noose slid over his head, pulling tight about his neck. Cords were whipped skillfully around his paws. Tammo was
unable to cry out; groggily he tried to head-butt one of the wraithlike figures, but a heavy stick struck him in the
midriff. Doubled up and fighting to suck air through his wide-open mouth, Tammo was shoved roughly into a cradle
made from woven vines. In a trice he was hoisted up into the tree foliage, high among the leafy branches. A dirty gag
was bound around his mouth, and the noose loosened.
Savage green-black faces came close to his, lots of them—they seemed to be everywhere.
“Mayka move! Goo on, beast, mayka move! Choohakk! Cutcha t’roat an’ eatcha iffya mayka move!”
A paw stroked Tammo’s long ears, and a deep grating voice chuckled, “Choohoohoo! Dis a nicey wan, dis wan
ours!”
19
On the afternoon that the weather cleared and brightened up, there was great activity in Redwall Abbey. Armed
with axes, saws, and pruning knives, the creatures set about the task of dismantling the beech tree mat had collapsed
upon the already unstable south wall. Arven and Shad the Gatekeeper took a long, double-pawed saw, and between
them they tackled the heaviest limb they could reach.
Viola Bankvole stood by as Infirmary Sister, with an array of unguents, salves, bandages, and medicines, in case of
injuries, Mother Abbess Tansy had given her permission for any willing Redwallers, young or old, to join in. She
remarked to her friend Craklyn as they watched the beech being decimated, “Far better to let everybeast take part,
don’t you think? It makes a heavy chore into more of a social activity.”
The squirrel Recorder had her doubts. “We need more organization, Tansy. Look at Sloey and Gubbio—they’re
sitting perched up on that branch with hammers, knocking away at twigs, the little turnipheads!”
Tansy smiled fondly up at the two Dibbuns. “Oh, leave them, they can’t get into much mischief doing that.”
Craklyn pointed lower down the same branch. “But see, Brother Sedum and Sister Egram are trying to saw through
the bottom of the same branch. Look out—there it goes!”
The branch snapped with a sharp crack, Sedum and Egram fell backward with a joint yell, and the two Dibbuns
squeaked in dismay as they plummeted earthward.
“Haharr gotcha!”
Lithe and brawny, Skipper of Otters dropped his ax and leapt beneath the branch to catch Sloey and Gubbio in his
strong paws. Giggling helplessly, the three of them fell into the mass of leafy foliage, the Dibbuns crowing aloud with
excitement, “Again! Do it again! More, more!”
Skipper sat up rubbing his head. “Ouch! You liddle coves—watch where yore a wavin’ those ’ammers!”
Viola was over tike a shot. “I knew it, some creature was bound to get hurt! Come away from there, you naughty
babes! And you, call yourself a Skipper of Otters, have you no sense at all? Stop scrabbling about in those leaves with
the Dibbuns this instant!”
She swept Sloey up in her paws, and the mousebabe, who was still waving her hammer, which was no more than a
small nut mallet, bopped the good Sister an unlucky one between the ears. Viola turned her eyes upward, gave a faint
whoop, and sat down hard.
Skipper shook with laughter as he gave orders to some other Dibbuns who had just arrived on the scene. “Ahoy,
mates, git bandages an’ ointment, fix pore Sister Viola up, she’s sore wounded!”
Full of mischief, the Abbeybabes needed no second bidding.
Viola floundered about helplessly on the grass as they poured ointment on her head and dashed ’round and ’round
her until she was swathed in bandages. Tansy and Craklyn had to turn away, they were chuckling so hard. Then Tansy
caught sight of the cook.
“Mother Buscol, perhaps you and Gurrbowl would like to Set up the evening meal out here? There’s lots of
deadwood from the tree for a fire. Couldn’t we have a chestnut roast and baked parsnips? Craklyn and I will help—I
know, we’ll make honey and maple apples. Is there any strawberry fizz in the cellars? That would be lovely for our
workers!”
Grumbling aloud, the fat old squirrel trundled off to the kitchens for her ingredients. “Lackaday, an’ what’s wrong
with a kitchen oven, may I arsk? Indeed to goodness, look you, a full picnic meal for who knows ’ow many creatures,
an’ everywhere ’tis nought but bushes an’ bangin’. Come on, Gurrbowl, we’ll ’ave to see what can be done!”
Goodwife Gurrbowl the Cellar Keeper shook her head severely at Sister Viola as she passed. “Moi dearie me,
b’aint you’m gotten no sense, Viola, a playin’ wi’ ee Dibbuns an’ gittin’ eeself all messed oop loik that!”
Skipper and his crew, with Arven and the more able-bodied Redwallers, set to with a will, chopping, sawing, and
hauling heavy branches. The work went well. They struck up a song as they toiled:
“Oh, seed is in the ground an’ up comes a shoot, Seed is in the soil an’ down goes a root, Here comes a leaf an’
there goes a twig, Seasons turn as the tree grows big!
Saplin’ bends with the breeze at dawn, Wearin’ a coat of bark t’keep warm, Growin’ lots o’ green leaves ’stead o’
fur, Birds go a nestin’ in its hair.
Some gets flow’rs as they spread root, Some gets berries, some gets fruit, Trees grow t’gether in a glade, All
through summer that’s nice shade.
Lots o’ trees do make a wood, Just the way that good trees should, Ole dead trees when they expire Keep my paws
warm by the fire!”
They had scarcely finished the song when a voice rapped sternly from the deepest section of the foliage, “That’s
still no reason to cut down a tree, is it?”
Skipper looked at Arven strangely. “Did you say somethin’, mate?”
“No, I thought it was you for a moment, Skip.”
The voice sounded out again, quite irritable this time. “Honestly, where there’s no feeling there’s no sense. I’m
trapped in here, you great pair of buffoons. In here!”
Skipper thrust himself into the foliage. “Sounds like an owlbird t’me!”
A deep sigh escaped from the leafy depths. “‘Owlbird?’ Did I call you an otterdog? No! Then pray have the
goodness to at least get the name of my species right. Owl, say it!”
Skipper shrugged his brawny shoulders. “Owl!”
“Thank you!” the voice continued. “Now are you going to stand about jawing all day or do you think you and your
friends can muster up the decency to get me out of here?”
Right at the heart of the foliage was a thick dead limb with a deep weather-spread crack in it, and wedged there
was a female of the type known as Little Owls. She had wide gray eyebrows and huge yellow eyes, which were fixed
in a permanent frown.
Arven climbed over a limb and nodded amiably at her. “Good day to ye, marm. You’ll excuse my sayin’, but we
never cut down your tree, the storm knocked it down.”
The owl moved her head from side to side huffily. “So you say. All I know is that I’m not three days in this nest,
hardly settled down, Taunoc gone hunting for beetles, when the whole world collapses in on me. Knocked
unconscious, completely out! I’ve only just regained my senses, due to your infernal banging and knocking, of
course!”
Skipper put down his ax guiltily. “An’ are ye all right, marm?”
The owl was a very small one, but she puffed herself up Until she filled the entire crack, glaring at the otter. “All
right? Do I look all right? Clutching on here, half upside down, doing my level best to stop three eggs spilling out and
breaking all over the ground. Oh, yes, apart from that and being knocked out, I suppose I’m all right!”