‘Tinker will be jealous that I’ve managed to stay outside,’ muttered Pedlar, hopefully, to himself. ‘He’ll be sorry that I’ve managed to experience the great as well as the small.’
The scent of the storm came closer as the distant line of rain drove into the ground and new Earth-odours were awakened, rushing like river currents over the landscape towards the notch where he sat and waited.
Then came the wind, whipping through the tall stinging nettles, tearing at the Hedgerow garlic and bindweed. A mason wasp was ripped from its perch on a thorn and carried away into Infinity in an instant. Pedlar gulped and grasped the blackthorn more tightly. Hart’s-tongue fern and broadleafed docks lashed the ground under duress: primroses closed, returning to buds. The wind screamed through the Hedgerow, reshaping it by the moment, sending great ripples along its broad flank. The Hedgerow became an excited animate creature, straining to run off somewhere, over the hills and valleys.
‘So much for the wind,’ said Pedlar, impressed but not overwhelmed by its power. He wondered what it would have been like in the mystical nights of long ago, when there were no Hedgerows or trees, when the wind tore through the long grasses to which Pedlar’s ancestors must have clung like harvest mice.
Next came the rain wearing a cloak of darkness, hissing out of the sky.
A youthful vole which had ventured out of its hole below Pedlar, thinking the storm was over, shouted, ‘Heck!’ and went hurtling back down its hole again.
Pedlar gasped under the onslaught of the flood, hardly able to take a breath without taking in water. Then came the thunder and lightning, which almost blew him out of the Hedgerow and made his eyes bulge.
‘All right, that’s it!’ Pedlar said. ‘I’m scared.’
When the next lull arrived, he scrambled down the blackthorn and into the hole in the bank. The tunnel sloped upwards at first, which kept out the water, then dipped down to a number of chambers, one of which was Pedlar’s nest.
* * *
The labyrinth of tunnels had been dug directly below a twisty-looped hazel branch – a curlie-wurlie – a powerful symbol in mouselore. A curlie-wurlie could be good or evil, had the properties of both: those who deserved good received it, and those who deserved bad, likewise. It protected the nests below from weasels and stoats, who were loath to pass under the shadow of such a significant emblem.
As Pedlar passed by Tinker’s nest, his cousin called, ‘Had enough, eh?’
‘For now,’ sniffed Pedlar.
Crossing his own odour-line he found his small nest and settled down on the warm hay, now safely closeted by the comfortable feeling of having earthen walls around him and an earthen roof above. A wych-hazel root looped out of one wall of his nest, which Pedlar often gnawed in times of boredom. It was something to do, something to keep his teeth in trim. He did it now, while listening to the distant thunder, now muted to a far-off pounding.
Curled into a spiral, his tail over his eyes, it was not long before Pedlar was dozing, and for the first time, he dreamed the Dream. In the Dream his ancestors came to him and urged him to go to the House, telling him that his destiny lay within its walls. ‘History and mythology will become entwined,’ they told him, ‘as the columbine and ivy entwine.’ His ancestors came to him as wisps of marsh mist, speaking with tongues of rustling leaves, but their meaning was plain. He was to leave the Hedgerow and go to the House: there to seek his part in the events that were to befall that great country, there to become the One who will walk with the many, they said.
When he woke, with a start and a shiver, Pedlar went immediately to a very old mouse, a sage, named Diddycoy. The wizened old fellow was over four hundred nights and his grisly appearance frightened many of the younger mice. Diddycoy lived right at the back of the colony, in a large chamber, with a few of the older does and bucks, where he was not likely to be disturbed by the frantic energy of the young.
When Pedlar timidly entered his chamber, Diddycoy said gruffly, ‘I’ve no food to swop, young mouse, nothing at all, so you can go and peddle elsewhere.’
‘I don’t want to swop anything, I’ve come to ask a question,’ said the nervous Pedlar.
He was allowed to stay and he told Diddycoy his dream, asking the old sage whether it was true.
‘What do you mean, true?’ said Diddycoy.
‘Well, do you think I must embark on a journey to the House?’
‘Of course you must,’ instructed Diddycoy knowingly. ‘What do you think the damn dream was for? Heed the call of your ancestors, young ’un, or you’ll regret it to the end of your nights.’ The sage gave Pedlar a curious look, as if seeing him with new eyes.
‘You think I must go now?’
‘If this is a call, it means you’ve been given a great purpose and you’ll dream the Dream again,’ replied Diddycoy, ‘and your ancestors will tell you when the time has come for you to leave home. Now, be off, my own time is past and my nap is overdue.’
Pedlar left Diddycoy’s place, feeling awed that a humble mouse such as himself had been chosen to receive the wisdom of his ancestors. Yet once he was back amongst his own crowd, with excitable mice like the youngsters Totter and Pikey running around like mad creatures, it was hard to believe that he had been singled out in any way.
But he was visited by the Dream again, several more times, and the call became more urgent with each visitation. ‘You are the One who will walk with the many.’ Only then did Pedlar begin to understand that he might be destined to tread a path different from that of other mice…
When deep spring came, Pedlar began wandering further and further away from the Hedgerow, out into the fields. He kept testing himself, seeing how far he could go away from familiar smells, sounds and sights, before he got worried. One night he went so far the Hedgerow’s perfumes were lost to him and in the moon’s bright glow its silent line became another curve of the Earth.
He knew that out in the open fields there were few animals, but in the shelter he had left there were hundreds, thousands of creatures. Yet for the first time in his life he could not smell them, nor could he hear them. They were closeted and contained in a world apart.
It was only out there in the fields that Pedlar really became aware of the rhythm of life in the Hedgerow, which in turn was in tune with the rhythms of the Earth. Only now that he was out of its immediate influence, did he see how important that rhythm was in creating harmony. This did not mean that there were no conflicts in the Hedgerow, no desperate lives, no terrible deaths, but that the harmony of the whole was safe and well. The Hedgerow was locked neatly and securely to the Earth and the vibrations of the Earth flowed through the Hedgerow.
Pedlar was a little frightened by this revelation. It made him feel like an exile in the making, looking at his own land from afar. But there was excitement too mingled with his fear, and he felt this was rewarding.
He also felt the Hedgerow drawing him back, very strongly, but he was able to resist for as long as it took to satisfy his hunger.
‘The beets are much nicer out there in the middle,’ he told Tinker casually, when he returned.
The bees and wasps were buzzing in the Hedgerow, creating quite a racket, and Tinker shook his head sharply as if he couldn’t believe his ears.
‘You’ve been out there?’ cried Tinker. ‘You’re crazy. Don’t you know a kestrel can see you from – from as high as a cloud in open country?’
Pedlar thought his cousin was exaggerating. ‘It’s not exactly open country – there’s lots of beet leaves to hide under.’ He paused and spoke thoughtfully, ‘You feel the Hedgerow pulling you back,’ he said. ‘It’s strange. I wonder if you can get right outside that feeling – right away from its influence?’
When Pedlar reached the age of 142 nights his Dream told him he must say his farewells and set off on his journey to the House. It was time to turn his back on the ditch and Hedgerow on the edge of the fields, which had been his life since birth, and venture out to seek the mysterious ‘many’
with whom he must walk in order to satisfy the demands of his ancestors. Hours of chaff falling like golden rain were upon him, the dock leaves hung like limp, dried tongues in the heat of the summer, and yet his feet were itching to carry him away.
There were rituals to perform before the leave-taking, both secret and public. The secret ritual was done during the day, when everyone was asleep. It meant burying a wild rosehip under a primrose root. This had three-fold significance. It was to ensure he returned to eat the fruit of the Earth. It was an offering to the one Creator: a gesture that the would-be traveller hoped might be returned by the Creator if the traveller became hungry on his journey. And finally, the wild rosehip was symbolic of a mouse’s heart, which he left in his homeland of the Hedgerow.
The next step involved water, the life-blood of the mouse, which Pedlar took from the ditch, carried in his mouth, and deposited on the spot where he had buried the wild rosehip.
The public ritual took place at the time he was to leave. He broadcast his intentions of going by carrying pieces of his nest back to the surface and leaving it for the winds to strew, until his chamber was bare. Then he slept one hour in his bare chamber, on the naked Earth. This was noticed by other mice and a gathering took place at the entrance to the chambers. When he was ready, Pedlar left the hole without a word and travelled a way down the Hedgerow. He returned, then left again and went a little further along the ditch. Finally, he returned for the last time to say his goodbyes to the band that had gathered, for on his third departure he would not return again, unless it was for good.
There were many to see him off, including the elderly Diddycoy.
‘It’s not poor circumstances which drive me from the Hedgerow,’ he told his friends and relatives, in a formal farewell speech. ‘Now spring is here, food is plentiful on the edge of beet and corn country. It’s not loneliness, though I’m considered a solitary animal and prefer my own company much of the time.
‘Nor,’ he said positively, ‘is it any death-wish, for as a yellow-necked mouse you know I can be expected to live for five hundred long, long nights – half a millennium! – and like most mice I consider myself fortunate in being a creature blessed with longevity. The mayfly comes and goes, a brief, burning life often lasting only a single day – but a mouse is almost for ever.’
There were murmurs of, ‘True, true…’
‘No, it is none of these. I have heard the call of my ancestors. They have bid me travel to the land of the House where a great multitude awaits me, and so I must leave you and my beloved Hedgerow. It may be that I shall return one night, to be back amongst you…’
‘My own dear coz,’ sniffed Tinker.
‘…but by then I may be as old as Diddycoy here, not as wise of course, for he is unique…’
‘Don’t try to bamboozle me with your flattery,’ grumbled Diddycoy, clearly pleased.
‘…but until then, my friends, goodbye – and keep you safe from stoats, barn owls, weasels and their kind.’
And so he set forth, bravely, with heart beating fast and a kind of terror in his breast.
‘You show those house mice,’ shouted the young Pikey after him. ‘You show ’em!’
This was a bit tactless, since there were many house mice living in the Hedgerow, one or two of whom had come to see Pedlar off, but those who heard decided to let it go, willing to accept that the youngster meant House mice, rather than house mice.
Pedlar acknowledged the yell with a wave of his tail.
As for his dangerous journey, Pedlar told himself if you had good ears, a good nose, and were quick, you stood as much chance as any other creature of not being eaten alive. And, after all, he could jump as high as hogweed in the air; dart as swiftly as an adder bites; balance with the aid of his tail on an out-of-reach twig; magically blend with his surroundings. His ears were sharp, his senses keen, his whiskers fine.
There was not much that troubled Pedlar about going out into the great world, except meeting with a scarcity of food. No, his greatest burden lay in fulfilling the expectations of his ancestors, and perhaps gaining his own place in mouse history. But like all mice he did like to eat well.
And he could always come back, couldn’t he?
RIBBLESDALE
Once in the thick jungle of the ditch-bank, Pedlar tunnelled through the grasses and weeds, trusting he would not meet a predator. The territorial urine markings he found along the way were many and varied, but so long as he did not pause he was in no immediate danger.
Some of his journey followed the Hedgerow itself, so he did not feel too alienated from his surroundings, but eventually he had to make the break and set off through a field of corn. He did so by urging himself, ‘You-can-do-it-you-can-do-it-you-can-do-it.’ And to his surprise, he did it.
What met him was a crop of oats and only yet in its infancy: still half-green. The ears hung sorrowfully, drooping high above him, forming a double-thick canopy to his forest of stalks. All the while he had to keep stopping and climbing an individual stalk to ask directions of both friendly and unfriendly mice, some yellow-necks like himself, some wood mice (known as long-tailed fieldmice out in the jungles of corn) and harvest mice.
Sometimes he was told to push off, sometimes he was ignored, sometimes he would be given a direction.
“Scuse me,’ he would say, ‘which way is the House?’
‘Keep the sun over your left shoulder,’ he might be told, ‘and you’ll come to a wide ditch. Ask again there.’
It was all very well to say ‘Keep the sun over your left shoulder’, but what about when he was at the bottom of a dense forest of corn, and later kale, and couldn’t see the sun at all! After two days and nights, he began to feel like a veteran campaigner. But all the while he travelled Pedlar knew he had to beware of predators, especially stoats during the day and owls at night. With this in mind he tried to keep to the furrows, or ditches with plenty of bolt holes, or tree roots. When he needed to rest, he would find soft mosses to burrow in, this being the quickest and most efficient way of providing himself with cover for a short period of time.
Once, he saw a badger – a great giant of a fellow snuffling around amongst some acorns at the foot of an oak – and the sight almost made his heart stop. Badgers were not above snapping up a mouse if one wandered within reach. Even as Pedlar stared, the badger pulled a long earthworm out of its hole and chomped it down with great relish.
Finally, weary and travel-worn, feeling as if he had crossed the world and back again, Pedlar arrived in a strange land on the far side of a wide disused road. The smooth hard surface beneath his feet signalled to Pedlar that he was now in new territory and he knew that from now on new rules would apply. It took him some time to get the tar from between his toes, but once he was satisfied with the state of his paws, he looked up and around him.
It was dawn and the sky was almost obscured by the high, curving grasses which rose five times his own length above his head. However, towering even above this forest, as tall as a live oak, was an enormous square object which filled him with feelings of relief and foreboding in equal parts. There could be no doubt that this was his destination. It was the House to which the voices of his ancestors had directed him.
Something stirred in Pedlar’s racial memory. Some of his ancestors had lived in massive structures of stone, with thick walls and straw on the flagstoned floors, and crenellated walls and towers. Magnificent places of many chambers, many tunnels. Every so often the nudniks in these great buildings had put on suits of iron, grabbed iron sticks, and gone to confront other nudniks knocking on their door with treetrunks. All these images were transmitted to Pedlar as he drew on his empathy with the past and tried to use it to help him understand the present.
The big House before him threw a phantom shadow over the whole region. There were many mysterious square eyes in its surface, which shone blindingly down on the yellow-necked mouse. The House looked a sinister and wicked place, with a life of its own.
Anothe
r mouse might have turned back at this point, but Pedlar kept telling himself that he was the one and that inside were the many whom he must meet. The inhabitants, he knew, would be mainly house mice. These were savage little creatures who bit first and asked you your business afterwards. They would know the nooks of their homeland and any stranger entering from the Outside would automatically be at a great disadvantage.
Pedlar could hear some harvest mice in the tall grasses of the jungled plain before the House. He found their tracks, followed one, and found its maker, dangling from a stalk by its useful tail. Pedlar spoke in his bluff, Hedgerow dialect.
‘Who lives in that great country standing above the grasses?’ he asked, without preamble.
The harvest mouse looked up, a little startled since she had obviously not heard anyone enter the clearing. She dropped from the stalk and sat up on her haunches with a seed in her foreclaws – the ‘high-nose’ position mice call it – eating the kernel of the grass seed. Once she had eaten she dropped immediately to low-nose position, four feet on the ground, she sniffed and shuffled around a little, assessing whether this meeting was to be friendly or not, and finally decided the much bigger yellow-neck meant her no harm.
‘Country?’ she replied with her mouth full. ‘Oh, the House? You want to stay away from there. It’s full of barbarous tribes. You’d be killed. Anyway,’ she continued, going high-nose and munching away on a new seed, ‘there’s only one way to enter the House and that’s through the maze under the floor. The maze is guarded by a vicious shrew, called Tunneller. She’d bite your head off and spit it between your legs before your body hits the ground, believe me.’
Pedlar had met shrews before and knew them to be, in general, bad-tempered and violent creatures.
‘And she won’t let me past without a fight?’
‘You have to give her a piece of cheese to get past, and you don’t look as if you’ve got any.’
Pedlar certainly wasn’t carrying cheese to pay any toll. He wasn’t even sure what cheese was, exactly, and he didn’t want to appear even more ignorant than he had already. There was a plant called ‘bread and cheese’ but it was nothing special, so he was pretty sure they weren’t talking about that.
House of Tribes Page 2