The Final Version.
Video recording to come....
Thicker Than A Thief
“Pssssit,” Mr Fox peered round the side of the tree where he’d been hiding from Hen. He’d straw in his ears, muck on his whiskers and his top hat – squished at the tip, was teetering on the brink of collapse.
“Psssssit!” He tried again, a little more quietly this time; a little less certain. His monocle was so muzzy with mist, that if the truth be known, he had no idea whether he was psssssiting at Duck or not, until…
“Yes!” Without meaning to Mr Fox hushed the word so loudly and scared himself so much, he was immediately forced to duck – if you’ll pardon the expression, back behind the tree. Still, he’d seen it - just the tiniest hint of nervous movement from the filthy muddle of feathers that crouched in a heap by the side of the river. He had found his feathered accomplice at last. He had found Duck, and with a huge sigh of relief, he slumped on the ground to ponder the pickle in which he’d been put.
Mr Fox had known long days before this, but in all his days, he’d never known one like this. First, right from the beginning when he’d opened his eyes to find Summer had disappointingly stolen herself away during the night, to be replaced with an eerie fug that crept and weaved its way over the drumlins, everything had felt wrong. Second: Hen.
He’d never warmed to Hen. She was fussy and clucky and wore that damn pinny as though she were mother – who she was not. She wasn’t even bonafide. She’d come as an orphan – picked up from the side of the road by all accounts. She should have been eaten. He, should have eaten her, and then he wouldn’t have found himself here, miles from home, lost, his waistcoat ruined, his legs torn to ribbons and his first-best monocle smashed in his pocket. Hen. She’d made his blood boil before and now she made it boil all over again.
“Mr Fox?” A familiar voice interrupted his thoughts and he looked up. Duck was standing there, staring at him, her usually pristine feathers, ruffled. At the side of her head a whole patch had been stripped clean and she appeared to have developed a limp. As she whispered,
“So, you lost her?” Mr Fox, troubled by his friend’s expression, gulped - guiltily, then turned away.
“I think,” he replied rubbing his left ear as he was often wont to do when nervous, “there’s a strong possibility…” He looked around. The mist was thicker than thieves. An appropriate punishment he thought, after all, thieves they had aspired to be - him and Duck. “… Maybe,” he continued, drawing his words out cautiously, “she’s about as ‘lost’ as you and… me…” At this, Duck gasped,
“You mean, she could be anywhere?”
For a second time since they’d met, Mr Fox gulped. He didn’t think Hen could be anywhere, not really. He’d ripped at her hackle and shredded her comb. Even though he’d since devoured half a ton of river water - no mean feat given that he couldn’t swim for toffee and the river scared him befiddleless - he was still, quite literally, spitting feathers. And all for what? Because he hadn’t even…
“But you got the prize, didn’t you, Mr Fox?” Duck’s eyes shone luminous with expectation.
“The prize?” He paused for time. Duck was the best friend he’d ever had, but she frightened him sometimes too, and briefly, he thought about how easy it would be to lie – just as Hen had lied to them and so caused all this kerfuffle in the first place. “Yes,” he would say, of course he’d got the prize and yes, he’d say, of course he’d chased Hen far, far away, and yes, yes, yes, of course, he would say, the farm was just beyond and they weren’t lost after all, and everything was going to be ok, and everyone (but not Hen), was going to live happily ever after. Instead, he said,
“There wasn’t a prize,” and for a moment, it felt like someone had wandered into the air between the two friends with a huge hoover and sucked it all away. In grim mortification, he assessed Duck’s response – the narrowed eyes, the wings folded in half and placed on her hips in an almost perfect impersonation of ‘Angry Mother.’
“Well, well,” she said at last, and if looks could kill, Mr Fox was quite certain he would be dead. “What a to-do. And all for nothing. I take it you looked – thoroughly?”
Mr Fox squirmed. Yes, he had, and he didn’t want to think anymore of it.
“Hmpf,” she huffed through her nose. “Well in that case, I propose that until Summer returns and we can find our way home,” Duck sniffed the air curiously. “We go our separate ways.”
“No!” Mr Fox lurched forward and fell at Duck’s feet in a rather amusing display - to Duck, of supplication. “I’m sorry,” he whinnied as his hat tumbled from his head, and the smashed, first best monocle, fell from his pocket. “I tried. I promise.” It might have been that he lay there forever, or so it seemed, until, after a few difficult moments, Duck finally stretched, shook out her feathers, sighed and said, “oh get back on your feet you old fool. Come on. Home’s this way.”
“Home?” Mr Fox lifted his head slowly. It was quite possibly the best news he’d ever heard in his whole entire life. They’d be Mother, Father; all their friends – Mr and Mrs Mare, the lamb triplets, stinky Grime Dog - and he’d even be happy to see pesky old Goat who was forever in a foul temper. Plus, carved deep into the warm earth beneath the drystone wall in the furthermost yard: Bed. It was what he’d been looking forward to more than anything else all day. Once there, he swore he would never, ever dream of stealing never ever ever…”
“Yes,” Duck was waddling off. Mr Fox watched her carefully, pondering on how she was a little more waddly than usual; a little less nimble on her feet. He noticed too that she was heading…
‘Over the river…’ he breathed, in horror. She was there already, paddling awkwardly through the pulsing rapids, and for the third time since they’d met that day, Mr Fox gulped. He gulped again as he pulled his twig coated hat down past his ears, and again when he stuffed the monocle – now without any glass whatsoever, into his pocket, and again when he saw, just on the edge of the mist, at the other side of the detestable water… Hen.
Mr Fox gasped, because this wasn’t just Hen... this was dead Hen!
“Bye, bye, Mr Fox.” Confused, he looked to the side of the mass of shredded red feathers where Duck appeared to be waving at him. In a daze, he went to raise his own paw, then stopped, because Duck wasn’t waving at him at all. Instead, between those two ruffled wings she was holding something up - something large and something shiny. Something golden.
In an instant, and against all his better judgements, Mr Fox was in the river, pounding its waves, but Mr Fox had never been a swimmer. Before long he’d been stripped of his hat and stripped of his waistcoat, lost both his monocles, and though he flailed and fought against the flow of the waters, soon he was carried far, far away, and off to sea. As he went, Duck sighed.
“’Sly old Mr Fox’ they’ll all say.” She giggled. “Bad old Mr Fox.” She tittered. Then, carefully tucking the prized Golden Egg out of sight, she continued her journey back to the farm.
And this, my friends, is the story of why you’ll find no foxes on the Isle of Man, but if you look hard enough, perhaps somewhere over in Maughold, you never know, you might just find a Golden Egg.
