The Long Patrol Part 10

Cregga smiled approvingly. "I'd have picked that for you myself. Go on, take it down and try it, see how it feels!"

115 Reverently, Deodar took the saber from its peg and held it, feeling the fine balance of the long, slightly curving single-edged blade. It had a cord-whipped handle, with a basket hilt to protect the paw. So keen was its edge that it whistled menacingly when she swung it sideways.

Suddenly Lady Cregga was in front of her, brandis.h.i.+ng a poker as if it were a sword. "On guard, miss, have at ye!"

Steel changed upon steel as they fenced around the glowing forge, Cregga calling out encouragement to her pupil as she parried blows and thrusts with the poker.

"That's the way, miss! Step step, swing counter! Now step step step, thrust! Backstep sideswing! Keep that paw up! Remember, the blade is an extension of the paw, keep it flexible! And one and two and thrust and parry! Counter, step step, figure of eight at shoulder level! Footpaws never flat, up up!"

With a quick skirmis.h.i.+ng movement the badger disarmed her pupil, sending the saber quivering point first into the door. "Enough! Enough! Where did you learn saber fighting, young *un?"

Deodar looked disappointed that she had been disarmed. "From my uncle, Lieutenant Morio, but evidently I didn't learn too well, marm."

Cregga pulled the saber from the door, presenting it back to Deodar hilt first. "Nonsense! If you'd learned any better Fd have been slain. What d'you want to do, beat the Ruler of Salamandastron on your first practice?"

The young Runner took the saber back, smiling gratefully. "No, marm! Thank you for this saber-and the lesson too."

That same night the list of new recruits was posted at the entrance to the Dining Hall, and everyone clamored around it to see who had been promoted to the Long Patrol. Drill Sergeant Clubrush, who was responsible for day-to-day discipline among the younger set, sat near the doorway of the Officers' Mess with Colonel Eyebright. The hares were old friends, being of the same age and having served together many long seasons.

Eyebright tapped his pace stick gently against the table edge. "Stap me, but I wish Lady Cregga hadn't ordered me t'post that confounded list. Just look at 'em, burstin' their n6

britches to be Patrollers, all afire with the stories they've heard, an' not a mother's babe o' them knows what they're really in for, wot?"

The Sergeant sipped his small beaker of mountain beer. "Aye, sir, 'taint the same as when we was young. You didn't get t'be a Patroller then 'til you 'ad t'duck yore 'ead to get through the doorway. I recall my ole pa sayin' you had t'be long enough t'be picked for Long Patrol. I'd 'ave gived those young 'uns another season yet, two mebbe, 'tis a shame really, sir."

The Colonel turned his eyes upward to the direction of the forge. "Mark m'words, Sarge, 'tis all Rose Eyes's doin'. I've never known or heard of a badger sufferin' from the Blood-wrath so badly. I've had it from her own blinkin' mouth that she's bound to march off from here with half the garrison strength to destroy Tunn an' his Rapscallions. Have y'ever heard the like? A Ruler of Salamandastron leavin' our mountain t'do battle goodness knows how far off. She'd have had us all go if I hadn't dug me paws in!"

Clubrush finished his drink and rose stiffly. "Beggin' y'pardon, sir, I'd best get 'em organized afore supper. Oh but-tons'n'bra.s.s, w.i.l.l.yer lookit, there's young Cheeva sobbin' 'er 'eart out 'cos she wasn't posted on the list."

Eyebright nodded sadly. "She was far too young, her pa an' I decided we'd leave her a while yet. Better Cheeva cryin* now than me an' her father weepin' when Cregga's bloodl.u.s.t brings back sad results. You go about y'business now, Sarge, I'll see to her."

Drill Sergeant Clubrush marched smartly into the midst of the successful candidates, bellowing out orders.

"Keep y'fur on now, young sirs an' missies! Silence in the ranks there an' lissen up please! Right, anybeast whose name's bin posted up 'ere-in double file an' foller me. We're goin' up to Lady Cregga's forge room where I'll h'issue you wid weapons I thinks best suited to gentlebeasts. No foolin' about while yore up there ... Are you lissenin', Trowbaggs, I'll 'ave my beady eye on you, laddie buck! Keep silence in the ranks, show proper respect to the Badger marm, an' mind yore manners. Tenshun! By the right... Wait for it, Trowbaggs ... By the right quick march!"

J 117 '-; As they marched eagerly off, Colonel Eyebright went to sit *; next to the young hare Cheeva, who was sobbing uncontrol- t lably in a corner. The kindly old officer pa.s.sed her his own i;'red-spotted kerchief.

? * "Now, now, missie, this won't do, you'll flood the place $ out. Come on now, tell me all about it, wot?"

' Cheeva rocked back and forth, her face buried in the ker- >;' chief. "Waahahhh! M ... m ... my n ... n ... name wasn't ^ p... p ... posted on m' r ... r ... rotten ole li... li... list!

jv Boohoohoo!"

'^" Eyebright straightened his shoulders, adopting a stern tone.

if: "Well I should hope not! It was the unanimous verdict of the f officers who made out that list that you be kept back. D'you know why?"

$ " 'Co ... co ... cos I'm t... too yu ... yu ... young! ' x Waaahahaaarr!"

-,^ The Colonel's trim mustache bristled. "Balderdash, m'gel, $ who told y'that? The reason is that we decided you were real I; officer material, needed sorely on this mountain, doncha fe know! Suppose Searats or Corsairs launched an attack on us whilst that lot were off gallivantin'. Who d'you suppose we'd l- be lookin' for to take up a trainee commandin' position, eh, vtell me that? Long Patrol isn't the be all an' end all of young ffefeares like y'self who want t'make somethin' of themselves. JjliAin't that right, young Deodar?" 1 ; Without Cheeva seeing him, the Colonel winked broadly at Pxiar, seated nearby. She had had no need to go to the forge m for a weapon; she was polis.h.i.+ng her saber blade with a . Deodar caught on to the officer's little ruse right away. 'Oh, right you are, sah, I'd have been rather chuffed if I p was picked t'be a trainee officer at the garrison here."

Cheeva looked up, red-eyed and tear-stained. "Would you really?"

Deodar snorted as if the question was totally ridiculous. "Hah! Would I ever? How's about swappin' places-I'll stay iC here for officer trainin' an* you go bally well harin' off with that other cracked bunch?"

Colonel Eyebright shook his head sternly. "Sorry, miss, or-ders've been posted, you've got to go. Soon as I've got you /lot out o' my whiskers I'm goin' to start Cheeva's officer n8

trainin'. First task, nip off an' wash that face in cold water, miss. Can't have the troops seein' anybeast of officer material boohooin' all over the place, can we, wot?"

Cheeva gave back the kerchief and ran off half laughing and half weeping. " 'Course not, Colonel, sah, thank you very much!"

Eyebright wrung out the spotted kerchief, smiling at Deodar. "Good form, gel, thanks for your help. And don't polish that saber away now, will ye!"

After supper the new recruits laid their paws upon the table and began drumming loudly until the dining hall reverberated to the noise. This was the prelude to a bit of fun traditional to Long Patrol.

Colonel Eyebright played his part well. Striding from the Officers' Mess, he held up his pace stick for silence.

When it was quiet he began the ritual with a short rhyme.

' 'Who are these strange creatures, pray, Say who are you all, Stirring up a din an' clatter In our dining hall?''

Young Furgale rose in answer in time-honored manner.

' 'We are no strange creatures, sah, But perilous one an' all, Tell Sergeant we're the Long Patrol, We've come to pay a call!"

The Colonel bowed stiffly and marched back to the Mess, where he could be heard announcing to the waiting Clubrush: "Wake up from your slumbers, Sergeant, dear, I think your new recruits are here."

Wild cheering and unbridled laughter greeted the appearance of Clubrush. He dashed out of the Officers' Mess, roaring and glaring fiercely like the Drill Sergeant of every recruit's nightmares. On these occasions a Sergeant always wore certain 119 things, and Clubrush had dressed accordingly. 'Round his waist he wore a belt with dried and faded dock leaves hanging from it-these were supposed to be the ears of recruits that he had collected. 'Round his footpaws he trailed soft white roots-recruits' guts. Over one shoulder was a banderole of cotton thistles representing tails. AH over the Sergeant's uniform were pinned bits and pieces of herb and fauna, supposedly the gruesome bits he had collected from sloppy recruits. Scowling savagely, he paced the tables, singing in a terri-fyingly gruff voice as he went: "You 'orrible lollopy sloppy lot, You idle scruffy bunch! I'll 'ave yore tails off like a shot An' boil 'em for me lunch!

You lazy loafin' layabouts, 'Ere's wot I'll do fer starters If you don't lissen when I shouts, I'll 'ave yore guts fer garters!

O mamma's darlin's, don't you cry, Yore dear ole Sergeant's 'ere, Those foebeasts, why, they're just small fry, 'Tis me you'll learn to fear!

I'll 'ave yore ears'n'elbows, You sweepin's o' the floors, An' long before the dawn shows, You'll 'ave marched ten leagues outdoors.

O dreadful 'alf-baked dozy crowd, I'll stake me oath 'tis true. Long Patrol Warriors, tall'n'proud, Is wot I'll make of you!"

Sergeant Clubrush's fierce demeanor changed instantly as : he patted backs and shook paws of the young hares crowding 'round him.

"Welcome to me Patrol, buckoes, you'll do us proud!"

i2o * * *

Cregga Rose Eyes had a handle for her axpike-a thick pole, taller than herself. The wood was dark, hard, and sea-washed, like that of Russa's stick. Long summers gone, somebeast had found it among the flotsam of the tide line. Now the Badger Lady rediscovered it, lying with a pile of other timber at the back of her forge. She worked furiously, far into the night, shaping, binding, fixing the awesome steel headpiece to its haft, speaking aloud her thoughts as she bored holes through wood and metal for three heavy copper rivets.

"Sleep well, Gormad Tunn, sleep on, Damug, Byral, and all your Rapscallion sc.u.m! I am coming, death is on the wind! On the day when you see my face, you and all of your evil followers will sleep the sleep from which there is no awakening!"

Tammo had been gone too long for Russa Nodrey's liking. She caught Perigord's glance as she took up her stick. "No-beast takes this long t'gather a few pawfuls of 'cress, Major. Somethin's wrong-I'm goin' to take a look!"

Perigord buckled on his saber. "Tare, Turry, Rubbadub, guard the camp an' supplies, the rest o' you chaps, off y'hunkers an' come with us!"

Traveling swiftly and silently they spread out, covering trees, riverbank, and shallows carefully. It was not long before they picked up Tammo's trail. Captain Twayblade found the rock where she too had noted watercress growing underwater.

Pasque waved wordlessly from a short distance up the bank. Keeping voices to a barely audible murmur, they gathered 'round her. "A bundle o' watercress. He was here-see, 'tis tied up with his shoulder belt."

Midge Manycoats inspected the trunk of a nearby sycamore. "There's a knifepoint mark here. Looks like Tammo stuck his blade in this tree!"

A pebble struck Rockjaw Grang on the side of his neck. "Owch! 'Ey up, somebeast's chuckin' stones!"

122 Out of the darkness above, a volley of small stones peppered Perigord's troop, followed by rustling in the high foliage, sn.i.g.g.e.ring laughs, and reedy voices calling, "Tammo! Tammo! Choohakka choohak! Where poor Tammo?"

Russa shouted aloud at Perigord, "Let's get out o' here!"

The Major shot her a puzzled look. * 'Wot, you mean retreat, run away?"

s.h.i.+elding herself from the stones with an upraised paw, the squirrel winked several times at him. "Aye, let's run fer it afore we're battered t'death!"

Perigord suddenly caught on; he cut and ran into the shallows. "Retreat, troop, everybeast out o' here, quick as y'like. Retreat!"

were not used to running from anything, but they obeyed the command. Pounding upstream through the shallows, they halted out of range of the rain of pebbles.

Then Twayblade turned on Perigord, her long rapier flicking angrily at the air. "Retreat from a few stones' n' pebbles, what are we, pray-a flight of startled swallows?"

Perigord laid the blame firmly at Russa's paws. "Ask her!"

The squirrel looked from one to the other. "Well, if y'stop lookin' all n.o.ble an' outraged for a tick I'll tell ye. Really 'twas my fault. I've traveled this riverbank afore, an' if n I'd been thinkin' clear I'd have stopped you pitchin' camp where the Painted Ones roam."

Twayblade ceased twitching her rapier. "Painted Ones?"

Russa's bushy tail stood up angrily. "Aye, Painted Ones. Tribes o' little tree rats is all they are, though they paints their fur black'n'green an' lives in the boughs an* leaves 'igh up. Huh! Some o' the villains even attaches bushtails to themselves an' masquerades as squirrels, the liddle blackguards, not fit t'lick a decent squirrel's paws! But they're savage an' dangerous, almost invisible when they're among the treetops. Young Tammo's in a bad fix if y'ask me!"

The saturnine Lieutenant Morio nodded his agreement. "But no doubt you've got a plan, marm?"

Russa had. She explained her strategy then slid off among the trees, leaving the hares to carry out their part of the scheme.

Sheathing his blade, Perigord began gathering flat heavy 123 pebbles. "Slings out, chaps, load up an' give 'em stones for supper!"

Meanwhile, Tammo lay bound and gagged. The leader of the Painted Ones was digging teasingly at him with the point of his captured dirk, giggling wickedly each time his prisoner flinched.

"Ch'hakka hak! 'Ear you friends, alia gone now, soon dissa one cutcha up wirra you own knife. Den we eatcha! Hakka-chook!"

Tammo had heard Russa and the hares and felt a mixture of anger and sadness when Perigord shouted retrc?.t and they ran off. Now he felt alone and deserted, certain too that something horrible was about to be inflicted upon him by the s.a.d.i.s.tic little tree creatures, who seemed very confident and contemptuous of landbeasts.

Then Tammo's heart leapt as he heard the night air ring with a familiar war cry: "Eulalia! 'Tis death on the wind! Eulalia! Charge!"

Whacking, cracking, whizzing all around him, a veritable load of slingstones tore upward into the foliage. One rock big as a miniature boulder whipped by him, snapping off branches in its path. Good old Rockjaw Grang!

Turning his head to one side, Tammo peered into the gloom and saw small black and green figures retaliating, loosing peb-, bles from their own slings at the bold enemy below.

Russa had reached the far side of the trees. She skipped nimbly up into a stately elm and turned toward the distant din of battle. Thrusting the hardwood stick into her mouth she bit down on it and took off like a fish skimming through water, ; building up her speed as she raced through the treetops. Bright eyes cut through the darkness as she traveled even faster, the limbs and leaves pa.s.sing in a blur, knowing that swiftness was the key to her mission. Sighting the back of the first Painted One, Russa grabbed her stick in one paw, still hurtling through the top terraces of foliage at a breakneck pace. She cracked the hardwood stick down between the rat's ears, then, changing her angle at the same time and shooting in a downward curve, she battered mercilessly at anybeast in her path.

The hardwood stick was like a living thing in her paws, 124 whacking heads and paws and cracking limbs. Overhead Russa spotted a glint of steel as a stream of orders was shouted down through the treetops. "Chakkachook! Killa! Killa!" Swooping upward, she disposed of two more rats with a quick side-to-side jab to tiieir faces. Bulling into the leader of the Painted Ones, she laid him senseless with a single rap to his skull.

Russa grabbed the dirk and slashed through Tammo's bonds. "Quick, get behind me an' lock y'paws 'round my waist!"

With a swift kick she sent the Painted Ones' leader from the bough they were standing on. As soon as he started to fall, Russa leapt after him, with Tammo holding grimly on to her and shouting, "We're comin' doooooooown!"

Leaves, twigs, branches, limbs tore madly by in a rus.h.i.+ng kaleidoscope of brown, black, and green. Tammo's heart seemed to fly up into his mouth as all three plummeted earthward, Russa's footpaws practically resting on the back of the rat as his body smashed a path down to the ground for them. They landed with a thras.h.i.+ng cras.h.i.+ng sound, flattening an osier bush as the three bodies. .h.i.t it.

Major Perigord whirled a slingstone upward, remarking as he let the pebble fly, "Just dropped in to join the jolly old sc.r.a.p, wot? Bravo!"

Letting go of Russa, Tammo flopped awkwardly onto the ground. Apart from various scratches he was surprised to find himself unharmed. Russa yanked the battered and unconscious tree rat leader upright and pushed him into Rockjaw's open paws.

"Make light, get me a lantern, somebeast, "urry!" she cried.

Tinder and flint hastily fired a lantern Riffle had brought. Bidding Riffle hold the light close to their captive, Russa grabbed the leader by one ear, hauling his head upright. Then she pressed the dirkpoint under his chin and called upward, imitating the tree rats' speech, "Chakkachook! Dis beast a dead'n, we cuttim 'ead off, you chukka more rocks. Dissa beast tellya true, chahakachah!"

The slingstones stopped and a ma.s.s wail went up from the foliage.

"Yaaahaaaagg! Norra kill Shavvakamalla! Yaaahaaaagg!"

Rockjaw Grang slung the senseless leader over his shoulder.

125 "Shavvakawot? Sithee, 'tis a big name for a lickle rat!"

Sergeant Torgoch smiled at his friend's broad accent. "Take 'im back t'camp. We'll get a good night's sleep with their Chief as 'ostage, wot d'ye say, sah?"

; Drawing his saber, Perigord began backing his troop out of the area. ' 'Capital idea! But we'd best keep up the threats, just ' t'make sure they know we mean business. I say, are you hurt, old lad?"

Tammo was limping on his right footpaw. "Little sprain, sah, I'll be right as rain in a bit."

* The hares backed off, shouting horrible threats into the trees. "I say, you rips up there, leave us alone or we'll scoff your jolly old leader. I'm quite serious, y'know. Chop chop, yum yum, eatim alia up, as you blighters say, savvy?"

"Yaaaaahaaaag! No eata Shavvakamalla! Yaaahaaa-haaagghh!"

"Hah! Y'don't like that, do you? Well keep your bally dis-.' tance or it's frica.s.see of tree rat for brekkers!"

"Aye, an' we'll use the leftovers t'make tree rat turnover /fer lunch, it'll go nice with a bit o' salad!"

"Actually I'd rather fancy a slice of tree rat tart. D'you think there'd be enough of him left t'make one, eh, Rock- By 'eck, goo an' get thy own tree rat, Cap'n. I'm doin' all the carryin*, so this 'un's mine. Bah goom, *e'll make a grand tree rat 'otpot with a crust o'er 'is 'ead!"

"Yaaaahaggaaaah! Nono tree rats 'otpot, yerra no eatim!"

Major Perigord called a halt to the teasing. "Quite enough now, pack it in, chaps-those rotters've got the message, I think. I say, Rockjaw, I hope you were jokin' about tree rat hotpot. We're not really goin' to eat the blighter, y'know."