“Their smells are bad enough, Sir, but when their gazes start at dusk, beware! Intoxicated and then hypnotised, a mole is likely to wander where he shouldn’t until he gets used to them, and such wandering leads to death, even for Stone Moles. Humble me has got away with a lot in his worthless time but even he would find it difficult to find a form of words which he could use to Tryfan and your mother which would pass over the grim truth that moledom’s greatest hope had been squashed flat within sight of Duncton Wood. Not a good beginning, Sir! Not one to inspire others to follow in your paws. No, no, not good at all.” Mayweed laughed wryly, and Beechen grinned, but took the warning seriously.
This counsel given and repeated several times, Mayweed eventually turned tail and led Beechen south. Perhaps they would be able to cross the way in safety and find a route right round the cow cross-under which is the only direct exit from Duncton Wood.
They travelled all day and at night took unpleasant refuge along the way and waited for the dawn. Still unsatisfied Mayweed pressed on south and for another day they braved the continual race of roaring owl and occasional harassment of kestrel.
Throughout all this the inimitable Mayweed made observations and gave constant advice which he thought Beechen might find useful.
“Keen sighted Sir,” he said after one especially frightening kestrel-stoop on them, “it isn’t that our feathered friend the kestrel likes our flesh, because he doesn’t. It’s bitter to him. It is rather that (astonishingly enough) they mistake us for voles, in whom they have a consuming interest. Ha, ha, ha! Moles should therefore look carefully at the stooping kestrel and decide if he has brains. If his eyes are close-set and his tail and wings have a doltish look, flap your paws and look madly molish and he’ll take the hint and fly off.”
“And roaring owls?” laughed Beechen. “Do they like us?”
Mayweed grinned and said, “Like us! Stop one and ask it and let humbleness know the answer!”
They spent another uncomfortable night along the embankment.
“Begrimed Beechen,” Mayweed said the next morning. “We apologise, do Sleekit my consort and I myself for this unexpected inconvenience and filth but there we are! What is a mole to do? It is a mole to do! Ha! See? He smiles, my sweet and dusty love, our ward sees the joke! But seriously...” And Mayweed wrinkled his snout and glanced here and there... “me, Mayweed, has felt better going south. There’s something wrong with going north. Something not quite right.”
“Perhaps we should be going south. Perhaps what’s wrong is thinking we should go north,” said Beechen reasonably. “And anyway, Fyfield’s down this way and that’s an Ancient System every bit as good as Rollright is according to Spindle’s texts.”
“Not only well informed but brilliant Sir, that is true. Let me point my snout south with that in mind and see what we get. Humph! We get, we get....”
“We get something very appealing,” said Sleekit. “We get off this roaring owl way towards the area where scribing first started.”
At this a remarkable change overtook Mayweed.
“We also, we also... oh, humble me, we....”
In the space of a few moments poor Mayweed had turned from his normal self to a mole who seemed frozen to the spot with fear.
Sleekit went immediately to his flank, put her paws tenderly to him, signalled with her eyes to Beechen to do nothing and stay where he was, and said, “What is it, my love?”
“Buckland, the Slopeside tunnels black as night. Humbleness never wants to go back there. That’s south as well, and not far from Fyfield.”
“But you don’t have to go there, Mayweed,” said Sleekit.
“Don’t I, Madam? Can you be sure? You cannot. Mayweed trembles because what Beechen said was right – we should be going south, that was what was wrong. Rollright, which is where we’re meant to be going by common consent, certainly does not seem to be south since it is in the opposite direction. But then if humbleness can state a truism of travelling: the longer way is often better or, as nomole has been brainy enough to say until this moment, the hasty mole dies first. Yes, yes, the way round may be the only way. It is the way. But me myself do not want to go that way because Buckland lies there waiting.”
“Well...” began Sleekit.
“But it is the way we must go, isn’t it?” said Beechen with authority. “It does feel right to me.”
Mayweed nodded his head sadly, shook it wearily, then nodded it again.
“I shall go alone,” said Beechen. “We’re clear of Duncton and I can find my way from here.”
But Mayweed went quickly past him, took several paces on along the way, turned round and leered in a rueful manner, and said, “Promise me one thing, boldness: if our “right” route goes anywhere near Buckland, let alone the Slopeside, you, Beechen, can go first.”
With that, having agreed to give themselves up to the free and vagrant spirit that often leads moles with the courage to follow it to where the Stone intended they should go, Mayweed led them down the embankment of the roaring owl way and south into the Vale of Uffington.
The details of the route they initially took, in what has become known as Beechen’s First Ministry, have been the subject of much research and argument, and few facts about the early weeks of their journey can be established. We know only that Beechen, used as he was to all moles being friends, had a natural wish to talk with anymole they found. Therefore it was with great difficulty that Mayweed and Sleekit persuaded him to be cautious, at least at first, and to proceed slowly. Their advice prevailed in those early days and Mayweed or Sleekit – the one thin and scarred with scalpskin, the other elegant and with all the authority her sideem training had given her – went on ahead to sound out moles they met.
In fact, however, there seems no evidence that Beechen was much noticed, nor any that they suffered interference from guardmoles or grikes. They could not know that the part of the vale they had entered, though theoretically under the thrall of the Word like the rest of the south, was but thinly populated by grike. The policy long since adopted by Wyre in Buckland had been to put his resources into the bigger systems, draw moles into them, and let the smaller systems in between die. This had made sense in the wake of the plagues and the first invasion, for there had been few moles about. Wyre knew that some outcasts lived in the less populated areas, but the occasional foray of guardmoles, a few prisoners taken and cruel examples made was enough to keep moles in the centres where they were and those outside lying very low indeed.
The moles who had survived were the more cunning and wily ones. Most were of the Stone, and if they were not they had their own reasons to live and let live and kept whatever little faith years of devastation had left them to themselves. What was more, by that October the young these free-thinking moles had borne in the spring were long grown up and, though wary of grikes, still had all the nerve and naivety of youth, and so had dared take tunnels in the more wormful places.
It was this kind of laxity (as Lucerne’s new sideem termed it) which was soon to be the target of the great crusade, and had Beechen delayed going forth into the vale until November he would have found a very different and much darker scene.
Indeed, had he and Mayweed not decided that their right route from Duncton was south, and gone north instead, they would have travelled straight into that advancing tide of darkness that Lucerne had sent out from Cannock.
As it was, by journeying to the Vale of Uffington that October it might truly be said that the Stone had guided them to the place in all of moledom most ready to hear the truth of the Stone, and to recognise the mole of all moles best suited to preach it. In those crucial first molemonths of October it was still possible in that part of the vale for Beechen to move freely among moles who worshipped the Stone in relative safety. More, even, than that: they found a place where there were young adult moles with the rearing and nerve to dare listen to one who would preach of the Silence of the Stone, and to follow him.
We may guess that
in the first weeks of their journey Mayweed and Sleekit warned Beechen many times against being too open about the Stone. But in any case, it is certain that he first wished to do what Tryfan had advised moles should do: listen and listen more. Then listen yet again, and only when the heart is loving and the mind is calm, speak.
This Beechen must have done, but since secrecy and deceit were never his way, and he believed that a mole must stance on all four paws, it was not long before he felt he must state his name, his system and his faith as clearly as he could.
Yet astonishingly, the earliest record of Beechen outside those in Duncton Wood – but for the brief record of those times that Mayweed himself later came to scribe – is one made in a short scrivening by an anonymous sideem in Blagrove, a minor grike system that lies between Duncton and Fyfield.
Blagrove. Two outcasts, one diseased, the other a Stone-fool. Warned them yet they gave their names readily: Mayweed and Becknon. From the east, no system noted. Becknon spoke of the Stone and I warned him again, but he continued his foolishness. There are more such Stone-fools about since the summer years and something must be done.
The scrivening does not mention Sleekit, who was perhaps hiding lest she should be recognised as a fellow sideem, but “Becknon” must be a mis-hearing of “Beechen”, and clearly the moles were free to move about.
The reference to a “Stone-fool” suggests that in the vale at least there were enough moles who had been maddened by disease and past troubles and the stresses of a vagrant’s life that they dared to speak of the Stone openly. It is clear that until then the grikes had no need to punish such moles, seeing them as harmless and better left alone, but the comment “something must be done” is an ominous precursor of the new repression soon to come.
But if Beechen and his friends succeeded at first in remaining little noticed it was not long before Beechen’s name became more widely known among followers in the vale.
No single incident seems to have made more certain that this would be so than his healing, at Dry Sandford, of the mole Buckram. It seems that word had reached a small colony of moles at Sandford, a heath which lies a little to the west of Blagrove, that a mole most truly of the Stone was about, and perhaps already there was the hint that he was a healer. However that might be, a mole appeared one day where Beechen and the others were eating and asked if one of them was of the Stone.
“We are all of the Stone,” Beechen said softly, gazing on the mole. “Whatmole is it that troubles you?”
The mole, whose name was Poplar, seemed astonished at this reply, and faltered, “Nomole, none at all. It was just that we heard you might... we thought you could... is your name Beechen?”
He saw that it was.
“A mole told us that you spoke of the Stone. Well, we would like to hear what you’ve got to say.”
“Whatmole troubles you?” asked Beechen again. “It’s for that you want me not my words.”
“Will you come?” said Poplar hastily. “Please.”
So they had gone, climbing the dusty way up to Sandford and finding there, on a nondescript slope of pasture above a brook, a few meagre burrows and five moles.
It was not long before Beechen had them telling of whatmole it was that put the fear he had straightaway seen in the mole’s heart. The little colony had started a cycle before, with Poplar and his mate, and they had three autumn young of whom one died. The surviving two, both females, made tunnels nearby and a male outcast had come by in the spring and taken one of the females to mate, though as yet there were no young.
“We live a peaceful life, we avoid the grikes, we meet others like ourselves in the higher heath where the guardmoles do not bother to go and there, in our way, we give thanks to the Stone. But in August our peace was shattered and our lives are now in jeopardy. We dare not move from here and yet we hardly dare stay...” It was plain from the faces of the others that they lived in great fear.
“You did not ask us here to learn of the Stone, did you?” said Beechen impatiently. Poplar was silent.
“It is our talons you value, not our hearts,” said Beechen. “A mole finds it harder to help another who dares not speak the truth directly.”
Poplar’s snout was low.
“Well, mole?”
Poplar nodded his head and then, looking up, he blurted out, “I don’t know how you know but you’re right. We heard there was a Stone-fool passing near. They said you were a strong-looking mole in the company of two others, though I didn’t realise they were old. But even so I thought if you came the one who threatens us might be afraid and go away.”
Mayweed looked at Sleekit and said, “Ancient Crone, fellow ‘old’ mole, we will not be of much use up here. Food? Certainly, withered Mayweed thinks. Sleep? Why not? he would say. Let us listen and feel old and eat and sleep when we will.” With that he fixed poor Poplar with one of his most ghastly grins, showing what yellow teeth remained in his mouth, and fell silent again.
“I didn’t mean, I mean... well.”
“Tell us about this mole. Why does he make you so afraid?”
“He’s diseased!” said one of the females.
“He threatens us!” said her sister.
“He says he’ll kill us if we try to go away,” said Poplar’s mate.
“Or tell the grikes we’re followers of the Stone.”
The mole’s name, it seemed, was Buckram. He was a guardmole with murrain and well known in those parts as having been cast out of Fyfield. He was said to have killed fellow guardmoles who threatened him, and had terrorised a succession of the small outposts of moles he had settled near. One day at the end of August he had appeared at one of the little meetings of followers up on the heath and shouted at them, and then taloned and wounded one of the males who had remonstrated with him.
“He said terrible things,” Poplar explained, “and disrupted our meeting. Then when it was over he followed me rather than any of the others, not saying anything. We thought he would leave us but he didn’t. He took over a burrow on the slopes above us and now he often threatens us as we’ve told you. He takes our worms and drinks in the stream where we like to, although there are plenty of other places. Nomole among those around here will help us drive him off because he’s got murrain and it’s getting worse. Recently he has been more violent and taloned and buffeted me out of his way by the stream. He’s a trained guardmole. He’s very strong and....”
“What do you want me to do?”
A look of hope came to Poplar’s face.
“Drive him away. You look strong enough to me, and since you must be outcasts you could stay on near here. You could all find room here. The grikes won’t trouble you.”
“But my heart would trouble me,” said Beechen, gazing on them all and a look of terrible despair came over his face. “You say his name is Buckram? Take me to him. Now.”
“We can point to where he lives,” said Poplar eagerly.
“Is there a Stone on the heath where you worship?”
“Why no, the nearest is at Fyfield. But nomole can go there and come out alive.”
“Would you like a Stone to rise above your burrows?”
“Why... yes. We’re followers, aren’t we? But there’s no Stone here and never has been.”
“There is a Stone here, Poplar, but you cannot see it. It rises where Buckram waits.” Beechen leaned forward and touched the timid Poplar on the paw and gazed on him so that Poplar could not take his eyes away. “Your Stone is where he is, and as he waits so it waits as well. See him truly, mole, and you shall see thy Stone.”
Poplar stared in awe at Beechen, and then as Beechen drew his paw away, the mole raised the paw he had touched and looked at it as if he expected to see more than a paw.
“I don’t know what to do,” he said, and then turning to his family he said again, “I have never known what to do.”
“So you ask another whom you barely know to do something for you, not even knowing what it should be? No, mole, you go to him.
Go now, and ask him here and you might learn what it is you must do. He shall not harm you any more than you can bear.”
“I am afraid.”
“Then take these moles with you, for they are what you most love, which he will know. Go together, ask him to come with you, and we shall wait for you.”
“But... but...” began Poplar, but somehow, almost in a dream, he signalled the others out of the burrow and then followed them. At its exit he turned back and said, “Whatmole are you?”
“You know my name.”
“Yes, yes I do,” said Poplar. “What shall I say to Buckram? What happens if...?”
“The Stone you shall see rise before you will tell you what to say. Now think no more but with thy heart. Go to him.”
And so they did, and Beechen and the others followed them to the surface and watched as they timidly went up the slope together, staying close for fear of what Buckram might do to them.
They saw the group stop and Poplar go forward. They guessed that he called out Buckram’s name, for they heard a roar of rage and saw a great mole emerge and tower over Poplar.
Then all seemed quiet, all still, all caught in silence. Then Poplar turned from Buckram, and the great guardmole, his face livid with raw murrain, his paws bleeding with ulcers, his flanks open and fetid, followed behind him as meekly as if he were a pup.
They saw that in Poplar’s gait and eyes were wonder and strange pride as he guided the diseased guardmole back to where Beechen had taken stance.
When they reached him it was Buckram who started to speak first, his voice rough and broken, yet his hurt body restless and stanced as if ready to fight.
“He said... the mole said... he told me....”
“What did he tell you?” asked Beechen, going to the stricken mole and putting his paws where the sores were worst. “What did he say?”
But Buckram could not speak, for his hurt snout was low and his great ruined body seemed unable to support itself more.