by Michael Tod
Later on that hot afternoon, the three of them were together, resting in one of the trees that formed the Island Screen. Chip seemed unhappy that Marguerite planned to spend so much time alone with Sycamore and when she had suggested they go to look at the Mainland from the South Shore trees, he had tagged along.
‘What in the Sunless Pit is that?’ Sycamore asked, when a roar as of some great animal came from the direction of the meadow between them and the church.
Moments later the sound came again and the three squirrels hurried through the trees to where they could look out over the open grassy area. They could see a few humans gathered around a hump, the colour of a buttercup flower, which billowed and rippled in the breeze. Nearby a peacock and his harem of peahens scratched and pecked at the ground as though nothing unusual was happening.
‘What’s that thing?’ Sycamore asked again in a hushed voice.
‘I don’t know, I’ve seen nothing like it before,’ Marguerite replied, climbing higher for a better view.
There was a longer roar and the glossy yellow hump, seeming to have a life of its own, rose above the heads of the humans and tossed about in the breeze. An unfamiliar and disturbing burning smell blew directly towards the squirrels in the pine. The humans were now clustered below the yellow thing, which had become a round ball, and were holding something beneath it that the squirrels could not see.
‘It’s the Suns-child,’ whispered Marguerite, ‘come again!’
‘What’s the Suns-child?’ Sycamore asked, hoping for a better answer this time.
‘Twice in the past, the Sun has sent its child when we squirrels have been in trouble. Now it’s here again, only it’s grown much bigger. Look at the size of it!’
The balloon towered above the humans who were debating amongst themselves as to whether or not it was safe to fly with the wind rising and blowing so strongly from east to west. The pilot was annoyed that the boy scouts had not turned up as promised to help with holding the basket, even though a boy had come at the last minute with an apologetic message.
Finally, having decided that it was not safe, the pilot tried to release the hot air but the ripcord seemed to have jammed. With the other helpers hanging grimly on to the basket, he climbed on to the woven wicker edge and reached upwards for the cord.
He was doing this when a sudden swirl of wind spun across the meadow, lifting the dried soil from the peacocks’ dusting places, and blowing it into the eyes of those around the balloon. Each, believing that others were holding it down, let go to wipe their eyes. The balloon suddenly lifted. The pilot, also temporarily blinded, let go and fell backwards off the basket, knocking two of the helpers to the ground.
The balloon jerked violently away, rose higher and floated off in a westerly direction towards the trees, trailing a rope.
‘Grab that rope someone. Grab hold of that rope,’ the pilot shouted, getting to his feet and running after the balloon which was now nearly above the trees. Others joined the chase.
The squirrels heard the incomprehensible shouting and saw the humans running after the tail-end of the rope, now far out of their reach. It trailed through the branches towards them.
Marguerite sensed that the Suns-child should be restrained and called to Chip and Sycamore, ‘Help me catch that rope, we must help the Suns-child,’ and snatched at the trailing line as it slithered past them.
In a moment, the three squirrels, all clutching the rope, had been torn from the treetop and were being lifted bodily high into the air. ‘Hang on for your lives,’ Marguerite shouted.
It was suddenly calm and, looking down, Marguerite could see the island falling away behind them. Below was the blue water of Poole Harbour, dotted with the white spots of boat sails. There was no sensation of dizziness as there had been when she had once climbed the chalk cliff to the Barrow of the Flowers. Somehow the ground was remote and distant, not a part of the world they now found themselves in.
‘ Climb up after me,’ she called down to Chip and Sycamore and the three climbed easily, their claws gripping firmly into the fibres of the rope until they reached the basket and scrambled over the padded edge. They explored the box of woven willow stems, which contained only a few loose items of human’s coverings and two round red metal things as big as tree stumps.
Marguerite was puzzled by the silence. Apart from the occasional creaking of the willow box, there was no sound at all. Down in the trees the wind had been singing its gentle song, so familiar to the squirrels that they hardly noticed it. There pine needles had rubbed against one another, leaves shook and rustled and the movement of air past the twigs and branches always had a special sound of its own.
Suddenly she realised what had made the change – they were floating and drifting on the very wind itself!
How many times had she watched the white-winged gulls flying effortlessly on the breezes over the sea and envied them? Now she and her companions were doing the same. Her tail rose with pleasure as they climbed to the edge of the basket and sat there, claws gripping the soft padding.
‘We are flying on the wind,’ she shouted and Sycamore grinned across at Chip. This was much more fun than the stupid things he had been doing lately.
There was land below them now and the Suns-child seemed to be slowly getting nearer the ground as they drifted along.
‘There’s the Blue Pool,’ Marguerite said excitedly, as she recognised her old home demesne, the pool itself glowing sapphire in the green trees, below and to the south of them. The Sun had sent its child once again to help her and now it was carrying her to Wood Anemone. She prepared herself for the Suns-child to come down out of the sky but it floated on.
Perplexed, Marguerite recited the Kernel:
Trust in the Sun.
His ways are mysterious.
Faith can fell fir trees.
‘That must be Rowan’s Pool down there.’ She pointed out another small pool now passing beneath them, shaped like a crouching animal with an island where its eye would have been. And still the Suns-child floated on.
Have faith in the Sun
His ways are mysterious…
Rowan looked up and saw the yellow balloon above the three trees of the Eyeland.
‘The Suns-child has come again to save us,’ he called, and the besieged squirrels followed his pointing claw, then saw his face fall as the great yellow ball, its fabric now billowing lazily in the wind, drifted westwards apparently without seeing them.
The balloon floated on, the wind veering slightly and blowing more from the north-east. Below them, Marguerite could hear the gun-fire from the Lulworth ranges and see the flashes as the humans played with the thunder and lightning force. The Suns-child was now much nearer the ground and heading for a ridge of hills, beyond which she caught glimpses of the sea.
As it dropped even more the basket bumped along the ground on the top of the ridge, and their movement slowed briefly. Before the squirrels, tumbled in the bottom of the basket, could compose themselves and jump clear, it lifted again and floated feebly out towards the sea. Then, as if giving up, the Suns-child collapsed with its flaccid skin draping the mellow stone walls of a ruined barn.
‘That was fun,’ said Sycamore, crawling from the basket and brushing himself down, followed by Marguerite and Chip who did the same. ‘Where do we go from here?’
The sun was setting, painting the sky in dramatic shades of gold and red, all reflected in the waters of the circular cove to their right. A mass of rock far out to sea in the south-west was dark against the glow. Chip pointed to it.
‘That’s the Isle of Portland. That’s where I was born,’ he told Sycamore.
Rowan watched the Suns-child disappear and suddenly felt very tired. He looked at the bright western sky and the setting sun.
In times of great stress
Rest is a sound investment –
Restoring one’s strength.
‘Organise the night watch again, Spindle-friend,’ he said, ‘but count me in this
night.’
He went into the ground-drey, curled up and closed his eyes.
On Ourland, a Council Meeting had been called and was better attended than most.
Just Poplar called for order.
‘Doez any zquirrel know what huz happened to Marguerite, Chip and Zycamore? They zeem to have left Ourland with the round yellow thing the humanz brought here. The thing that looked like the Zun and floated in the zky?'’
CHAPTER TWENTY
The humans arrived at the ruined barn as it was getting dark, folded the Suns-child and carried it, with its basket, away into the night. The three squirrels hid in holes in the decaying stonework until the humans had gone, then climbed up to the highest point and looked around.
Somehow we’ve got to get back to the Blue Pool, Marguerite was thinking. But if the Sun had meant us to go there, why has the Sun’s-child brought us to the coast?
She turned towards Portland far across the bay and watched as it seemed to sink into the water as the light faded from the sky. Stars appeared, twinkling and sparkling above her head and she sensed a sadness trapped in the stone walls below her. Chip seemed to feel it too and he urged her to leave.
‘Wait,’ she said. ‘Hush.’ She had felt tingling at the base of her whiskers which usually indicated that the dolphins were trying to contact her. She cleared her mind to listen.
It was Lundy’s lone voice she heard, and by turning her head, she could locate its direction - far out in the sea to the south.
There was an urgency and concern in it that was new to her. Marguerite had only ever known calmness in the dolphin’s voices – except when Malin spoke about pollution. Lundy’s voice was far from calm now.
‘Squirrel-friend, where are you? I am on my way to your island to find you, but I sense that you are not there, but are somewhere nearer.’
Marguerite projected her thoughts seaward. ‘I am here with two friends. We are near a place where the sea is in a circle with land almost all round it. Do you know this place?’
‘That must be the Cove of Lulworth. I’ll come at once. Can you get down to the water’s edge? I need your help – desperately!’
Marguerite roused her companions, who were dozing near her, and in the light of a moon that was now casting a silver sheen over the seascape, she told them what she had just heard.
‘The dolphins need us. Lundy is coming to meet us soon. We must go down to the edge of the water in that round hollow.’
Treading carefully and alert for night-danger they went along a stony Man-track and through a wire fence, then under dark bushes the foliage of which was permanently bent landwards by winds from the sea. Slippery paths and steps took them down to the shore.
The water in the bay was calm and lapped quietly on the shingle beach. Smells of damp and rotting seaweed filled their noses as they waited, looking towards the gap in the cliffs with the open sea beyond. Soon a black shape, a dorsal fin clearly visible in the moonlight, rose from the water some distance from the shore, and they heard the sound of air being blown through the nostril on top of a dolphin’s head.
‘We are here, Lundy-friend,’ Marguerite called.
‘I am pleased that you were so near. My prayer must have been heard.’
‘The Suns-child brought us,’ Marguerite replied. ‘You prayed for us to come?’
‘It’s Finisterre. He’s tangled in a human’s fish-net on the other side of the Bank of Chesils. He is safe at the moment laying on the pebbles, but there is a storm coming and the net is stopping him from swimming.’
Marguerite looked up at the night sky and remembered the sunset.
A red sky at night
Heralds a delightful day –
Dawn to dusk sunshine.
‘Are you sure about a storm?’ she asked.
‘Yes, the red sky was deceiving. The wind is shifting to the west and then the south-west and a storm is coming. We have learned a lot about the weather in the last years. Believe me!’
( = 60 x 60 x 60 – 216,000 years)
‘I do,’ said Marguerite. ‘How can we help?’ Wood Anemone and the troubles on Ourland were forgotten.
‘I must find a way to get you to Finisterre before the storm reaches him. Can your teeth cut away the Man-cords of the net?’
‘We will do all we can.’ Marguerite replied, ‘Can you get a boat?’
‘There won’t be time for that – can you hold on to some wood if I carry it in my mouth?’
‘We will do our best. Have you brought some wood?’
‘No, can you find some on the shore? Please hurry.’
Marguerite quickly explained the situation to Sycamore who had only heard one side of the conversation and the three squirrels scurried along the high-tide mark, searching for a suitable piece of driftwood. Lundy, in the water, kept pace with them, her agitation sweeping in waves towards the land.
At first there was a total absence of wood, the glowing embers of a human’s fire explaining this. They briefly watched the tiny flames, some blue from the salt in the wood and others a soft green around a copper nail. Marguerite hustled them on until, further along, Sycamore found the handle of a broken oar, half buried in the slimy ribbons of kelpweed. They struggled to free it, tiny crabs scuttling for cover as they did so, then rolled it down the beach to the water’s edge.
‘What now?’ Marguerite called out to Lundy.
‘Are you all coming?’
Marguerite looked at the others.
‘Yes,’ said Chip simply, and once Sycamore had been told he said, ‘Wouldn’t miss this for all the nuts on Ourland.’
The squirrels grasped the wood, Chip and Marguerite at one end, Sycamore at the other.
‘Hold tightly to the wood – I’m coming in.’
There was a rush of water as the dolphin surged forwards the beach and the squirrels felt the oar handle being picked up and held high, as the great black body thrashed in the shallows and turned about. Then, with another heave and a violent beating of her tail, Lundy was in deep water again, holding the oar handle crossways in her mouth. All three squirrels were soaked and, as the dolphin swam rapidly towards the opening from the bay into the open sea, a cold night wind blowing from the south-west quickly chilled them.
Lundy was right about the wind changing, thought Marguerite, digging her claws deeper through the layers of peeling varnish and into the soft wood below.
‘Thank you all. Hold on tightly.’ Lundy let her thoughts envelop the squirrels, then she closed her mind to interrogation and tuned in to the minds of each squirrel in turn.
~ The young one is enjoying this; it’s nothing more than a great adventure to him. The other male is here because Marguerite is here, he would follow her anywhere. He loves her – I wonder if she knows?
~ Marguerite, my friend, I seem to know you so well. You have never even thought of Chip as a suitor. You really do want to help me and you have such complete trust in your Sun that you now believe you have been sent to do that. This is a strange friendship – but one I value highly. ~
Lundy reopened her mind as she swam steadily on; Marguerite was asking how far they had to go.
‘I came round the end of the Isle of Portland, through the tearing waters of the Race, but we won’t go back that way. We are swimming the Bay of Weymouth and then we’ll cross the Harbour of Portland to the Lagoon of Fleet, between the Bank of Chesils and the Mainland. Malin and Finisterre are on the seaward side of the pebble bank, with other dolphins helping, but none have teeth to cut like yours can. We should be there soon after dawn – if my strength holds.’
Marguerite sensed that swimming with her head out of water was tiring Lundy. She would normally swim sub-merged, only coming up to breathe.
Occasionally the dolphin changed course slightly to take advantage of the different currents that she seemed to know intimately. She was holding the oar handle steady and firm, and by the time they passed between the great rocks forming the breakwater that protected the ships in the Harbour of
Portland, the squirrels’ fur had dried in the wind.
‘The tide is against us,’ Lundy told Marguerite, and the squirrel sensed the extra energy the dolphin was having to expend to swim against the mass of water rushing out through the narrow gap.
The moon was turning pale and the dawn showed grey behind them. Huge metal cylinders leaned with the flow, the seaweed and barnacles on the undersides and the anchor chains of the giant buoys smelling dank and salty on the morning air. Lundy swam doggedly on against the current.
At the Ferry-bridge they passed under the metal girders, past the round black bridge supports where the whole weight of water trapped in the lagoon was trying to follow the moon’s pull and rush out into the Harbour before the earth rotated enough for it to be drawn back to fill the lagoon once again.
Marguerite knew that Lundy’s strength was failing. ‘You must rest,’ she told her.
In times of great stress
Rest is a sound investment –
Restoring one’s strength.