Watership Down

'Meester 'Azel, vat for you vait?'

'To know where to go,' answered Fiver.

'Pridge near. You go on, you see.'

Where they were, the undergrowth stood close to the green path, but beyond-downstream, as they all intuitively felt-it gave way to open parkland. Out into this they went, Hazel following Fiver.

Hazel did not know what a bridge was. It was another of Kehaar's unknown words that he did not feel up to questioning. Despite his trust in Kehaar and his respect for his wide experience, he felt still more disturbed as they came into the open. Clearly, this was some sort of man place, frequented and dangerous. A short way ahead was a road. He could see its smooth, unnatural surface stretching away over the grass. He stopped and looked at it. At length, when he was sure that there were no men anywhere near, he went cautiously up to the verge.

The road crossed the river on a bridge about thirty feet long. It did not occur to Hazel that there was anything unusual in this. The idea of a bridge was beyond him. He saw only a line of stout posts and rails on either side of the road. Similarly, simple African villagers who have never left their remote homes may not be particularly surprised by their first sight of an airplane: it is outside their comprehension. But their first sight of a horse pulling a cart will set them pointing and laughing at the ingenuity of the fellow who thought of that one. Hazel saw without surprise the road crossing the river. What worried him was that where it did so there were only very narrow verges of short grass, offering no cover. His rabbits would be exposed to view and unable to bolt, except along the road.

'Do you think we can risk it, Fiver?' he asked.

'I can't see why you're bothered,' answered Fiver. 'You went into the farmyard and the shed where the hutch rabbits were. This is much less dangerous. Come on-they're all watching while we hesitate.'

Fiver hopped out on the road. He looked round for a moment and then made his way to the nearer end of the bridge. Hazel followed him along the verge, keeping close beside the rail on the upstream side. Looking round, he saw Pipkin close behind. In the middle of the bridge Fiver, who was perfectly calm and unhurried, stopped and sat up. The other two joined him.

'Let's put on a bit of an act,' said Fiver. 'Make them inquisitive. They'll follow us just to see what we're looking at.'

There was no sill along the edge of the bridge: they could have walked off it into the water three feet below. From under the lowest rail they looked out, upstream, and now, for the first time, saw the whole river plainly. If the bridge had not startled Hazel, the river did. He remembered the Enborne, its surface broken by gravel spits and plant growth. The Test, a weed-cut, carefully tended trout stream, seemed to him like a world of water. A good ten yards wide it was, fast-flowing and smooth, spangling and dazzling in the evening sun. The tree reflections on the even current were unbroken as on a lake. There was not a reed or a plant to be seen above the water. Close by, under the left bank, a bed of crowfoot trailed downstream, the wheel-like leaves all submerged. Darker still, almost black, were the mats of water moss, their thick masses motionless on the bed of the river and only the trailing fronds waving slowly from side to side. Waving, too, were the wider expanses of pale green cressweed; but these rippled with the current, lightly and quickly. The water was very clear, with a bed of clean yellow gravel, and even in the middle was hardly four feet deep. As the rabbits stared down they could discern, here and there, a very fine scour, like smoke- chalk and powdered gravel carried along by the river as dust is blown on the wind. Suddenly, from under the bridge, with a languid movement of its flat tail, swam a gravel- colored fish as long as a rabbit. The watchers, immediately above, could see the dark, vivid spots along its sides. Warily it hung in the current below them, undulating from side to side. It reminded Hazel of the cat in the yard. As they stared, it swam upward with a lithe flicker and stopped just below the surface. A moment later its blunt nose thrust clear of the stream and they saw the open mouth, pure white inside. Rhythmically, without haste, it sucked down a floating sedge fly and sank back under water. A ripple spread outward in subsiding circles, breaking both the reflections and the transparency. Gradually the stream grew smooth and once more they saw the fish below them, waving its tail as it held its place in the current.

'A water hawk!' said Fiver. 'So they hunt and eat down there, too! Don't fall in, Hlao-roo. Remember El- ahrairah and the pike.'

'Would it eat me?' asked Pipkin, staring.

'There may be creatures in there that could,' said Hazel. 'How do we know? Come on, let's get across. What would you do if a hrududu came?'

'Run,' said Fiver simply, 'like this.' And he scurried off the further end of the bridge into the grass beyond.

On this far side of the river, undergrowth and a grove of great horse chestnuts extended almost down to the bridge. The ground was marshy, but at least there was plenty of cover. Fiver and Pipkin began at once on some scrapes, while Hazel sat chewing pellets and resting his injured leg. Soon they were joined by Silver and Dandelion, but the other rabbits, more hesitant even than Hazel, remained crouching in the long grass on the right bank. At last, just before darkness fell, Fiver re-crossed the bridge and coaxed them to follow him back. Bigwig, to everyone's surprise, showed considerable reluctance, and only crossed in the end after Kehaar, returning from another flight over Efrafa, had asked whether he would like him to go and fetch a fox.

The night that followed seemed to all of them disorganized and precarious. Hazel, still conscious of being in man country, was half expecting either a dog or a cat. But although they heard owls more than once, no elil attacked them and by the morning they were in better spirits.

As soon as they had fed, Hazel set them to exploring the surroundings. It became even more plain that the ground near the river was too wet for rabbits. Indeed, in places it was almost bog. Marsh sedge grew there, pink, sweet-scented valerian and the drooping water avens. Silver reported that it was drier up in the woodland away from the bank, and at first Hazel had the idea of picking a fresh spot and digging again. But presently the day grew so hot and humid that all activity was quenched. The faint breeze vanished. The sun drew up a torpid moisture from the watery thickets. The smell of water mint filled all the hydrophanic air. The rabbits crept into the shade, under any cover that offered. Long before ni-Frith, all were drowsing in the undergrowth.

It was not until the dappled afternoon began to grow cool that Hazel woke suddenly, to find Kehaar beside him. The gull was strutting from side to side with short, quick steps and pecking impatiently in the long grass. Hazel sat up quickly.

'What is it, Kehaar? Not a patrol?'

'Na, na. Ees all fine for sleep like bloody owls. Maybe I go for Peeg Vater. Meester 'Azel, you getting mudders now soon? Vat for vait now?'

'No, you're right, Kehaar, we must start now. The trouble is, I can see how to start but not how to finish.'

Hazel made his way through the grass, roused the first rabbit he found-who happened to be Bluebell-and sent him to fetch Bigwig, Blackberry and Fiver. When they came, he took them to join Kehaar on the short grass of the riverbank.

'This is the problem, Blackberry,' he said. 'You remember that when we were under the down that evening I said we should have to do three things: get the does out of Efrafa, break up the pursuit and then get right away so that they wouldn't find us. This plan you've thought up is clever. It'll do the first two things, all right, I'm sure of that. But what about the last one? The Efrafan rabbits are fast and savage. They'll find us if we're to be found and I don't believe we can run away faster than they can follow-especially with a lot of does who've never been out of Efrafa. We couldn't possibly stand and fight them to a finish-we're too few. And on top of that, my leg seems to be bad again. So what's to be done?'

'I don't know,' answered Blackberry. 'But, obviously, we shall need to disappear. Could we swim the river? No scent then, you know.'

'It's too swift,' said Hazel. 'We'd be carried away. But even if we did swim it, we couldn't count on not being followed. From what I've heard of these Efrafans, they'd certainly swim the river if they thought we had. What it comes to is that, with Kehaar to help us, we can break up a pursuit while we're getting the does out, but they'll know which way we've gone and they won't leave it at that. No, you're right, we've got to vanish without a trace, so that they can't even track us. But how?'

'I don't know,' said Blackberry again. 'Shall we go up the river a little way and have a look at it? Perhaps there's somewhere we could use for a hiding place. Can you manage that, with your leg?'

'If we don't go too far,' replied Hazel.