It was only when he began to tell her of the seven Stillstones that went with the Books, and she realised that they were not huge stones like the one on top of Duncton Hill but smaller, that her sense of bliss was transmuted into the shiveringly awesome feeling that she and Boswell were touching something that made time and circumstance fall away into a different place.
Boswell sensed this feeling in her, for he stopped talking at once and asked: ‘Can you tell me something about any of this?’ For the first time since he had come to Duncton he felt that the Stone was giving him its help.
Then, very simply, Rebecca told him about what she and Bracken had seen and felt on Longest Night. She described it matter-of-factly and quite without mystery, though the fears, doubts and joys that had been a part of that night were a part of her description.
He listened to her, trembling with the same sense of awe that she had felt, and when she finished, his first comment was: ‘So he touched that stone, which must have been a Stillstone and its light faded? He touched it!’
‘Does it matter?’ she asked a little nervously, because he sounded shocked.
‘I don’t know, Rebecca. Perhaps not. I don’t know.’
‘Hasn’t Bracken told you anything about this at all?’ she asked.
Boswell shook his head. ‘Nothing. In fact, he doesn’t even like to talk about you. I’ve asked him to take me up to the Ancient System but he has ordered that nomole goes there. I think…’ But he stopped, because what he thought was something that Rebecca perhaps ought not to hear.
‘Yes?’ said Rebecca who, as a healer, was more used than anymole in the two systems to moles who were reluctant to finish sentences. Usually the unspoken part of the sentence was what they had come to talk to her about. She didn’t think this of Boswell, but habits die hard.
‘I was going to say that I think his apparent dislike of the Ancient System, which extends to the Stone, as you well know, has a lot to do with you and him… well… not…’ said Boswell, searching vainly for the right words.
‘Not being in touch?’ said Rebecca.
‘Exactly,’ smiled Boswell. ‘Yes, that’s it!’ He wanted to laugh, but Rebecca was not smiling. She was serious, and for the first time since he had been in her burrow her face expressed the sense of loss that he had sensed in her spirit when he first came.
Once more he saw how vulnerable she was. There were times when he felt acutely his own lack of wisdom and wished he knew how to comfort a mole. He was full to bursting with the desire to say something to Rebecca, but did not know the words. But he found himself saying, ‘He loves you.’ Perhaps it was all he had come to say to Rebecca anyway.
‘Does he know it?’ asked Rebecca.
Boswell shook his head: he didn’t know. He could not help wondering whether or not Rebecca knew that she loved Bracken. But then, what did those words mean unless they were expressed through the Stone, which, in the first place, they had been?
‘When I think of him or hear his name, I think of Mandrake,’ said Rebecca quietly. ‘I think of him trying to reach out to me by the Stone and Bracken stopping me, stopping me.’
‘But it was Stonecrop who killed him,’ said Boswell.
‘It wasn’t that,’ whispered Rebecca, remembering. ‘Perhaps a fight is better than an owl, or disease, especially for Mandrake. Perhaps that was best. No, you see, Bracken heard Mandrake. He heard him calling me and because he was afraid he stopped me going, and Mandrake was left in that… place—’ Rebecca could not go on. She cried freely, freer than she would have been before any other mole but Boswell. Boswell wished he had had the wisdom to understand.
But Bracken and Rebecca did meet, an accidental crossing of paths in the Marsh End where he and Boswell had been talking to Mekkins one day about what everymole now recognised was a drought, and getting more serious every day.
Bracken and Boswell were going down a tunnel. There was laughter ahead, a couple of females chatting, and then there was Rebecca, large as life, Bracken tensed and looked surly, even angry. Rebecca smiled, a shade too calmly Boswell thought, as he backed away to leave the two together.
‘Rebecca!’ exclaimed Bracken with false cheer, having recovered himself. ‘I hear good reports of your work—not only in Duncton but on the pasture as well.’
‘Hello, Bracken,’ said Rebecca quietly.
‘Yes, again and again I come across moles who…’ and within Boswell’s hearing Bracken launched into a shower of talk about everything but what was in his heart—his joy and confusion at seeing Rebecca again.
She said hardly a word during this prattle, except ‘yes’ and ‘mmm’ and ‘really?’ but each word she spoke seemed slower and sadder than the last. But there was a point in their painful conversation when, for a brief moment, the light shone again. Bracken had got on to the subject of the drought and Rebecca suddenly said, ironically, ‘You should put a stop to it, Bracken. You’re the leader of Duncton.’
Bracken laughed a little too loudly and then said, ‘I’m not the Stone, Rebecca,’ and Boswell heard her soft reply: ‘No, my dear, you’re not.’
Bracken was silent, for he heard the love behind her reproof just as much as Boswell did, and he could not hide the sadness in his own eyes. For a moment he relaxed and looked directly into Rebecca’s eyes—and she into his. And there was stillness between them again. Rebecca had seen that look before, one September in the fading of a rainstorm when Bracken had first told her his name. He had run off then, and he did it again now, barely saying goodbye before he was gone. And Rebecca was left with only a look of understanding from Boswell to weigh against the loss she felt, the frustration at Bracken’s fear, and the feeling that in some way, surely, it was her fault. She could have done more: the same feeling she had so often and so sadly faced with Mandrake. And then she thought of Mandrake, whom she had loved so deeply, and wondered why Bracken had not heard his cries.
Chapter Thirty-Three
In the third week of August, Stonecrop came over from the pastures to see Bracken. They talked in the elder burrow with Boswell and a couple of other Duncton moles present.
‘The drought on the pastures is now getting very serious, Bracken,’ started Stonecrop. ‘Perhaps you in the wood are more protected than we are, and so do not realise how critical it is becoming. The grass is turning yellow with dryness; the soil is cracking and so hard for lack of rain that our youngsters who have left their home burrows cannot burrow tunnels and are being forced to live on the surface in the few areas of longer grass that exist. Many have been taken by owl and kestrel. The stronger ones are fighting for older moles’ territory and there is death and violence in the system. Food is scarce and moles that find a source of worms are keeping it secret, or killing other moles who find out their secret, and there is a growing sense of distrust and treachery throughout the system.’
‘What can we do about it?’ asked Bracken coldly. ‘Our own food supply is poor and, I am told, getting worse.’ He looked round at the others for confirmation. They nodded, and
Boswell thought to himself that there is nothing like a shortage of food to turn a system violently against others and itself. He had heard of it, but never seen it at first paw.