Little Foxes (6 page)

Billy slipped the belt over the fox’s head, pulled it tight so that it fitted snugly around his neck, and then gently lifted the fox to his feet. There was some resistance at first, a shaking of the head, a few attempts to gnaw at the belt, but a turn or two around the graveyard and the fox seemed happy to be led, just so long as Billy did not jerk the lead too sharply. As they passed the vixen’s grave, Billy wanted to tell her what had happened but he could not find the words. He had let her down and he could not bring himself to confess it.

The estate was just waking up when Billy came out of the Wilderness with the fox. The milk float was humming through the streets and the lights were on in the paper shop on the corner. The only car he saw was a police car cruising slowly around the estate. Billy dared not run too fast for fear of pulling too hard on the lead and upsetting the fox; so he trotted gently, keeping the lead slack. Every few paces though, the fox would stop and look about him. Billy had to talk him on, calming his fears, stroking his head and ears until he was happy to go on again.

The journey seemed interminably long to Billy, but they reached the door to the flats without being spotted. Nothing would persuade the fox to follow Billy through the doors no matter how hard Billy tried to make him. In the end he was forced to pick him up and climb the echoing stairway to the tenth floor. Aunty May never woke up until the alarm went at eight, so he felt quite safe as he stole into the flat and closed the front door behind him. But even as he put his hand onto his bedroom door to push it open, he felt someone watching him from the kitchen.

The light went on and Aunty May was there, standing by the kitchen table, her face pasty white and drawn without its make-up. Billy kept his back to her, one arm holding the fox tightly to his chest. ‘Billy, Billy,’ Aunty May was crying; Billy was not sure if she was crying with fury or with relief. ‘Where’ve you been, Billy? All night I’ve been up, all night. The police are out looking for you, have been ever since midnight, when I found your bed empty. Now what am I going to say to them, Billy? It’s too much, Billy, too much.’ She came towards him, gathering her dressing-gown around her. ‘What’s that you’re hiding there, Billy? Show me, show me at once.’ And she took Billy by the shoulder and swung him round to face her. Billy expected her to scream but she did not. Her mouth gaped in horror as she backed away from him, knocking over the kitchen stool behind her. ‘Get that thing out of here,’ she whispered. ‘Get it out. Billy, either you put that thing out of that door this minute or . . . or . . . Billy, either it goes at once, or you both go. Do you understand me, Billy? Do you understand what I’m saying?’

‘Yes, Aunty May,’ said Billy. And with the fox cradled against him he walked to the front door and opened it. ‘Goodbye,’ he said, and he was gone before she could collect herself.

Billy ran towards the canal, the only way he could go. The estate lay in a triangle of two main roads with the canal behind. The roads led only into the city and there was no refuge there for a boy and a fox on the run. Billy had often looked out across the canal and seen the hills rising into the clouds on the horizon, and common sense told him that this was where he had to go. There were scarcely any houses on those high hills, and that meant fewer people. It was the countryside, an empty place where people went for picnics in the summer time and where he had always longed to go. Billy had seen it fleetingly, flashing by out of coach windows, but he had never been there. It seemed to him the kind of place a boy and a fox could lose themselves and never be found. As Billy ran across the estate, the fox trotting out alongside him, he could hear Aunty May calling out after him to come back. It only made him run faster.

Quite how he planned to cross the canal Billy did not know, and he had not had the time to think about it. Even as he stood now, looking out across the weed-choked water to the far bank, he still had no idea how he would get across, for Billy could not swim. He could splash and kick enough to keep himself afloat for a few brief seconds in the shallow end of the pool in swimming lessons, but then panic invariably overtook him and his legs would reach for the bottom. It had been different when he rescued the swan. Then he had had no time to think about it. The fox stood beside him panting hard, glad of the rest. ‘All right, so you can swim,’ said Billy. ‘Comes natural to a fox I suppose. Nearest bridge over the canal is the main road and they’d catch us before we got there. No choice, have we?’ He remembered then that he had not drowned the last time he jumped in. He remembered he had felt the mud under his feet and he had managed to keep his head above the water. That memory and the sight of Aunty May bearing down on him, dressing-gown flying out behind her, screaming out for him to stop, was all the spur Billy needed. He pushed the fox out into the canal and watched him paddle away before jumping in after him.

He sank at once, his feet kicking out desperately for the bottom, which did not seem to be there as he had expected. He came up again gasping for air and flailing the water to keep himself afloat. Ahead of him he could see the fox’s white muzzle nosing through the weeds and he struck out after him, legs and arms working frantically in an untidy dog paddle. But the far bank came no closer and he was tiring fast. He pounded the water furiously, but no matter how hard he tried he seemed unable to prevent his body from sinking. By the time he reached the middle of the canal he had swallowed a lot of water and was choking. The weeds were wrapping around his legs and dragging him down. He could see that the fox had reached the bank safely and was shaking himself, and that gave him new heart, but his legs seemed incapable now of obeying him. He knew then that he was going to drown, that there was nothing he could do about it, no point in struggling any more.

He had sunk twice already when he saw a branch floating slowly towards him and reached out for it. He caught at the twigs and hauled it towards him until he could cling to the branch itself. He hooked his arms over it and kicked his legs free of the weed, and as he did so he found he was moving slowly towards the fox on the bank. So he kept kicking and kicking until the branch edged its way into the reeds and would go no further. Billy threw himself down on the bank by the fox and coughed the water out of his lungs.

Only the fox saw the swan glide away, in under the shadow of the hanging alder trees, and he stiffened momentarily with surprise.

Billy looked up to find Aunty May standing on the bank opposite. ‘Now you come back here this minute, Billy Bunch,’ she shouted. ‘This minute, d’you hear?’ Billy said nothing, but walked away through the long grass, the fox at his heels. ‘Well good riddance then, Billy Bunch,’ she screamed. ‘There’s plenty more where you come from, always will be. Don’t think you can come running back to me when they pick you up either. I won’t have you, you hear? I won’t have you. You take your filthy fox and run for all I care. P’raps that’s where you belong, Billy Bunch, out there in the wild with the animals, with that fox.’ But Billy was out of earshot by now and running and leaping through the grass, his eyes on the thin grey line of light that was creeping up over the dark and distant hills.

Those hills beckoned him all morning as he trudged on through the grass-waving meadows and across the sun-spangled streams, but they seemed to come no nearer. Often in the valleys he would lose sight of the hills completely and become swallowed up in the immensity of the countryside; and when the hills did reappear there always seemed to be villages or farmyards in the way, between him and the hills, places where he knew there would be people, places he knew they had to avoid. That the police would be looking for them all over the countryside Billy had no doubt; and he could not doubt that they already knew in which direction he had gone. They would know well enough where to look for them. If he were to be sighted now it would be the end of everything. They would take his fox away from him and he would never see him again. With that terrible threat hanging over him he moved only under cover, as far as possible keeping to the hedgerows and the woods. If that meant going the long way round, then he went the long way round.

Only once that morning did he stray too near a farmhouse. He was not to know that the smell of the fox would carry on the wind and draw the sheepdog towards them. They were making their way stealthily across a farm track and then into a cut hayfield the other side when the sheepdog came at them suddenly, hackles up, its body stiff with fury at them. The fox jerked away violently, snapping the lead, and bolted into the hedgerow. Billy’s instinct too was to run, but the dog was too close and he knew he could not run fast enough. So he stood his ground, his spine warm with fear, and faced the hysterical barking and the bared teeth. When it went for his ankles he lashed out viciously, landing a lucky kick on its side that sent it scampering away, tail tucked abjectly between its legs. It took several minutes of patient persuasion for him to cajole the fox out from the sanctuary of the hedge.

Billy had nothing to use for a lead now and wondered if the fox would follow him up the track. Walking backwards, he whistled him up and called him. At first the fox sat watching him in the middle of the track, head on one side, thinking. Billy kept walking and whistled again. Whether the fox grasped the idea or whether he just did not want to be left alone there Billy did not know, but the fox came loping up the lane after him. After that he seemed not to want to stray more than a few paces from Billy’s feet, and if he ever did Billy’s whistle would always bring him back.

CHAPTER EIGHT

AS THE DAY WORE ON, THE SUN BEAT relentlessly down on their backs. Billy was glad of it, for it dried his soaking clothes as he walked; but with only stream water inside them both boy and fox began to weaken. As he tired, Billy began to take more risks, and in his anxiety to get as far as possible from the city before nightfall he became careless. Where before he had kept close to the edges of fields, hugging the hedgerows, now he would take the shortest route, walking openly out across fields where they might be seen from the farmhouses. He knew well enough that they were more exposed to discovery on the roads than anywhere else. Until now he had been scrupulously careful to ensure there was no one about, no traffic approaching, before crossing; and he had always picked up the fox and carried him across. But when in the late afternoon they came to a narrow, winding lane he did not even bother to pick up the fox and gave only a cursory glance down the lane. He was about half-way across, and whistling for the fox to follow him, when the little girl on the bicycle came round the bend fast. She skidded to a halt on the gravelly road, using her feet for brakes.

‘Didn’t see you,’ she said. ‘Haven’t got no brakes – busted.’ As she spoke, the fox walked nonchalantly out across the road towards Billy, belatedly obeying his call. ‘Hey, isn’t that a fox?’ she said.

‘No, it isn’t,’ said Billy.

‘He is,’ she said. ‘I seen ’em in books, and my dad shot one once when it came around the fowls. ’S a fox, that is, ’s a fox.’

‘Just looks like a fox,’ said Billy. ‘’T’isn’t really.’ The girl, he thought, was a little younger than he was, with long blond pigtails and an open smiling face, the kind, Billy thought, that would talk a lot. He would have to be convincing. ‘Looks like a fox, I know,’ he said. ‘Everyone says so, but it’s just a funny kind of sheepdog – still a puppy he is really. I mean you’ve never heard of a fox you could stroke, have you? I mean they’re wild animals, foxes are. Like wolves they are, sort of, take your hand off they would, give ’em half a chance.’ And he crouched down and stroked the fox’s neck, burying his fingers in the soft fur. ‘Good dog,’ he said. ‘Good dog. See? Quiet as a mouse, he is. No need to be frightened of him. He won’t hurt you. Wouldn’t hurt a fly, would you, boy? Come on, you have a go.’ The girl stepped off her bike and laid it down in the middle of the road.

‘You sure he’s all right?’ she said, approaching nervously. The fox sat quite still, looking up at Billy for reassurance. Billy felt his whole body stiffen as the girl touched him, and when his ears went back on his head Billy feared he might be betrayed, but as the girl relaxed, her petting became less tentative and she was soon smoothing him all over and enjoying it. ‘Never seen a dog like this before,’ she said. ‘’Spose it’ll look proper when it’s grown up.’

‘’Spose so,’ said Billy, much relieved at the success of his ruse but conscious of the fact that a car could come down the road at any moment and that the driver might not be so gullible as this girl. ‘You’d better pick your bike up before someone comes round that bend. Got to be going now.’ And he opened the field gate and whistled for the fox to come after him, and then walked away out into the field as casually as he could.

‘Where you going?’ called the girl, following him to the gate.

‘Home,’ said Billy, waving his hand above his head.

‘Where’s that?’ she cried. But Billy pretended he had not heard and walked on a little faster, not so fast that it could be thought he was running away, but fast enough to get away from her questions. ‘My dad’s a farmer and he says you should ought to keep dogs on the lead, they’ll end up chasing sheep else. And you ought to shut gates, don’t you know that?’ On the brow of the hill Billy looked back over his shoulder to be sure he was not being followed and she was gone. He broke into a run, cursing himself aloud for his carelessness.

After that, exhausted as he was, he took no more risks. He had had his warning and did not ignore it. As evening came on his stomach began to ache with hunger and he could think of little else but food. He thought of raiding vegetable gardens, of stealing eggs and even of venturing into a village under the cover of darkness to rifle the dustbins. But the dread of capture was stronger even than the nagging hunger pains that tugged at his stomach.

He found talking helped him to forget, providing he could avoid the subject of food, but somehow it always came back to that. By nightfall they still had had nothing to eat. The last red of the sun bled into the clouds above the glowing city in the distance. Billy sat with his fox on the bracken hillside. ‘Looks pretty from here,’ he said. ‘But we’re never going back there. You and me, we don’t belong there, do we? Only sensible thing Aunty May ever said to me. You remember? She said we belong out here in the wilds together. Well, we do, don’t we?’ The fox sat trim beside him, attentive, alert to every sound of the encroaching night. ‘Mind you,’ said Billy, ‘I could do with some of her baked beans, couldn’t you? Wouldn’t even say no to a corned beef sandwich, and I know you wouldn’t, would you? Yes, you’re right. Best not to talk about it, only makes it worse.’ But he was too tired even to talk now. He beat the bracken around him into a soft bed, and lay back in it, turned on his side, his knees drawn up to his chin and was asleep almost at once.