Brendon Chase

by B. B.

  ‘Not he,’ said Robin with emphasis, ‘If he found us here it would be all U. P. with us. We’d be hauled off to Cherry Walden.’

  ‘What about waiting up for it tonight with the rifle? There’s more moon now and we might get a shot.’

  ‘All right, let’s. I’d like to shoot a badger. We’d skin it and make a lovely pelt. We could make some skins to wear; my breeks are wearing out pretty badly.’

  Big John exhibited his right trouser leg. The shabby old flannels he had worn since he came to the Chase were ripped to ribbons from the knee downwards. He had caught them on a briar. ‘We shan’t have any clothes fit to wear if we live here much longer.’

  ‘By Jove! That would be fun,’ exclaimed Robin, quite perking up, ‘and we can save all the rabbits’ skins and stitch ’em together.’

  ‘How?’

  Robin was nonplussed for a moment. ‘I know,’ he exclaimed, ‘there’s some string we’ve saved from the Quaker Oats packets – that would do. It’s thick string and we can unravel it; it would make strong thread.’

  ‘Well, if I bag the badger I’ll have the skin for a coat,’ said Big John.

  ‘I’ll shoot it,’ said Robin imperiously. ‘I’m the chief, it’s my job.’

  ‘But it’s my turn to fire,’ said Big John sulkily. ‘You had the last shot.’

  ‘Let’s toss.’

  ‘Righto!’

  Robin produced a penny, his only worldly wealth.

  ‘Call.’

  ‘Heads!’

  ‘Heads it is,’ said Robin with rather bad grace. ‘All right, Big John, you shoot, but if you miss I’ll have two extra turns with the rifle.’

  That night, after they’d had supper – pigeon’s eggs and a squirrel, which was surprisingly good, as tender and white as a chicken – they turned in early.

  Already the moon was rising over the forest trees and as the glow in the west died its new pale light shone down on the clearing. Owls hooted and they heard a fox barking, far away. Big John lay at the entrance with his rifle fixed on the hazels ten yards distant. They had sighted it in daylight and had wedged it into position with logs. Even if the light was bad they might hit the beast, for they had put the refuse in a small heap under the bushes and carefully aligned the sights on it. They had even tried out the experiment by placing a piece of wood behind the heap. The bullet had pierced it, right through the centre.

  They had no means of telling the time for Robin’s watch had stopped – he had forgotten to wind it up one night – and they had to guess the time by the sun.

  As they crouched there waiting they felt like lion hunters sitting up over a kill.

  The moon had already reached its zenith and had begun to dip down behind the trees. Soon all would be complete darkness for it was now an overcast night and a slight wind was blowing, rustling the bushes in a creepy sort of way.

  Just when they thought their mysterious visitor would never come Robin gently touched Big John’s arm. That worthy was almost asleep. He awakened with a start and nearly upset the rifle. ‘Hist! It’s coming!’

  Big John’s heart suddenly began to thump wildly, hammering at the base of his skull: thump, thump, thump. His mouth went dry. Some way off they heard sticks cracking. A heavy body was blundering through the bushes.

  Then, peering into the gloom of the hazels he saw something moving. It was a large pale object and it grunted. ‘There it is!’ whispered Robin in Big John’s ear, ‘Wait till you can see it more clearly and take your time.’

  ‘Whatever is it?’

  ‘I don’t know, it’s bigger than a badger.’

  At that moment the moon was obscured by cloud and when it reappeared it had slid behind the crown of a distant oak.

  ‘I can’t see a thing,’ whispered Big John, nearly choking with excitement, ‘but it’s there, eating up the stuff. Shall I fire?’

  ‘Yes, fire!’

  Very gently Big John squeezed the trigger. There came the blunt report and a short sharp thud of the bullet striking a heavy object.

  Instantly there arose the most blood-curdling sound the boys had ever heard. It was like a human scream but infinitely louder; it was a squeal, a grunt and a scream, all rolled into one. A terrific blundering and crashing followed in the bushes and then something rushed across the clearing right in front of the oak. It passed so swiftly that it looked like an enormous dog, but a dog with extremely short legs.

  As it passed, Big John fired again, but they heard the bullet sing like an angry hornet away among the trees.

  A terrified owl hooted, more distant cracking and smashing of sticks sounded, and then there was nothing but the wind in the trees and a complaining owl which called ‘Eeewe-wip! Eeewe-wip!’ in a penetrating urgent voice.

  ‘I hit ’im,’ said Big John excitedly. ‘I hit him all right, but he’s gone.’

  ‘Serve him right, he won’t come back!’

  ‘But I didn’t kill him; we shall never know what it was.’

  Together they gingerly approached the bushes and Robin struck a match and examined the ground. All the refuse had gone. There was no sign of fur.

  ‘I believe you missed him,’ muttered Robin, trying to shield the wavering flame of the match with his coat, ‘There’s no fur or blood about.’

  ‘I didn’t miss him, I swear,’ said Big John, ‘I heard the bullet strike. I’ll bet he won’t go far.’

  ‘Well, it’s no use looking for him now, the moon’s setting. We’ll have a look tomorrow.’

  Together they re-entered the tree and lay down on their bracken beds. For a long time they talked and argued. Robin said it was a dog; Big John insisted it was a badger, the grandfather of all badgers.

  Next morning, at first light, the outlaws were out hunting in the bracken. A crushed fern frond here, a broken stick there, led them some way into the bushes and then for a time they found nothing. After a while the spoor petered out entirely and they cast about like baffled hounds.

  ‘If only we had Tilly here with us, she’d find it,’ said Robin.

  Big John, who was on all fours examining the bracken, suddenly let out a shout. ‘Here! Come here! There’s blood!’

  Sure enough, on a bracken stem was a spot of blood, and a little farther on, another. ‘I hit him all right,’ said Big John triumphantly, ‘I told you so. We’ll find him in a minute.’

  And find him they did, not forty yards from the clearing. There was a deep ditch choked with bramble and fern which at one time no doubt had been cut for drainage, for the forest was very damp in places. And there, sticking out from under the bracken they saw a most amazing sight. It was a half-grown pig, a perfectly ordinary pig, like the one at Cherry Walden Bank Holiday Fête – the boys had bowled for it but it had been won by the vicar’s gardener, much to their disgust.

  ‘Well, I …!’ Big John was speechless. They got hold of its curly tail and hauled it out, a perfectly beautiful pig! There was no need to ‘stick’ it, the bullet had performed that grisly operation for them. The crumb of lead had, by an extraordinary piece of luck, cut its throat.

  ‘It must be a wild one,’ said Robin after a pause, ‘there’s no reason why it shouldn’t be. There’s no farm within miles and no house in the Chase but the old charcoal burner’s.’

  ‘It must be his,’ said Big John, rather sorrowfully looking at his victim. The pig lay on its side and seemed to be grinning sardonically.

  ‘Well, we can’t help that. It shouldn’t come rooting about camp pinchin’ things; serves him right.’

  ‘What are we going to do with it, bury it?’

  Robin turned a face of utter scorn on his brother. ‘Bury it? Whoever heard of an outlaw burying wild boar? Why, Big John, where are your senses? Can’t you see we’ve got bacon for breakfast? Can’t you see we’ve got fat, we’ve got hams? We’re in clover! It’s the most amazing bit of luck that’s happened since we came! Think of it, Big John. We come here, we find a camp ready made, a pigeon obligingly flies into the very tree we’re
camping under and makes our supper and now – a porker, a perfectly good porker, comes and provides us with bacon! Here, give us a hand, we’ll drag him back to camp.’

  Robin and the wild pig

  Robin grabbed the tail, Big John seized a leg, and together they lugged the pig back to the clearing.

  Breakfast over, the outlaws then had leisure to examine their prize. Truth to say, each felt a little embarrassed, even a little like murderers. Pigs are such good-natured, hearty creatures; like domestic ducks, they have a keen sense of fun, they belonged to that other civilized world just outside the forest. Yet, as Robin pointed out, they are originally woodland animals and descendants from the wild swine which at one time inhabited all the larger forests of Britain.

  There seemed nothing wild about this one. It lay on its side on the green grass as if it were peacefully asleep in Farmer Baldrick’s sty at home.

  Nevertheless, Robin and Big John could not help thinking of that globular silver dish at the Dower House and the exquisite smells which used to emerge from it at breakfast time.

  ‘Well, Master Robin, what about this pig forsooth?’ asked Big John, standing looking down at his victim. They had washed up the breakfast things and had taken off their coats.

  ‘Well, don’t ask me, I didn’t shoot the poor porker.’

  ‘I don’t know how to skin a pig,’ said Big John. ‘I suppose one does skin a pig?’

  ‘Dashed if I know. Wait a minute …’ Robin thought hard. ‘No, of course you don’t skin a pig! Don’t you remember Rumbold’s pig last Christmas holidays? He wanted us to come and see him kill it but we wouldn’t. Don’t you remember how we went out on our bicycles because the squealing was so awful? And we wondered how he could be such a beast to kill it after looking after it all the year and scratching its back and feedin’ it.’

  ‘Of course … and then after it had been killed it was scalded to get the hairs off and Rumbold scrubbed it on the table in the old laundry! We watched him do it.’

  ‘Yes, and then what happened? He salted it, didn’t he?’

  ‘Yes, he salted it all over with saltpetre and salt.’

  ‘Well, we haven’t got any saltpetre and precious little salt.’

  ‘Then we’re sunk, old boy,’ said Big John glumly. ‘We shan’t have bacon for many mornings; this old porker will pretty soon go bad, especially if the weather turns really hot, and – phew! – won’t he smell!’

  ‘We shall have to bury him then, cut off what we can eat and what we think we can keep and bury the rest.’

  ‘It’s an awful waste,’ said Big John. ‘We wouldn’t have shot it if we’d known it was a pig. Besides, it’s somebody’s pig, it must be. If it was found out who’d killed it, we should be in for a fine old row. We might be accused of stealing and have to go to prison.’

  ‘Wait a moment,’ exclaimed Robin suddenly, ‘don’t you remember that when we were crossing that last field, just before we came into the Chase, we saw those cattle round a salt lick?’

  ‘Well, what about it?’

  ‘Why, there’s our salt, you booby! There were several lumps lying about; the farmer wouldn’t notice if we took one. We can pound it up and salt our pig with it, just like Rumbold did!’

  ‘But we shall want something to salt it in, shan’t we?’

  ‘That’s easy. We must find a hollow log, or hollow one out into a trough, and we can salt him in that!’

  ‘Well,’ said Big John admiringly, ‘you are a bright chap, I shouldn’t have thought of that. We’ll fetch the salt tonight. It’s a long walk, but we’ll find the field all right.’

  ‘And meanwhile, let’s look for our salting trough,’ said Robin.

  The boys did not take long to find the very thing, an old half-decayed ash trunk which lay upon its side not far from the clearing. They gouged out the upper side with their hunting knives until they had made quite a deep trench. Then they set to work to cut up the pig. Robin, who had a gift for carving, soon had the animal correctly dismembered. The fat hams looked most appetizing. It was lucky that the bullet had saved them the trouble of bleeding the pig, otherwise, despite the salt, the meat would have gone bad.

  As soon as dusk fell they retraced their steps to the forest edge and speedily discovered the lump of rock salt. It was queer looking stuff, of a purple colour, but they ground and pounded it to a powder and hard work it was. Next, they fetched water from the nearby stream and filled the trough to the brim and after singeing the hairs off the skin they popped the pieces in, covering the whole contraption with boughs, to mask it from any prowling animal.

  They left the pig to soak for seven days and then removed it from the salt. It smelt as fresh as the day they cut it up. When this was done Robin had another idea. Smoked pig!

  ‘Big John, look ye here prithee, now we’ve cured this porker, we ought to smoke it; the flavour will be improved no end.’

  ‘Isn’t that a bit risky?’ asked Big John. ‘Won’t someone see the smoke?’

  ‘Yes, we can’t smoke him during the day. We’ll do it after dark. We’ll bank up a good smoky fire and let the pig hang in it all night. Nobody will see the smoke. You see,’ said Robin, ‘the fire we have during the day doesn’t show if we’re careful, but smoking the pig will make an awful “smeech” as Rumbold calls it.’

  So that night they built a fire of oak wood dust and rigged up a rough tripod of sticks to suspend the carcass and the hams. The thick blue-green smoke rose up in a column on the quiet air and ascended into the starlit heavens, unseen and unsmelt by anyone but the outlaws.

  They smoked the pig for a week and at the end of that time it had turned a golden brown. Once the hams fell into the fire but were rescued by Robin. At last it was all done and ready for eating. Bacon for breakfast would now be a regular thing. They had melted a quantity of fat from the pig and were well provided for some weeks to come. Fried pigeon’s eggs and smoked bacon made a breakfast which would have satisfied the most fastidious palate and it was voted even better than the Dower House bacon.

  And so, with a good deal of luck and a certain amount of pluck, Robin and Big John entered on their third week in the forest. No one had bothered them, they had not seen a soul and they had become accustomed to the fine outdoor life.

  The curing of the pig and various chores about the camp had occupied all their time. But now the pig was done they would have time at last to explore, or as Robin said, ‘begin to really enjoy ourselves’. There were so many things to find; Smokoe Joe’s house for instance, Smokoe Joe himself – they had decided to observe him from afar, however; there were butterflies to seek – had not the Whiting murmured the magic words purple emperor? There was the Blind Pool to find, wherein there might be fish to catch; there were birds’ nests and a hundred other delights which up to now they had had no time to seek.

  Eight miles away was Cherry Walden and in Cherry Walden was Aunt Ellen and Sergeant Bunting! But the outlaws gave them no thought, they continued to rise each dawn with the birds and go forth into the greenwood to hunt and bird’s-nest to their heart’s content, living their brave new life among the ferny glades and mighty oaks.

  6. Harold

  ‘Please’m, there’s a gentleman to see you.’

  Aunt Ellen, looking harassed and flustered, bundled up her letters into her desk and shut it hurriedly. She had been in the middle of a long letter to the boys’ parents in India to acquaint them with the news that they had run away.

  ‘Who is it, Emma? What name did he give?’

  ‘He didn’t give no name, ’m, but ’e said ’e’d come about Master Robin and John.’

  ‘Show him in, Emma.’

  Aunt Ellen felt a sudden hope rising in her heart: perhaps the boys had been found.

  A pleasant-looking young man entered and introduced himself. ‘My name is Hurling, and I represent the Morning Star, madam. My paper has sent me down to get some facts about the disappearance of your two nephews.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ gasped Aunt El
len, sinking down into the chair by the writing desk, ‘a reporter! No, no – I cannot … I cannot give you any information. I do not wish it to appear in the papers – far too many people know about it already.’

  ‘But, madam,’ the reporter began soothingly; Aunt Ellen cut him short.

  ‘I’m sorry, young man, but I have nothing to say on the matter; besides, it isn’t of sufficient importance to be given such publicity.’

  ‘I assure you, madam …’ but Aunt Ellen cut him short again.

  ‘Now, please, do not bother me with any more silly questions. I am driven almost demented as it is. I beg you not to mention the matter … I … I … I could not bear it – the publicity …’ Aunt Ellen shuddered.

  Rumbold was pricking out lettuces in the kitchen garden when a voice said behind him, ‘Good evening.’

  He turned round. A young man was standing on the cinder path; he had a brown leather camera box slung on his shoulder.

  ‘Good arternoon,’ said Rumbold after a pause, straightening his back and eyeing his visitor with suspicion.

  ‘Are you the gardener at the Dower House?’

  ‘I am that.’

  ‘Well, I represent the Morning Star. My paper has sent me down to get a story about the disappearance of the boys.’

  ‘Ah?’ Rumbold looked interested and began to feel important. ‘Oh, so you’re the Morning Star man, are ye? Takes it meself, allus has done.’

  ‘Splendid! Now, Mr … Mr …’

  ‘Rumbold’s the name.’

  ‘Mr Rumbold, can you let my paper have anything on the subject?’

  ‘Why surely, surely. I tells you what, I’m just a’goin’ up ’ome fer a cup of tea. Will ye come along, sir, an’ I’ll tell ye all I knows about the young devils, for devils they be, worritin’ everyone be their pranks. An’ the old lady, too … she’s driven near crazy.’ He led the way out of the kitchen garden and through the weed-grown stable yard to his cottage.

  Next morning Hannah burst into the kitchen with the Morning Star which Rumbold had given her with strict instructions to keep it away from Aunt Ellen. ‘There, Cook, wot d’you think of that, it’s in all the papers now, and there’s a picture of Rumbold, large as life, an’ Mrs Rumbold, the Dower House an’ all. Won’t the mistress be in a fit!’