his steps, crossing the road and then creeping along the sandy shoulder towards the beach. But this time he kept a cautious eye cocked up at the nest.
As he neared the foot of the osprey’s telephone pole, he got a whiff of something rotten and glanced into a shallow ditch that ran by the road there. His fur stood on end. There must have been two dozen fish skeletons in the ditch. Many had flesh and scales still hanging on the bones—fish the bird had merely sampled. These were crawling with bugs.
Bagley got away from there as fast as his paws would carry him. He scurried around the edge of the beach parking lot and didn’t stop till he was on top of a dune. From there he looked down at the beach. Nothing had changed. There were still only the three kinds of creatures in sight: the sea gulls, the sandpipers, and the fishermen.
As a rule, weasels aren’t avid beachgoers. They don’t care for sunbathing, and they’re not partial to the sorts of shellfish that wash up on the sand. Even the weasels of Wainscott, who live so near the shore and have so much spare time, never go to the beach. And of all the Wainscott weasels, Bagley liked the beach the least. It was more exposed to the open sky than any other place. On hot summer days, colorful umbrellas cropped up on the sand, but they were used by human beings, and except for these, there were no hiding places from birds of prey.
This morning, though, Bagley forced himself to slide down the seaward side of the dune to the beach. Once there, he understood another reason for staying away from it. Bad footing. If a bird dove at him, his paws would spin in the sand.