Chapter 13 #3
She had no idea where she was going until she found herself back in the garden.
She had thought it would be the last place she’d want to be, so close to the ruined mess inside the old farmhouse but, as she stood gazing out across the space, she realised that something had drawn her there.
Perhaps just the hope that something special lay hidden and all they had to do was find it. Perhaps just hope itself…
She began to walk the line of the brambles they’d been clearing, a tiny patch, and even though they hadn’t found any trace of the paths they’d been looking for, it was a start.
And already there was a difference. It looked like a place which could become something, and in her mind’s eye she could imagine it, in the golden hours of a late summer afternoon, tall heads of lavender swaying drowsily to the hum of bees…
She walked on, picking her way through the undergrowth, trying to fill her head with visions of how it could be.
Anything to distract her from the horrible scenes of earlier.
She stopped suddenly, some sense preventing her from stepping into an area of flattened grass, almost under the line of hedge but not quite.
Something had come this way and she peered closer, parting the taller stems of grass to see into the shallow depression which had been formed there.
Inside was something made of soft fur, small and perfectly still, a single gleaming eye turned towards her.
Heart beating harder, she straightened, looking around.
Although the straw-coloured fronds mostly camouflaged what lay beneath, the furry bundle was essentially out in the open and could be found by anything that had a mind to do so.
Surely it should be tucked safely in a burrow?
Anxiety rose in her throat and Gemma instinctively backed away, taking slow, careful steps until she was far enough away that she could move more quickly. Willow would know what to do, and with that thought in her head, she hurried back to the house.
The kitchen was empty when she arrived but her anguished call brought Willow running.
‘There’s a rabbit out in the field,’ she said. ‘A baby one. I think it must be hurt and I wasn’t sure what to do.’
Willow’s face fell immediately. ‘I hate it when that happens. Often there’s nothing we can do, but you feel so useless…
and it’s horrible knowing that something is suffering.
Nature can be so cruel at times.’ She unhooked her jacket from beside the door.
‘Do you want to show me where it is? Although I doubt there’s much I can do. ’
Gemma nodded. ‘It’s over in the garden.’
She led Willow straight there, parting the grass so that she could see what Gemma had discovered.
Willow bent down, peering closer before speaking, her voice breathy with wonder.
‘Oh… there’s two of them… leverets,’ she whispered.
‘Baby hares…’ She raised a hand signalling caution.
‘Hello, little ones.’ She turned to Gemma with the same smile on her face that Gemma remembered from the first time they’d met – serenity and warmth.
Enchantment, that’s what it was. She drew back and joined Gemma. ‘How lucky are we?’ she said.
Gemma paused, a little confused. Willow didn’t seem in the least concerned. ‘But shouldn’t we cover them up or something? They’ll get eaten.’
Willow shook her head. ‘No,’ she said softly. ‘The best thing we can do is leave them alone.’
‘But…’ Gemma peered to where the hares were lying. They were hard to see unless you knew they were there, but even so. ‘That seems so cruel. They’ve obviously been abandoned. Are they sick, do you think?’
Willow’s smile was gentle as she took Gemma’s arm, motioning that they should walk away.
‘No, it’s all exactly as it should be,’ she said.
‘Hares don’t use burrows in the same way that rabbits do.
Instead they make a kind of nest – a form, it’s called – no more than a shallow dip really, but it’s enough.
She leaves her babies there and probably won’t come back until dusk when she’ll feed them. ’
Gemma frowned. ‘But they won’t survive.’
‘They will though. By leaving them alone the mother doesn’t draw any attention to them.
It seems odd, I know, but that’s how it works.
The leverets know to keep perfectly still.
That’s what keeps them alive. Isn’t it wonderful?
’ Her eyes began to gleam with tears. ‘And what an absolutely perfect day to find them. Thank you, Gemma. Rowan will be so happy. We knew we had hares here but we’ve never seen any young.
’ She began to walk back to the house, excitement quickening her steps.
Gemma lagged behind her a moment. ‘It might keep them alive, but how horrible to have to live like that. It’s not really any kind of life, is it?’
‘Oh, but it is! Have you ever seen them when they’re dancing?
Out in the fields on a summer’s evening.
They jump, leap for joy, with the sheer thrill of being alive.
And run? You’ve never seen anything so fast. They more than make up for a few hours of stillness.
It’s the most wonderful trade-off, don’t you think? ’
Gemma stared at her. She could understand what Willow meant, but it didn’t seem that way to her at all. All she could see were two babies, huddled in the grass out of fear for their lives. Nothing about this day was perfect.