Duncton Rising (3 page)

“If I may be so bold. Stone, you might keep a special watch on the following
particular
moles for whom, as you know, I have especial fondness. I hope you will not think it presumptuous of me to remind you of whatmoles they are, and what they have done for your cause, though no doubt your memory is infinite and all-embracing; but the fact is that in troubled times like these an ordinary mole like me finds it all too easy to forget that you are on our side...”

He spoke in a puzzled, gentle voice, as if he did not quite like the rebellious direction in which his thoughts were taking him.

“I cannot truthfully say,” he continued, “that you have showered the High Wood with what I might call hints or signs of encouragement in recent days. In fact a mole might even think that you had forgotten us altogether...”

A certain acerbity now came to Pumpkin’s voice, and the semblance of a frown, though a weak one, marked his brow. Library Aide Pumpkin, it seemed, had grave doubts about the Stone and the unpleasant changes it had recently allowed (as it seemed to him) to occur in the state of moledom.

“I urge you, Stone, to try to see things from a mole’s point of view and to appreciate that though we may have faith in your plans for the future,
we
have to put up with the present, and all the terrible things that are now going on in the Library, and in Duncton Wood as a whole. It makes even a cheerful mole like me feel dejected sometimes, and in need of encouragement which, lacking friends as I now do since they’ve all gone off in your name, I somewhat miss!”

The dawn wind flurried about him, the wet leaves shifted and trembled on the ground and Pumpkin essayed a smile as if to say “I have moaned and whinged a bit, and feel better for doing so, but perhaps I should now get on with the important part of my prayer”.

“Now, let me see, there’s quite a list of moles whom I wish to commend to your attention and care, beginning of course with the Master Librarian himself, Stour, who at this very moment is in retreat in the dangerous and forgotten tunnels of the Ancient System which lie here below the High Wood. I trust you’re keeping an eye on him, and making sure he’s not lonely or hurt in any way. Many’s the time in the past days I’ve been inclined to go down into the tunnels myself to see if he needs me, for no Master Librarian could have been more kind or more thoughtful to a Library Aide than
him.
No, none
could
have been...”

Tears came to kindly Pumpkin’s eyes as he thought of the mole he loved so well, who had taught him all he knew about books, their cataloguing, and their conservation.

“Well, Stone, I can tell you that if he hadn’t given such very strict instructions that he was to be left alone I would have gone to him before now, or at least tried to. But if ever you think I should go to Master Stour – if he’s in need, or needs support – you tell me in some way, for I’ll do for him all that I can.

“Meanwhile, there’s other moles to think of and worry about for whom these prayers will not go amiss. There’s your old friend Drubbins for one, who’s the only other apart from me of those whom Master Stour entrusted with his final thoughts and instructions before he went into retreat, who was ordered to stay in Duncton Wood. Now Drubbins isn’t looking too well these days, which isn’t surprising as he’s having to deal with the Newborns, whom he doesn’t like, all day long, and do his best not to betray his friends in the Wood. Give him strength. Stone, give him your love.

“Then there’s the five good moles who left the Wood at Stour’s bidding, to try to see what they could do to right matters, and find out something about the lost Book of Silence, and, if they could, bring it back to Duncton. There’s not one of those five that I, Pumpkin, Library Aide, am not proud to call a friend, proud to know, and proud to think that on the glorious day when they come back home again they’ll seek me out and say, ‘Pumpkin, we’re glad to see you once more, and to see that some things in our beloved system don’t change and are dependable!’”

Once more tears came to Pumpkin’s eyes, indeed they trickled down his grey face-fur as he stared at the Stone, and visualized this reunion of moles who loved, trusted and respected each other, and might one day – if the Stone granted it – be all together once again.

“I’ll say their names. Stone, if you don’t mind, though I’m sure you’re growing tired of my repeating them in my prayers to you. But in this time of trial and loneliness my prayers here in the Stone Clearing are what keep me going, and saying the names of my friends helps me believe that they’re alive and well, and will come home again one day, safeguarded. There’s Fieldfare and her beloved Chater, both commanded by the Master Stour to go in the direction of Avebury and muster support for the Stone, or at least remind moles of the dangers of the Newborn creed. There’s Maple, strong Maple, who I’ve always thought had a destiny to lead moles in battle, for when he was a youngster didn’t he come to me and ask to be shown texts about campaigning, battles and the like? Didn’t I myself help him with the difficult words, and take him about this Wood and show him where the great battles of our own past were fought? I did! I ask you to look after him, and see that he fights justly and truly, as I told him great leaders do. And you see to it, too, that when the time comes, he knows when to pull in his talons and say “Enough is enough”!

“Then there’s Whillan, who does not seem old enough to be gallivanting about moledom at a dangerous time like this – but that’s what the Master ordered, and so it has to be. Now, Stone, I remember the day he was carried into the Library by the Master himself, who had found him down at the cross-under beneath the roaring owl way with his mother dying and his newborn siblings all killed by the rooks.

Bless me, but I’ve never seen a sight like it, nor want to again, as when that poor pup, struggling for breath, shivering with cold, and bleating his little life away, lay on the Library floor with all those old books about him, and nervous aides wondering what the Master was about bringing him there. From that day I watched Whillan grow, and when, like Maple before him, he came to me to learn scribing and explore the Library, why, it was the nearest I ever got to having a pup of my own. Of course, I’d never admit this to anymole, but I feel I contributed something to Whillan’s rearing, and I can’t believe you would want him to come to harm in the wide world beyond this system of ours having, as it were, had such a hard and tragic time getting into it. But there’s not a day goes by but I worry for him, and I hope you’re watching over him, for he hadn’t had time to grow up and find himself before the Newborns came and the Master ordered him off into moledom to do what he could for the Stone’s cause. Protect Whillan well, Stone, for there was always a special light in his eyes, and a certain set to his snout that said to me that this was a mole among moles; one whose destiny would carry something of your Light, and honour your Silence.

“Lastly, there’s Privet,
scholar
Privet, who you know well enough without me having to tell you that I learned to love and respect her more than any other of the scribemoles that came through the portals of the Library. She’s a great mole. Stone, and all the greater since Stour insisted that it was she who reared and nurtured Whillan, despite her protests. That was a heart-warming thing that was, seeing a prim and proper scholar like her coming to grips with a mischievous pup such as Whillan was.

“Aye, you
do
work in mysterious ways. Stone, making moles grow and deepen in themselves, as if you’re preparing them for tasks only you know are coming their way. I never in all my life worked for so wise and modest a scholar as Privet, excepting the Master himself, of course. She could scribe Whernish as well as Mole, she could ken a mediaeval story as well as a modern one, and despite her chilly exterior she could make moles love her and be loyal to her – even journeymole Chater, who never had much time for scholars.

“But off she went as well, with Maple and Whillan to watch over her, the scribemole who I believe the Master knew would one day, somehow, find the lost Book of Silence and bring it back to Duncton Wood. All that will be very well, but all
I
ask on her behalf is that when her task is done you give her time and space to find the one thing that eludes moles unless they live right however good their scholarship: happiness. For
that
was something that was lacking in her eyes, and on her thin and troubled face, even when young Whillan was at his most endearing; even then she seemed to fear it could not last. But that’s it, isn’t it, Stone? She never feels, not ever, that happiness can last, or the friendship of another mole, and so fear of the future destroys her pleasures in the present.

“And we know the reason, don’t we. Stone? Or part of it at any rate... Its name is a mole’s – Rooster, Master of the Delve, a
most
mysterious mole, most striking. Not the kind of mole I would like to meet on a dark night, or down in a ruined chamber served by ancient tunnels. But there we are, there’s no accounting for love, and it seems that
he’s
the mole she loved and lost. A mole, I fancy, she could do with finding once again to tell him... Well, an old mole like me who’s never had a mate and never will, won’t presume to put words into her mouth for what she should say to a mole such as Rooster, should she ever find him. But Stone, please an old mole, and bring those two together once again; if you do, I’ll die happy, with my faith in your essential goodness fully restored!

“So there they are, the moles I wish to pray for this miserable dawn, and those on whom I believe a great deal may depend. Watch over them. Stone, guide them, help them, show them your Light and let them be touched by your Silence.”

Pumpkin was silent for a time, and seemed to have finished; the wind flurried on about him and the dawn’s light brightened a little towards another morning. Yet he looked up once more at the grey Stone, so silent, so unyielding, so forbidding, and half opened his mouth to say something more. Then he seemed to have second thoughts, and shook his head and turned forlornly away, as lonely and isolated a mole as any who had ever come to the Duncton Stone for prayer and guidance.

Yet even as he headed east out of the Clearing, to cross the High Wood to begin another wretched day in thrall to the Newborn Inquisitors, he paused, and scuffed at the leaves a bit, and turned round to face the Stone once more. A watching mole would barely have seen him, for Pumpkin’s grey and wizened form was almost lost in the huge shadows and shapes of the beech tree roots.

“There’s another mole, isn’t there, Stone? One I should pray for as well...”

Pumpkin looked reluctant, and grumpy. He frowned again, and pursed his mouth with distaste at having to even think about this other mole; then a look of annoyance came into his eyes and he found something different to say, something which justified avoiding adding to his prayers a mole for whom, it seemed, he felt rather less love than he felt for the others, but to whom he still had some kind of duty.

“Can’t pray for ever without a bit of encouragement,” he said, his eyes dropping from the Stone to the damp beech leaves which covered the Clearing’s floor.
“I
need a sign to keep me going, a
hint
that something good is on the way. Nomole prays for
me,
you know. I mean, I know that Master Librarian Stour said it would be hard, but I didn’t think it would be
this
hard. It’s not that I’m blaming
you.
Stone, because of course allmole knows you’re above blame, just as, if I may say so, you are above praise. You
are,
and we’re the ones who have to struggle and strive, aren’t we? Not that you should construe that as criticism, though I admit that if I had a choice between being a Stone or a mole I would, this particular dawn, choose to be a Stone.

“The simple fact is that I feel I am not up to the task you have set me. I feel I should remind you that I am a mere library
aide
whose position until now has demanded only that he fetches and carries for scholars and scribemoles, tendering advice when he is asked, and keeping order for those who have not time for such tedious work. Is it reasonable, this Library Aide humbly asks, that he should be required to fulfill some other task whose nature, whose beginning and ending, whose demands, remain unspecified and mysterious? It is not!”

Pumpkin, now thoroughly roused on his own behalf, even took a step or two back towards the Stone before he continued.

“Now, Stone, I do not wish to bargain with you, but if I may say so, this particular mole would be motivated rather better than he is if you could apply a small part of your infinite and eternal wisdom to finding a way to show me that I am on the right track. This would help. So, too, would some hint that I am not alone in my struggle and that there are other moles about who share the burden. Yes, that’s it, that’s my personal petition to you this dawn: send a sign!”

Pumpkin continued to stare boldly at the Stone for a moment or two longer before, his ire dying, he retreated back into the modest and kindly mole he truly was and looked meek and apologetic.

“Well,” he added feebly, “that’s about it. Well, all right, almost it.”

How forbidding the Stone was, how silent, how great the void into which a mole of faith, as Pumpkin was, must utter his prayers!

“As for that other mole, and you know the one I mean, it is
very
hard for me to add him to my prayers. Why, he came to the Library the same day I did so many decades ago, and as he’s risen and gained seniority and honours I’ve stayed just an aide, and I don’t begrudge it, I really don” t. Sturne always had talents for study and scholarship that I did not have. And when he’s come to my burrow, as he has from time to time at seasons of celebration because he and I have no other moles to share such occasions with, I’ve been pleased with his taciturn company, and I’ve been happy to hear his attempts at being merry. But, Stone, it’s hard, it’s so hard, now the Inquisitors have made him Master of the Library in the proper Master’s place, and he’s accepted all they say, and their ways, and he daily orders me to destroy text after text and never
once
shows any remorse or guilt.