The Farthing Wood Collection 1 Read Online Free PDF Page A

kindly to his boastful manner at all.
    When he arrived on the scene the noise had ceased and there was a tug-of-war being enacted between Smooth Otter on the one hand and a very angry and determined Lean Vixen on the other. In the middle, with its legs in the jaws of the fox and its head clamped in the sharp teeth of the otter, was an unfortunate and very dead pheasant. Both animals had braced themselves, digging their feet into the damp soil and pulling hard. The vixen’s greater strength began to tell. But with the arrival of Slow Otter her antagonist was spurred on to new efforts.
    ‘Whatever is he doing?’ Slow Otter muttered. ‘This is a struggle he can’t possibly win.’
    Sure enough the carcass began to come apart. With a final wrench the vixen tore the body loose and Smooth Otter was left with only the pheasant’s head in his mouth.
    Lean Vixen dropped the bird. ‘You stupid animal,’she snarled at Smooth Otter. ‘Do you plan to wrest our food from our very jaws? What kind of madness will you get up to next? Be warned.’ She turned to look at Slow Otter. ‘You too,’ she growled. ‘Try those sort of tricks again and we foxes will drive you from the Wood!’
    ‘You and who else?’ muttered Smooth Otter. But it was his turn to feel humiliated and he turned to go.
    Slow Otter followed. ‘Just lead us back to the stream,’ he urged his companion. ‘There’s nothing for us here.’
    ‘There will be,’ Smooth Otter vowed grimly. ‘You don’t think I give up that easily, do you?’

In March Farthing Wood was carpeted with banks of celandine and wood anemone. Primroses gleamed in the sunny glades and marsh plants sprouted along the stream’s edges. Frogs, toads, newts and reptiles emerged from hibernation and, in the mammal world, hedgehogs woke and went about their business again.
    One old creature, who had lived in the Wood for many seasons, was known as Sage Hedgehog because of his wisdom. During his long winter sleep he had experienced strange and striking dreams which he believed were some kind of premonition. He related them to those animals willing to listen.
    ‘I saw a strange place with many animals. Animals such as us; such as those who live here. It was like Farthing Wood, yet it was not Farthing Wood. A beautiful antlered beast with the grace and carriage of a deer, but ghostly white, stood on its edge. On the one side was a poor broken piece of ground, barren of creatures and full of the noise and danger of humans and their works. On the other, rolling grassland and woodland. The white beast looked from one place, the one with nothing, to the place with the animals. Then it grew dark and the deer’s white coat shimmered likea pale beacon in the gloom. All at once the beast disappeared and there was nothing but darkness. Over and over I have dreamed this dream. I believe there is a message in it; that it foretells the end of Farthing Wood.’
    A group of hedgehogs who were listening stirred uneasily. They were puzzled and a little shaken. One of them said, ‘Dreams are dreams. This could mean anything – or nothing.’
    Sage Hedgehog looked at the animal steadily. ‘There is a different air in Farthing Wood now,’ he said. ‘The Wood is threatened. I feel it in my bones. It’s a new sensation. Before the winter I felt nothing and was content’
    ‘There’s no evidence of a threat,’ a young hedgehog said. ‘Everything is just the same as when we began our sleep.’
    Another hedgehog was more cautious. ‘There have been other times when the sage one has spoken strange words. And I recollect when once he foretold a great storm and urged us to take shelter and we –’
    ‘Yes, yes,’ cut in another. ‘We didn’t take any notice of him and then there was a storm and some hedgehogs were drowned when the stream burst its banks. So what? Simply a coincidence, I’d say.’
    ‘Well, I wouldn’t,’ the first hedgehog returned. ‘He’s something of a prophet in my