The Fox of Richmond Park Page 10

  ‘That was—’ the vixen began.

  ‘Horrifying?’ Vince said.

  ‘I was going for brilliant. Maybe cunning. Both, really.’

  ‘Oh. And I was—’

  ‘Useless.’ The vixen laughed, then wiped the blood from her eye with a paw. In any other situation, he would have smiled at the way her long tail shook with her chuckling, but he was too exhausted.

  ‘Yeah.’ He sighed and dropped his chin to the ground, between his front legs. ‘I’m really sorry. Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fine. I’m Laurie, by the way.’

  ‘I’m Vince. Thank you again. I don’t know what I would’ve done if you hadn’t shown up.’

  ‘Died, I expect.’ She laughed again. ‘Starved and shrivelled in that cage over there. Or been made into a nice human coat.’

  Vince looked at her, horrified.

  ‘What? It’s true. Sorry.’ She shrugged. ‘You’re no city fox, are you?’

  ‘Is it that obvious?’ Vince mumbled.

  ‘Yep. All those scratches are fresh. You’d be rather pristine if it wasn’t for those.’

  ‘Oh.’ He looked down at his battered forelegs. ‘Screamers. From the wetlands. Do you—’

  ‘I know them well. Only from afar, of course. Cravings got the better of you, eh?’ She nodded towards the trap.

  ‘Yeah. I’ve never seen one of those before. Where I’m from, humans don’t trap foxes. I’ll be more careful now, though. Thank you.’

  ‘Ha, don’t thank me too much – that trap was for me. Polished off those chickens a few nights ago. Human obviously isn’t too impressed. Frogs are nicer, to be honest, but they’re few and far between out here.’ She sat down and began to groom her tail, apparently unbothered by the swathe of red covering her front.

  Vince raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Don’t look so shocked. You’ll need to toughen up if you want to live in the city. I’ve escaped more traps and dodged more cars than you’ve seen full moons.’

  As her words sunk in, Vince looked past the bloodstains and took her in, completely, for the first time. Her dusty dark-brown fur was patchy in places, her ears badly torn, her tail thin and sparse. Scars dotted her bloodstained legs, chest and face. She was like no fox he’d ever seen before.

  ‘I’m no pretty countryside vixen, I know,’ Laurie said. ‘But I’m alive. Which is more than you would be if I hadn’t got rid of those geese. Anyone else would’ve just left you for dead. Anyway, I should get back to my bins. Smelled some good fried chicken, but it’s probably gone now. Ho hum.’ She turned to leave.

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean anything… I was just…’ Vince said. ‘You look fine to me. I mean… You look nice. Great. Not that it matters, of course. But…’ He trailed off.

  ‘Ha, thanks, and no, it doesn’t matter.’ She faced him and smiled, then turned away again.

  ‘Wait!’ he called after her. She couldn’t leave. Not this quickly.

  Laurie stopped and looked over her shoulder.

  ‘Is there anything I can do to repay you?’ Vince asked, standing up.

  ‘Nah, I like to do a good deed every now and then. Us city animals have to watch each other’s backs – we don’t always have humans on our side.’

  ‘Right.’ Life out here was certainly different.

  ‘Plus, winding up geese is fun. They are beyond stupid.’

  ‘I’d noticed.’ He couldn’t help but glance at Frank’s lifeless body again. He’d seen dead animals before, of course, but they were always food and never killed quite so viciously. If this was what Richmond Park had been sheltering him from, a tiny part of him wished to go back to blissful ignorance. Vince continued, ‘He was going to leave with the others. Why did you keep him here?’

  ‘To help me open your cage,’ Laurie said.

  ‘You couldn’t have gone and got a friend to help? I mean—’

  ‘Who says I have friends? And, I’m sorry, but are you upset that I killed a goose? A goose who was ready to do you in for absolutely no reason? Unless you did more than trespass… but that’s none of my business.’

  ‘I didn’t. And I’m not upset, I’m just…’

  ‘Just what?’

  ‘I don’t know. He was willing to make a deal with you…’

  ‘That deal was to make sure he trusted me, nothing more. But, whatever. Listen, you’ve obviously been through a lot and I was happy to help you, but now I’m hacked off. That goose pecked the scat out of me and it turns out I risked my life to save a stinking poodle.’

  ‘I am not a poodle!’ Vince was not entirely sure what a poodle was, but he definitely did not want to be thought of as one.

  ‘And not that you care, but I just turned those puffed-up chickens against their leader, for which a thousand stinking animals in there should thank me, but whatever,’ Laurie snorted.

  ‘Screw you! What do you know about that place?’ Vince snarled, his energy returning with his temper. ‘Did they put you up on a platform in the middle of the lake and starve you? Did they try to drown you?’

  ‘No, because I’m not stupid enough to get caught. And what kind of fox won’t kill a couple of geese if he has to? Did you just sit and lick your backside the whole time, like you did just now?’

  ‘That’s not fair,’ Vince said with a thrash of his tail.

  ‘Isn’t it? I asked you if you were going to help and you said yes, then I let you out and you do nothing.’ She walked towards him. ‘You let that bird attack me.’

  ‘You asked me if I could stand and walk, which I can. You said nothing about killing him.’

  ‘It was kind of implied.’

  ‘Ugh.’ Vince turned away. Tears of anger burned his eyes and there was no way he was going to let her see them.

  ‘Well, if there’s nothing else then I’ll be on my way. Things to do, animals to see, you know how it is,’ Laurie said. ‘Good luck. You’re going to need it.’

  Vince blinked and faced her again. Another animal he’d driven away with his temper. But, Mother Nature, she was infuriating. ‘Listen, I’m sorry…’

  ‘You can eat that if you want,’ Laurie said, ignoring him and nodding to the dead goose. Vince frowned, but said nothing. Laurie began to trot away, then looked over her shoulder through the darkness, her green eyes flashing as they caught the moonlight. She grinned as she called to him. ‘I prefer frogs anyway.’

  5

  Laurie’s whisper of a tail followed her like a ghost as she bounded effortlessly over the allotments and disappeared through a set of tall metal gates. Part of Vince wanted to call out to her again, chase her, but his anger and exhaustion overruled him. His attempted apology hung in the air, ignored. No way was he adding to his embarrassment. Plus, she owed him an apology or two. Who did she think she was, talking to him like some kind of wetlands know-it-all?

  Vince shivered as the silence struck him. He needed to leave. Those geese might come back, or Oswald himself, and if they found Frank’s body… Well, that wouldn’t help his case. Going back to the wetlands was out of the question. Hours had passed. If Rita was alive, she would have found him by now. He pushed the thought aside.

  Screw the wetlands. Screw Laurie. Screw Edward. Screw all of this.

  Get out of here. That’s what he had to do. As far away as possible. North of the river. That’s where he was supposed to be going, wasn’t it? The city? He could come back, maybe. When things calmed down. He couldn’t think about that now. He just had to put distance between him and those birds.

  Vince took one last look at Frank’s mutilated corpse – his black eyes turning milky, staring nowhere – and headed towards the gates. His leg throbbed as he limped through the rows of vegetables. Each shed he passed promised warmth and safety within its walls, but the padlocks on the doors sneered at him menacingly, reminding him of the humans who owned them. The same humans who had scattered the fish and hidden the trap.

  Laurie’s words circled his mind.

  Good luck. You’re goi
ng to need it.

  He squeezed through the black bars of the gate and his legs carried him aimlessly onwards. The road was busy with cars, but with his eyes and ears forward their roaring engines quickly turned to background noise. After a while he reached a bridge. Thick cables hung vertically, uniformly spaced along two horizontal beams suspended between two leaf-green arches, which ushered cars underneath their ornate towers. A path ran alongside so that walking humans – and foxes – could cross separately from the traffic.

  The moon was high and the buzz of the city coaxed him further north, but he could go no further. His desire to get as far away as possible from the wetlands had carried him this far, but now, seeing London’s famous river properly for the first time, he felt dangerously unqualified to cross it.

  I’m no city fox.

  Those were Laurie’s words too, and she was right.

  The thoughts flooded in. Clawing at his brain – above the pain of his injured leg, the fresh bout of hunger creeping up on him and the humans and animals doing everything they could to kill him – was Rita. She had been his eyes. Without her, he had no idea where he was going. No idea if he’d accidentally stumble across more train tracks or into another trap.

  He thought of the geese. Their size, their strength, compared to a magpie, was immense. Not forgetting the swan. The Screamers. The cormorants. Even the ducks. If she was injured and couldn’t fly, she had no chance.

  Then again, just because she hadn’t turned up at the allotments didn’t mean she was dead… She could still be there, hiding, hurt and waiting to be rescued. But he knew that was just wishful thinking, his brain doing its best to ignore the truth and ease his guilt.

  He covered his face with his paws. He didn’t know what to do, but the facts turned his stomach. Rita had saved his life and he had left her behind. And his first worry? Getting lost. Selfishness squeezed his gut, forcing the half-digested fish up into his throat. He swallowed, disgusted with himself.

  All she wanted was to see the city, tag along for the ride, and because of me she didn’t even make it across the river.

  Vince’s eyes brimmed with tears. If he’d never left Richmond Park, she wouldn’t have either, and then she’d still be flapping and squawking at his side. Why did he have to be so stubborn?

  He backed up off the bridge and headed immediately left, where a path and row of trees lined the river bank. There were no humans around; anywhere would do. Finding a thin tree with a curtain of leafy branches, he nestled into the dirt and curled his tail around himself. Tears spilled onto his cheeks. Eyes closed, he sobbed as the cars rumbled over the bridge, the moon sinking behind the city’s skyline.

  *

  A set of tiny claws pulled on Vince’s ear, then scrabbled on the tree bark above him. The owner of the claws yelled down from the branches with a shrill voice. ‘Excuse me!’

  Vince sighed, got up and peered up into the leaves. In the elbow of two boughs a grey squirrel clasped its front paws in front of its dusty white chest.

  ‘Hello,’ Vince said with as much energy as he could muster.

  ‘You’re probably wondering why I’m not scared of you. The answer is that I saw you limp over here and then I heard you crying, so it’s logical to assume that you are probably too tired to chase me up a tree,’ the squirrel said.

  ‘Logical indeed.’ She wasn’t wrong, but he didn’t like to eat squirrels anyway. Too bony. But she didn’t know that. ‘That’s quite an assumption.’

  She shrugged. ‘I’m faster than you up a tree and I’m smaller so I can climb higher.’

  ‘Can’t argue with that, I suppose.’

  ‘Anyway, please be quiet. I’m trying to sleep.’ She pointed to a tangle of twigs higher up the tree that formed her drey.

  Vince started to mutter an apology, but the squirrel interrupted. ‘Why are you upset? Are you lost?’

  ‘Lost? Uh, technically, yes, I suppose so. But I’m upset because my friend—’

  ‘I can give you directions. Where are you going? That’s north, south, east, west.’ She pointed as she spoke.

  ‘I know which way is north, thank you,’ Vince said as politely as possible. ‘I was just having a rest.’

  ‘You said you were lost.’ The squirrel blinked her jet-black eyes, the rest of her face unchanging.

  ‘Well, I don’t know where I am, but I’m going north, across the river.’

  ‘Then you should have said that in the first place.’

  Vince sighed. ‘Sorry. Anyway, I’m going to stay here for a while, if that’s okay. I’ll be quiet. I need to have a rest and think about some things.’

  ‘Think? I can help. I’m good at thinking.’

  ‘Er, thanks. This is kind of personal, though. I don’t think you’ll be able to help.’

  ‘You’d be surprised. Most animals think about silly things.’

  ‘Well, this isn’t silly,’ Vince said sternly.

  ‘I bet it is.’

  Vince flattened his ears. ‘It is NOT.’

  The squirrel didn’t flinch, but blinked again. ‘Then tell me.’

  Rita had been persistent when she first insisted on joining him, but this was another level. Vince conceded – to shut her up more than anything else – and told the squirrel about Richmond Park, the wetlands and Rita.

  When he had finished, the squirrel sniffed. ‘I knew it would be silly. You can’t go back, so you have to go forward. Easy.’

  ‘It’s not that simple.’

  ‘Isn’t it? Your friend’s current condition and location are unknown and her actions are beyond your control. You have three choices. Return to the wetlands, which is out of the question because probability suggests you’ll be killed, stay here and wait for her to find you, which is illogical for the aforementioned reasons, or go forward towards your destination.’

  Vince frowned. Of course it made sense when put like that, but it didn’t ease his guilt, anger, or sadness.

  ‘There is another option,’ the squirrel continued. ‘Go back home to Richmond Park. Travel a different way. You could almost certainly make it back safely, if you are logical about it.’

  Back home. Back to Sophie and the others. Compared to the wetlands, it seemed almost perfect. Almost logical. So what if Edward was in charge? The cemetery wasn’t that bad…

  But it wasn’t his home. Not anymore. His den was gone, Edward would make his life hell and Sophie was with Jake now. There was nothing left go back for.

  ‘I can’t,’ Vince said.

  The squirrel shrugged. ‘So, carry on then. If your original objective was to find this park, then there’s no reason to quit now.’

  ‘But I’m not from the city. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’ve already messed so many things up…’

  ‘On the contrary. You’re here, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘Your wounds are temporary. As long as you don’t make the same mistakes again, there’s no reason you can’t survive here. But if you haven’t learned anything, then maybe you should go home. The city is no place for stupid animals. Are you stupid?’

  Vince blinked. ‘No.’

  ‘Then keep going.’

  Rita had wanted an adventure; if she couldn’t have one, he would do it for her. A small smile spread across his face. ‘You’re right. But it’s not just about finding the park anymore. It’s about doing all the things Rita wanted to do. Seeing the city, experiencing new things…’

  The squirrel began washing her tail, thoroughly bored by Vince’s epiphany.

  He didn’t care. He was no less upset about Rita, but he knew now that he couldn’t give up. His grandparents’ park was out there somewhere. It might even be just around the next corner… All he had to do was keep going. And there was so much to see in the meantime. He could do this. No more moping, no more stupid mistakes, no more being a poodle… whatever that meant.

  Keep going, prove Edward wrong, prove Laurie wrong, and make Rita proud.

  Vince thanked t
he strange squirrel and went to leave, as her main concern seemed to be going back to bed. After a few steps, though, she called after him, ‘I told you I was good at thinking, didn’t I?’

  *

  Vince left the squirrel to return to her slumber and wondered if every animal who woke her received the same matter-of-fact treatment or whether it was just the ones who bothered her with their emotional self-loathing.

  Tired as he was, beside an open path was no place for a fox to sleep through the day, and the sun wasn’t due up for hours anyway. The plan was simple: keep going.

  Vince peered through the latticed metal barrier as he crossed the bridge, marvelling at the inky river beneath him. It smelled salty, like the fish that had lured him into the trap, but refreshing. Then he spotted them; curled up asleep on a metal walkway extending into the water from the bank was a small flock of geese. He pressed his ears against his head and quickened his pace.

  They were nothing but strangers, of course, simply sleeping in the place they slept every night, but Vince ran all the same. He passed under the second green arch, which signalled that he’d almost reached the other side, but it wasn’t until the rushing water below changed to solid concrete that he began to relax.

  He looked over his shoulder at the trees that lined the bank he’d been on moments before, their mossy outlines undulating in the wind. Almost exactly the same shade of green as the bridge. Now, greeting him on the north side of the great river, was a line of brown brick buildings, their square, white windows grinning unsettling welcomes.

  Up ahead, the road split into two and a huge concrete structure ran from east to west, blocking out the lower part of the sky. Cars whizzed over it, but it was raised up on thick pillars with an empty, concrete area beneath it. He waited for a break in traffic, then dashed across. It was safe from humans, but exposed; the street-level road circled the entire area.

  Mother Nature, why do they need to travel in circles?

  Ahead, high on a black pole, a green light flicked to red and the traffic slowed to a halt. The lights changed again, and the cars moved away. When the red light appeared once more, Vince took his chance, weaving around the warm, humming cars as fast as he could manage.