Skua himself, ever energetic, went from one group to another, listening, peering, probing and sometimes whispering in the ears of his fellow Inquisitors, the better to consult or advise them, or even perhaps, admonish. All the time Snyde, who seemed now to have attached himself to Skua, followed on in his wake like some abject apprentice to a lord of dark intent.
“So long as we can see where he is I’ll be the happier,” said Whillan.
The activity in the chamber produced a lot of noise of a low-level kind, punctuated occasionally by a sudden grunting shout as some piece of information or morsel of Newborn thought forced itself into the minds of the pilgrims below.
Meanwhile, as a bleak reminder of what happens to those on whose heart the snake of doubt has fed, the mole Snyde had exposed was now slumped in the comer of the chamber near the dais with no other mole but the fat Squelch, who was chewing his messy way through a fleshy lobworm, watching him.
Maple reported what he had seen, and also something of his meeting and conversation with Thripp, and he took the opportunity of the lull in the proceedings to quietly show the others the way to the escape route he had found in case they needed to get to it quickly later on. All of them were glad of the break and though they did not risk going out on to the surface when others might be about as well, they thrust their snouts out into the grey winter air, and felt relief to be away from the pressure of the Newborns.
“It’s the chanting I can’t get over,” said Whillan to Madoc, “we’ve nothing like that in Duncton Wood. It was so powerful, so moving – and I admit I enjoyed it.”
“They always do it,” replied Madoc. “I used to hear them practising.”
“And Squelch? Did he practise?”
“He is their inspiration. His voice is perfection. They say he sings when he mutilates young moles put into his power. They say all sorts of things about him.”
The two moles looked at each other, each glad to find one of their own age to talk to, each wanting to know so much about the world the other had come from.
“I
like
Privet,” said Madoc. “She’s the most brave and wonderful mole I’ve ever met. It must be so... satisfying to have a mother like her.”
“It must be!” laughed Whillan. “But she’s not my mother really. She adopted me when I was a pup.”
“Why? What happened to your mother?”
Even before the question was out of her mouth Madoc saw the shadow cross Whillan’s face and realized it had been in his eyes all the time. She felt regret for asking, as well as sympathy and helplessness, and wished she could have taken the question back again. She recognized the shadow because it was her own.
“She died giving birth to me,” said Whillan shortly, “just as she reached Duncton Wood. She must have been going there for sanctuary. Of course I can’t remember her, and Master Librarian Stour, who found me, never knew her name. He knew
something,
but not that.”
“Oh,” said Madoc quietly. She fell silent, evidently upset.
“What were your parents like?” asked Whillan. There was terrible longing in his voice.
“I only remember a little bit because the Newborns separated us. I don’t remember my father at all. We’ve got something in common, Whillan.”
“Yes,” he said quietly. “I don’t know who my father was either.”
Boden called out that he had found food for them and Whillan, asking Madoc to stay where she was, went to get some for them both. He turned, he felt nervous, his heart thumped, he even looked back to see if Madoc was where he had left her and nearly fell over his paws with embarrassment when she caught him doing so. He fumbled at the food, took it up clumsily, and turned back again.
“Thank you,” said Madoc politely. The two stanced down in silence eating, both wanting to speak but neither able to think of anything to say. The silence grew almost unbearable before Madoc said, “You’re lucky, then, to have had a mole like Privet as an adoptive mother.”
“That’s what others say,” said Whillan, more sharply than he intended. He laughed – his laughter all strange and not like his own at all. “She was all right. She’s very clever. She sees lots of things I never do.”
He was silent again, and Madoc stole a glance at him occasionally and saw him frowning, and the shadows of loss in his eyes.
Suddenly he looked straight at her and said almost savagely, “I’d like to get away from all this. I’d like to see moledom and just travel by myself. I’d like to get away from Privet and all Duncton moles.”
He stared hard at her after he had spoken, his face slowly relaxing, breathing heavily after the effort of this unexpected confession.
“Oh!” said Madoc in some surprise and secret dismay, for even as she had begun to dare hope that here was a male mole she could like, and perhaps more than like, it seemed he wanted to be up and off on a journey all by himself which might take, well, Stone knew how long. “That’s nice,” she added weakly, “but you’ll be
needed.
I’m sure you will.” This last was offered as a land of reassurance to him, and to herself as well.
“Yes,” he said gloomily, “I might be.”
But then, still flushed with the relief of getting a long-held feeling of constraint out in the open, he added with a delightful grin of the spontaneous kind Newborn moles whom Madoc knew never gave, “I’m glad you’re here. It’s nice to talk.”
“Yes,” said Madoc, filled with a sudden and unaccountable desire to touch him which she did not yield to. “It’s
very
nice.”
They allowed themselves a smile into each other’s eyes, and talked inconsequentially for some time more, only responding at last to Maple’s third summons to hurry back, for the Convocation seemed about to start again.
Whatever thoughts and nascent passions Whillan and Madoc had discovered in each other – and a mole should not think that the eager seed of love will find even such unpromising soil as that of the Convocation of Caer Caradoc infertile – they were very soon subsumed by the burgeoning events of the afternoon’s Convocation. As the moles returned to their places, and the chamber filled out and quietened down, the distant singing of falsetto voices was heard, mixed with that of young male moles. Squelch had disappeared, and a large strong-looking henchmole had taken his place to watch over the abject accused – the only mole there, it seemed, who had not benefited from the break in proceedings. He languished miserably, snout turned to the wall, and all the more noticeable because from the roof nearest to him came more light than elsewhere, and since its whiteness had a hint of pale green from the roots through which it filtered, the glow was almost luridly luminescent.
The singing had a certain rhythm to it, but its main effect was to lift the spirits and make even doubters like the Duncton moles think a little more brightly of the future. This time the singers entered from the side of the chamber, led by four young moles, followed by some older ones, the owners of the falsetto voices. These were led by Squelch, who only just managed to keep up with the young ones in front, though their pace was slow.
The Duncton moles were among the last to see them enter since they came into the chamber immediately below their vantage-point, but they could see the response of the watching delegates, who peered eagerly towards the singers, and then at six other moles processing behind.
Skua and two other Inquisitors were already on the dais and they now stanced up, which was the signal for every mole in the chamber to do the same. Simultaneously the bass voices of the original chanters joined those of Squelch’s singers and the chamber was suddenly tumultuous with formidable and soaring sound. All eyes were fixed on the procession and moles muttered and whispered to each other concerning those who now came into view. The singing ended quite suddenly and the final part of the procession entered in a quiet that steadily deepened into a reverential silence.
Without Arum and Boden there to comment the Duncton moles could have made no sense at all of the proceedings. “That’s Brother Quail,” whispered Boden, pointing down at the bald head, back and rear of a mole much bigger and stronger-looking than most of the others. He moved leisurely, looking to right and left, and Whillan noticed that few moles willingly met his gaze.
“And that’s Brother Rolt,” said Arum, and it was as well he did for from a high angle the good Brother looked thinner and greyer.
“And is
that
the Elder Senior Brother Thripp?” enquired Privet, peering down at the mole who came at Rolt’s flank. How thin he looked, how different from Quail in his gait. The one bold and belligerent, the other moving with slow grace. From the position they were in it was quite impossible to see his face.
“Yes,” breathed Arum, “that is the Elder Senior Brother. Look!”
But he had no need to point out the extraordinary change that overcame the nearest moles as Thripp went by. Whereas with Quail they had been afraid, with Thripp they were open and frank in their stares, and deeply respectful. Some even went so far as to reach out to him, which he seemed to acknowledge with a nod. Those further back pressed forward to get a better view as an excited buzz went through the chamber, seeming to say, “He’s here! That’s him!”
“He was a fine-looking mole before illness ravaged him,” muttered Boden sadly.
“Aye, he was,” said Arum, “full of fire, full of energy and faith. When he was young...”
“You remember him when he was young?” said Privet, surprised. Despite her scholarly background, and kenning of history, she had fallen into the trap of thinking of Thripp as “coming from nowhere”. But moles do not emerge into moledom fully formed – they are made by other moles and circumstances, and perhaps the changes that Thripp had recognized the need for in himself came from parts of his past only now coming to the fore. Parts, no doubt, others had recognized before he himself – the parts, indeed, which kept moles like Arum, Boden and Rolt loyal to him, and which inspired adoration and trust in the hearts of so many of the Newborns down below.
Privet looked down on the mole she had come so far to see, hear, and possibly to meet, and was moved by the last feeling she had expected: compassion. He had once had the courage and resolve to do what few can do, to stance up with faith and declare his beliefs of the Stone, and persuade others to follow him. He had created a sect and that sect had grown into a monster.
“And why?” whispered Privet looking down at Thripp. “Because others let him, and nomole had the like courage and resolve to stance in his way and persuade him to take another way. Except... Rooster.”
Her eyes softened at the memory of the Rooster she had known and loved – loved still. When she had seen him blundering across the slopes of Caer Caradoc the night before, as wild and angry and confused as he had ever been, she had felt disappointment, and anger in return. Now where was he? Caught again? Wandering off?
“Oh dear,” Privet whispered to herself, “we moles become so lost and so confused when we waver from the disciplines and the mystery of the Silence of the Stone. Why does the Stone give us such liberty to lose ourselves? Well, I know why... I know. It is because in the finding of our way back again to the Silence we lost when we were born is the discovery of true liberty of spirit, which is the positive act of choice, and of commitment.”
As Whillan and Madoc had earlier been so lost in their thoughts they did not hear others call them, so deeply was Privet now absorbed in hers. She ignored Arum’s attempts at further conversation, and when Whillan tried to speak to her she waved him into silence and continued to stare absently down at the slow rituals in the chamber.
The memory of Rooster had brought softness to her eyes; now the memory of the Newborn mole she had briefly known at Blagrove Slide, and who had been the father of her lost cubs, brought tears. So... Rolt had said he was dead.
“Dead,” she whispered. “Oh why I am weeping. Stone? I have barely thought of him since those days. He was nothing to me, and he was of a corrupt system that sought to turn me into a Confessed Sister. Oh Stone...” For through that mole, who had been forced on her, had taken her, and held her, she had known the thrill of ecstasy and passion, all the more intense for being secret, unexpected, stolen out of the bonds of captivity and restraint. The sweet passive power of her life, whose very existence she had denied even to herself until that night on the way to Evesham Wood when Weeth made her talk of it. It was now as dear and sweet in memory as it had been so briefly in life.
Tears trickled down her face, and Whillan came to her and simply touched her without words. She looked at him briefly, grateful for his silence, and saw what he did not see, which was Madoc glancing shyly at them both; even in that glance, timid and tender, hopeful yet not daring to hope, wise Privet saw much more.
“Is it because of what Rolt said about that mole you knew once, the Newborn?” asked Whillan.
“You heard?” sighed Privet.
Whillan nodded.
“Yes,” she whispered. “I didn’t think that a mole who gave me such a memory could die.”
“But maybe Rolt will know what happened to your young.”
“He may, and I would like to know. You don’t mind, Whillan?”
“If you found them still alive? I don’t think so,” said Whillan honestly, “but it would be strange.”
“They were told my name,” said Privet, “but would they want...?”
“To know you? They would be
proud,”
said Whillan.
“Yes. But then...” and suddenly she shook with weeping once again, and cried out; Maple turned round and frowned, and Whillan shushed her.
“What is it?” asked Whillan again, exasperation beginning to show through.
“Rooster,” said Privet,
“he
was the one I really loved. He
is
the one.”
“Rooster,” repeated Whillan blankly. He could not keep up with the rush of Privet’s emotions.
“He is the great force of my life, you see, and the Newborn at Blagrove Slide was just a season.” Privet grinned suddenly and added, coyly, “Well, something like that. You would like Rooster, Whillan. You would, I’m sure.”