CHAPTER 2

“There. Is that nice?”

In the farmyard, Fly, the black-and-white collie, was beginning to train her four puppies. For some time now they had shown an instinctive interest in anything that moved, driving it away or bringing it back, turning it to left or right, in fact herding it. They had begun with such things as passing beetles, but were now ready, Fly considered, for larger creatures.

She set them to work on Mrs. Hogget’s ducks.

Already the puppies were beginning to move as sheepdogs do, seeming to creep rather than walk, heads held low, ears pricked, eyes fixed on the angrily quacking birds as they maneuvered them about the yard.

“Good boys,” said Fly. “Leave them now. Here comes the boss.”

The ducks went grumbling off to the pond, and the five dogs watched as Farmer Hogget got out of the Land Rover. He lifted something out of a crate in the back, and carried it into the stables.

“What was that, Mum?” said one of the puppies.

“That was a pig.”

“What will the boss do with it?”

“Eat it.” said Fly. “When it’s big enough.”

“Will he eat us,” said another, rather nervously, “when we’re big enough?”

“Bless you,” said his mother. “People only eat stupid animals. Like sheep and cows and ducks and chickens. They don’t eat clever ones like dogs.”

“So pigs are stupid?” said the puppies.

Fly hesitated. On the one hand, having been born and brought up in sheep country, she had in fact never been personally acquainted with a pig. On the other, like most mothers, she did not wish to appear ignorant before her children.

“Yes,” she said. “They’re stupid.”

At this point there came from the kitchen window a long burst of words like the rattle of a machine gun, answered by a single shot from the stables, and Farmer Hogget emerged and crossed the yard toward the farmhouse with his loping stride.

“Come on,” said the collie bitch. “I’ll show you.”

The floor of the stables had not rung to a horse’s hoof for many years, but it was a useful place for storing things. The hens foraged about there, and sometimes laid their eggs in the old wooden mangers; the swallows built their nests against its roof beams with mud from the duck pond; and rats and mice lived happy lives in its shelter until the farm cats cut them short. At one end of the stables were two loose boxes with boarded sides topped by iron rails. One served as a kennel for Fly and her puppies. The other sometimes housed sick sheep. In there Farmer Hogget had put the piglet.

A convenient stack of straw bales allowed the dogs to look down into the box through the bars.

“It certainly looks stupid,” said one of the puppies, yawning. At the sound of the words the piglet glanced up quickly. He put his head to one side and regarded the dogs with sharp eyes. Something about the sight of this very small animal standing all by itself in the middle of the roomy loose box touched Fly’s soft heart. Already she was sorry that she had said that pigs were stupid, for this one certainly did not appear to be so. Also there was something dignified about the way it stood its ground, in a strange place, confronted with strange animals. How different from the silly sheep, who at the mere sight of a dog would run aimlessly about, crying “Wolf! Wolf!” in their empty-headed way.

“Hullo,” she said. “Who are you?”

“I’m a Large White,” said the piglet.

“Blimey!” said one of the puppies. “If that’s a large white, what’s a small one like?” And they all four sniggered.

“Be quiet!” snapped Fly. “Just remember that five minutes ago you didn’t even know what a pig was.” And to the piglet she said kindly, “I expect that’s your breed, dear. I meant, what’s your name?”

“I don’t know,” said the piglet.

“Well, what did your mother call you, to tell you apart from your brothers and sisters?” said Fly and then wished she hadn’t, for at the mention of his family the piglet began to look distinctly unhappy. His little forehead wrinkled and he gulped and his voice trembled as he answered.

“She called us all the same.”

“And what was that, dear?”

“Babe,” said the piglet, and the puppies began to giggle until their mother silenced them with a growl.

“But that’s a lovely name,” she said. “Would you like us to call you that? It’ll make you feel more at home.”

At this last word the little pig’s face fell even further.

“I want my mum,” he said very quietly.

At that instant the collie bitch made up her mind that she would foster this unhappy child.

“Go out into the yard and play,” she said to the puppies, and she climbed to the top of the straw stack and jumped over the rail and down into the loose box beside the piglet.

“Listen, Babe,” she said. “You’ve got to be a brave boy. Everyone has to leave their mother, it’s all part of growing up. I did it, when I was your age, and my puppies will have to leave me quite soon. But I’ll look after you. If you like.” Then she licked his little snout with a warm rough tongue, her plumed tail wagging.

“There. Is that nice?” she said.

—

A little while later, Farmer Hogget came into the stables with his wife, to show her his prize. They looked over the loose box door and saw, to their astonishment, Fly curled around the piglet. Exhausted by the drama of the day, Babe lay fast asleep against his newfound foster parent.

“Well, will you look at that!” said Mrs. Hogget. “That old Fly, she’ll mother anything, kittens, ducklings, baby chicks, she’s looked after all of them, now ’tis a pig, in’t he lovely, what a picture, good thing he don’t know where he’ll finish up, but he’ll be big then and we’ll be glad to see the back of him, or the hams of him, I should say, shan’t we, wonder how I shall get it all in the freezer?”

“Pity. Really,” said Farmer Hogget absently.

Mrs. Hogget went back to her kitchen, shaking her head all the way across the yard at the thought of her husband’s softheartedness.

The farmer opened the loose box door, and to save the effort of a word, clicked his fingers to call the bitch out.

As soon as Fly moved the piglet woke and followed her, sticking so close to her that his snout touched her tail tip. Surprise forced Farmer Hogget into speech.

“Fly!” he said in amazement. Obediently, as always, the collie bitch turned and trotted back to him. The pig trotted behind her.

“Sit!” said Farmer Hogget. Fly sat. Babe sat. Farmer Hogget scratched his head. He could not think of anything to say.