“Of course I was talking to you,” Marty cried. “And you heard everything I said, didn’t you? You foxes have a great reputation for listening. I suppose you’re as good as most. Better, maybe.”
Bounder sniffed loudly a few times. “Listening?” he said. “Actually, my hearing hasn’t been very good lately. A kind of cold or . . . something. The snowstorm, I suspect. Even so, if you have something to say to me, I’d be happy to make an effort to hear it.”
Marty studied Bounder intently with his dark, emotionless eyes, trying to make up his mind if the fox was telling the truth or not. He decided he was not. And that annoyed him. “It’s your wife, Leaper,” he called bluntly. “She’s been killed.”
“Killed!” Bounder cried, taken aback, but under such self-control that he remained in place. “You’re lying!”
“No. It’s true. By a hunter’s steel trap. Near the cabin at Long Lake. It happened just yesterday, during the snowstorm.”
“What about my kits? Were they hurt?”
“Oh, no. They weren’t with her.”
“Do they know about her?”
“I’m not sure.”
Now Bounder was concerned. “Tell me everything you know.”
“All I know is that an old porcupine who goes by the name Ereth is staying with your kits!”
“Ereth!”
“That’s him. He seems to have moved into your den.”
“In my den!” Bounder cried. “With my kits?”
“I think so.”
Bounder knew all about Ereth. If anything, he knew him too well. Little more than a year ago he had been chasing a mouse through the forest when she ran into a hollow log to escape. The log proved to be Ereth’s home. Though all Bounder had wanted to do was to eat the mouse—porcupines, he knew, were not meat eaters—Ereth had slapped him with his tail, giving him a nose full of painful quills. So, yes, Bounder knew all about Ereth. He disliked him intensely.
“Those are my kits,” the fox growled. “That porcupine has no business with them, none. What’s he doing there?”
“I think . . .” Marty the Fisher said, “he’s pretending to be their . . . father.”
“Their father!” Bounder exclaimed. “Are you making any of this up?”
“Not in the least. And quite a happy family they’ve become. That’s all I know.” So saying, Marty the Fisher retreated among the branches of the tree. He was deep enough for Bounder to lose sight of him, but not so far away that he could not watch the fox.
Bounder was thinking hard about what he had heard. “Could it really be true?” he asked himself. If true, it was a dreadful thing that had happened to Leaper. He truly regretted it. He did. But at least his kits were safe and being cared for. As far as Bounder was concerned, that was the most important thing. Regarding Ereth the porcupine—Bounder grinned. It served the old porcupine right for being such a busybody. What a perfect revenge on Ereth—the old porcupine taking care of his kits. Acting like their father. Until of course, he dismissed him.
The more Bounder thought about it, the more it pleased him that his old foe should be stuck with the job of taking care of his children. Served the porcupine right. Moreover, it meant that he, Bounder, could get on with his business of catching the chickens from the coop at New Farm.
With that thought Bounder trotted off through the snow, his mind entirely on those plump chickens.
“Good,” Marty the Fisher said to himself as he watched Bounder go off. “If I know Bounder he’ll get Ereth away from those kits. And when the porcupine is alone again I’ll be there, waiting for him.”
CHAPTER 21
Discoveries
IT WAS NOW A WHOLE week since Ereth had first come to the foxes’ den. With a plenitude of food available, life had settled into a steady routine.
Sleeping arrangements were something of a compromise. While the kits slept on their own heap of leaves, it worked out that Ereth slept there too. Sixteen paws, four tails, and countless quills found a way to be close without anyone’s being hurt. What’s more, everyone’s sleep was sound.
Ereth was the first to get up each morning. Even as the sun threw golden shafts of light over the white field in front of the bluff, he could be found scrambling toward the grove of trees. There he breakfasted on tender bark, eating as much as he wanted. Only when he was fully satisfied did he return to the den to wake the kits.
It was not an easy task. “Time to wake up, you slimy slug bugs!” he’d cry out, or something equally cheerful and inviting.
Nimble was usually the first to stagger up. A very sleepy Flip followed. As for Tumble, he almost had to be dragged to his feet. Even then he protested in his grumpy fashion all the way.
Once the three kits were up, there was considerable yawning, stretching, and bumping, not to mention bickering. Ereth, meanwhile, snapped, ordered, cajoled, and otherwise insisted that faces be washed, fur groomed, tails smoothed. Nimble had the most trouble with this, insisting she did not care what anyone thought about how she looked, that she was going to appear as she chose no matter what. Flip went the other way. He took great pains with his grooming, insisting that there was no way he would be caught dead (his unfortunate words) looking anything less than exactly as he wished. As for Tumble, he did not care one way or the other, but simply went through the motions to avoid Ereth’s barbs.
Though it seemed to take forever, everyone was eventually up and ready. Then one of the foxes was sent out to the storage den to fetch breakfast. Being chosen and sent by Ereth was considered something of a privilege. Ereth tried to be careful as to his choice, rewarding now one, now another for good behavior, so no one was favored unfairly.
Whoever went brought back just enough breakfast for the other two. Ereth’s
