Fritti leaned forward and gave the youngster a nose-rub on his forehead. “You were very brave, Pouncequick. Very brave. So you never saw what it was that chased you?”
“Not quite, no. But I shall never forget those eyes. And those red claws! Phoof!” Pouncequick shook himself from nose to tail, then turned to Tailchaser, anxiety melted away. “All that talk of fla-fa‘az has made me ravenous. Did I mention that I was hungry?”
“I think you did,” laughed Tailchaser.
They rested through the afternoon, and set out again at twilight.
Tailchaser had some misgivings about keeping young Pouncequick with him, but decided that he really had no other choice: he couldn’t send the little cat away—back through the dangerous woods—and he himself could not give up his quest for Hushpad.
They made a fairly good pace. Pouncequick tended to trot ahead for a while, then lag behind—fascinated by a butterfly or a shiny stone. It seemed to even out, more or less, and their progress was steady. Pouncequick even managed to curb his squeaking a little, and the hunting improved.
Several days passed. They fell into a routine of alternating walks and rests—a long sleep at midday, when the sun was high, and another at Final Dancing, lasting until sunrise. They hunted as they traveled, catching the odd beetle or small bird hidden in the brush, and hunted bigger game only before the lying-in time of Smaller Shadows.
One afternoon, Pouncequick caught a Squeaker all by himself. It was a young mouse, and a very stupid one at that, but Pouncequick caught it without help and was justifiably proud. Moreover, Fritti decided, it tasted just as good as the cleverer sort.
Their companionship eased the tedium of the journey for both cats, and the days flew swiftly by. Although Pouncequick’s incessant bounding and capering occasionally drove Fritti to snarling and swatting, he was still very glad to have the little cat for company. As for Pouncequick, he was delighted to be adventuring with an admired elder. The shadow of his first night in the wild seemed to have vanished, leaving no trace.
The forest seemed to change around them as they traveled—now thick and knotted, choked as tangle-bush, then open and airy as Edge Copse. Then, at the end of their fifth day in the woods, the trees began to appear successively smaller and farther apart.
Topping a jutting rock that stood out among the treetops like a fela above her kittens, Tailchaser and Pouncequick stood and watched the sun of their sixth day rise. The forest below them stretched away another league or two, becoming steadily sparser, then dwindled to an end. Beyond it lay rolling green downs; clusters of trees sat in the hollows between their rounded sides.
The downs stretched on into the distance, their farthest reaches shrouded in early-morning fog. Beyond that might lie more hill land, or forests ... or anything. No one Tailchaser knew had ever spoken of what lay beyond the Old Woods.
The two companions scented the breeze, drinking up the smells rising on the warming air. Pouncequick looked down, then butted Fritti’s side.
Below them, on a subordinate peak of the outcropping, stood another cat. It was a strange sight, all muddy, with tangled fur and wild eyes. As Tailchaser and Pouncequick stared the unknown cat looked up at them with a strange, unfocused gaze. They had only a moment more to wonder at its ragged pelt and crooked tail; then the stranger leaped down from the rock, landing unsteadily on a wide limb, and vanished into the foliage. Where it had passed, the leaves bobbed for a moment, then were still.
7
CHAPTER
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.
“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”
Tailchaser was doing a lot of thinking. The long days of walking had given him time to do that, and he was adding up facts in a very careful way.
Pouncequick’s story of pursuit fit in with the other things he had heard: the disappearance of some of the Folk; the Rikchikchik’s tales of cat raids.
Lord Snap had mentioned four cats: the number alone made Fritti believe someone other than Folk was responsible for the raids on the squirrel-nests. And Karthwine the fox had said that the beasts had smelled part badger, part cat. Perhaps the creatures just looked enough like cats to lead small animals like the Rikchikchik to a false conclusion.
Even Stretchslow had said that something strange was in the air. A new kind of marauding beast? Pouncequick’s descriptions of eyes and claws came back to him, and he shuddered.
With a sudden start, he thought of Hushpad—could those things have gotten her? But no, he had smelled no fear at her empty nesting place. They might have caught her in the forest, though! Poor Hushpad! Such a big world, and so full of dangers....
His attention was diverted by Pouncequick, who was annoying a badger. The great digging beasts could be savage when they needed to be. Tailchaser threw over his pondering and hurried to extricate the youngling from a potential disaster.
Dragging Pouncequick away by the scruff of the neck, Fritti mumbled an apology to the nettled badger. The beast grunted scornfully at him as he retreated, then waddled off, striped sides huffing.
A lecture failed to dampen Pouncequick much. Soon they were off again, heading toward the outer edge of the Old Woods.
Waking from his midday nap, Tailchaser felt eyes upon him. Across the clearing stood the strange cat they had seen at the jutting rock. Before Fritti could untangle himself from the snoring Pouncequick the cat was gone, leaving no trace. It seemed to Fritti that the odd creature had been about to speak to them—there had been a strange yearning in its eyes.
That evening, as they were crossing a stand of aspens, the cat again appeared before them. This time it did not run away, but stood gnawing its lower lip nervously as they approached.
Seen up close, the cat was a fantastic sight. Its original color was long since hidden under the dirt and mud that caked its fur and twined the hair into swirls and tangles. Sticks and leaves, bits of tree lichen and evergreen needles, all manner of odd clutter festooned its coat from head to tail-tip. It had bent whiskers, and its eyes looked sad and puzzled.
“Who are you, hunt-brother?” asked Fritti cautiously. “Do you seek us?” Pouncequick hung close by Tailchaser’s side.
“Who ... who ... who ... the Ruhu ...” the stranger intoned solemnly, then fell to chewing his lip again. His voice was deep and male.
“What is your name?” Fritti tried again.
“Ixum squixum ... hollow and hellioned ... how so?” The strange cat looked vaguely into Fritti’s eyes. “Eatbugs is me, I am ... I ran, so I am ... so you see ...”
“He’s mad, Tailchaser!” squeaked Pouncequick nervously. “He has the dripping-mouth sickness, I’m sure of it!”
Fritti signaled him to hush. “You are called Eatbugs? That is your name?”
“The same, the same. Grass-gobbler and stone-chewer ... isky pisky squiddlum squee ... oh! No!” Eatbugs whirled around, as if something were creeping up behind him. “Aroint thee!” he cried at the empty air. “No more of your dandly dancing out of earshot, you hugger-mugger hiss-mouse!” He turned back toward the cats with a wild look in his eyes, but as they stared, a change seemed to come over him. The crazed look was replaced by one of embarrassment.
“Ah, old Eatbugs gets confused sometimes, he does,” he said, arid scuffed the ground with his grimy paw. “He don’t mean no harm, though—never would, you see....”
Pouncequick hissed with alarm. “He is mad—did you see him? We must go!”
Tailchaser was also a little nervous, but something about the old cat touched him. “What can we do for you, Eatbugs?” he asked. Pouncequick stared at him as though he, too, had gone quite mad.
“There you are,” the stranger said. “There you be.
Old Eatbugs were just lonesome for some talk. It’s a
big world—but precious few there are to speak with.”
The old cat scratched distractedly at his ear and
dislodged a small seed pod, which fell to the ground.
Eatbugs bent and sniffed it eagerly, then a moment
later swiped at it angrily with his paw and sent it
rolling away.
“That’s your world, now isn’t it? That’s your world,” he mumbled, then seemed to remember the others. “Your pardon, young masters,” he said. “I do wander a bit, betimes. Might I walk with you a ways? I do know some stories, and a game or two. I was a hunter when the world was a pup, and I catch a fair bit of game still!” He looked hopefully at Fritti.
Tailchaser did not really want another companion, but he felt sorry for this scruffy old tom.
Ignoring Pouncequick’s frantic “no” signals, he said: “Certainly. We would be honored to have you accompany us for a while, Eatbugs.”
The mud-splattered old cat leaped up and cut a caper in the air so ridiculous that even Pouncequick had to laugh.
“Piglets and pawprints!” cried Eatbugs, then paused and looked quickly around. He leaned toward his companions. “Let’s be off!” he added, his voice a conspiratorial whisper.
Eatbugs was not a bad traveling companion. His occasional fits did not prove dangerous in any way, and after a while even Pouncequick accepted him without too much trepidation. He kept up a constant stream of songs and strange poetry all through the evening. When Fritti—wanting a little peace—finally asked him to quiet down a bit, he became silent as mud.
When they stopped to rest at Final Dancing, Eatbugs was still not speaking.
Fritti felt badly about how the old cat had taken his admonishment—he had not wanted to silence him
completely.
He walked over to the stranger, who was lying on the ground with his eyes in that odd, unfixed gaze.
“You told us that you knew some stories, Eatbugs. Why don’t you give us one? We’d enjoy it.”
Eatbugs did not immediately respond. When he raised his head to look at Tailchaser, his eyes were filled with a great and terrible sadness. At first Fritti thought that he had been the cause, but a moment’s observation showed that the old cat wasn’t seeing him at all.
The look suddenly passed from Eatbugs’ begrimed mask, and his eyes focused on Tailchaser. A weak smile came to his mouth.
“Ah, what, lad, what?”
“A story. You said that you would tell us a story, Eatbugs.”
“Yes, I did. And I know plenty—ramblers and tumblers and bottom-droppers. What do you want to hear about?”
“One about Firefoot. His adventures!” said Pouncequick eagerly.
“Oh ...” said Eatbugs, shaking his muddy head. “I’m afraid I don’t know any good ones, kitling ... not about Firefoot. What else?”
“Wellll ...” Pouncequick pondered, disappointed. “What about Growlers? Big, mean Growlers—and brave cats! How about that?”
“By the Sniffling Snail, I do happen to know a good one about the Growlers! Shall I sing it for you?”
“Oh, please do!” said Pouncequick, wiggling in his fur. He had missed stories.
“All right,” said Eatbugs. And he did.
“Long ago, when cats were cats, and rats and mice sang ‘mumbledy-peg, mumbledy-peg’ in the brush at night, the Growlers and the Folk lived in peace. The last of the devil-hounds had died out, and their more peaceable descendants hunted alongside our ancestorous ancestors.
“There was a prince—O, such a prince—named Redlegs, who had suffered great unhappiness in the Court where his mother, Queen Cloudleaper, ruled. He went whispering and dancing into the wilderness to hugger-mugger with the rocks and trees, and to have Adventures—”
“Just like Firefoot!” squeaked Pouncequick.
“Hush!” hissed Fritti.
“Well,” continued Eatbugs, “one day, when the sun was high in the sky and hurt his eyes, Redlegs came upon two giant piles of bones lying on either side of his path at the mouth of the valley. He knew that he was at the gates of Barbarbar, the City of the Dogs. Growlers and Folk had no quarrel at this time, and Redlegs was anyway a prince of his people, so he entered into the valley.
“Around him he did spy every manner of Growler: tall and small, fat and flat; who leaped and bounded and barked, and dug holes, and carried bones hither and yon. But most of the bones were being carried to the pillars of the gate, where the yapping and yelping crews clambered up the piles and laid them on top. As the day wore on, the shinnying Growlers had more and more difficulty getting to the top—where they were trying, dry-nosed and gasping, to join the pillars into an arch.
“Finally, a huge and majestic mastiff appeared, barking commands; the Growlers jumped and gyrated in their efforts to please him, but at last nothing further could be done to join the pillars at the apex. Every leg-sprightly pup of the dog city was sent up to fill the last small gap—which was but one bonelength wide—but none could climb to the top of the curving pillars....”
Tailchaser had an unusual feeling. As he lay, eyes tightly shut, listening to Eatbugs’ song, he found that he could see the events in a way that he had never been able to at Meeting Wall. In his mind’s eye, he witnessed the leaning towers of bone, the efforts of the Growler-folk and their mastiff leader, as clearly as if he had been present. Why did he feel this way? He licked his foreleg and washed his face, concentrating on the old cat’s words.
“Now,” Eatbugs was saying, “in those days dogs had not become the lick-M‘an, drunk-slobber wretches we see today, but the Folk have
always
found them amusing—unless in direct battle, you see. So, as Redlegs watched the parade of frightened doglings shinnying up the gate arch, only to come cowering down in defeat a moment later, he could not help laughing.
“At the sound of this the huge mastiff turned in anger and gullet-growled: ‘Who are you that laughs so, cat?’