“Oh, go shake yer old shanks elsewheres, Yllib!” replied Taog, pausing from his pipe playing and rudely sticking his tongue out in brotherly protest and defiance.
“Well, you can says what yer likes, yer knows Cap’n Caprinus will ‘ave both our hides if ye causes any delay to the troop. We’ve got ter get to the meeting by sundown an’ that’s a fact that is. So, as I’m yer caring, big bruvver, yous keeps up with me, you hears me?”
“Alright, hold yer hooves, bruv, juss let me relieves meself, an’ I’ll be right with yers.”
With that said, Roger soon heard a tiny tinkling sound that then became a much louder splashing, as the Goat-man, Taog, sent a long stream of steaming pee cascading down, over the rocks they were hiding behind. As the Goat-man duly relieved himself, Roger sat hunched tightly up against the rock face with Mary and looked on aghast.
Soon a pool of the frothing, yellow liquid gathered in a depression in the rocky floor right next to him. He then felt Mary shuddering, as she sat rigidly beside him, and so he turned towards her, feeling concerned that she might be terrified by these wild, uncouth creatures.
But he needn’t have worried though.
Mary looked at him with a big grin on her face. Her blue eyes streaming with the gleaming tears of suppressed laughter. She spluttered and squealed and desperately tried to keep herself from guffawing out loud, quickly slapping a hand over her mouth. She’d obviously found the whole thing highly amusing.
“Well, I don’t see what’s so funny,” hissed Roger through gritted teeth. “Getting peed on and then being eaten by wild cannibalistic goat-men isn’t my idea of a fun time!”
Taog had now finished his call of nature and was re-joining the troop of Satyrs.
Roger prayed that their whereabouts wouldn’t be given away. He reckoned that just as long as they remained quiet and still, they would be fine.
Mary had recovered herself too now and was leaning across Roger to get a better look at what was going on with the Goat-men. She was fascinated by this sudden evidence of such new (to her) wonders of nature. Actual Mythical creatures being real flesh and blood!
“I think they’re about to leave now,” she said very quietly, “they seem to be gathering around their Captain, that big tall chap over there, Captain Caprinus, I think they called him. Shhh, let’s listen, he’s talking now.”
Roger didn’t have any time to protest that he wasn’t the one actually making any noise. The burly leader of the Satyr troop, these rough and rude Goat-men of the Bad Wood, spoke, calmly addressing his motley, caprine brothers, in a deep and commanding voice.
“Harken, my Hairy Hircumen, * gather and attend me! We arrive at the Tree-King’s Court by turn of dark. But we must there present ourselves as best we can.
“Let us not arrive before our King, soiled and stinking. No, my brothers, no more battering, pell-mell through the trees and the bracken; from now on, we make our way downstream.”
The Hircumen all nodded and grunted and stamped their agreement.
“And we must be alert for those filthy Humdrum poisons, for we’ll head along the River Quaggy and go around Hooter’s Hill and then on down to the grassy sward of the Green Lea. There we’ll wash our flanks and cool our hocks and hooves. For down at the Green Lea, we can rest and groom ourselves as is fit an’ proper for attending the Court of his Majesty, the Tree King.” He paused, ensuring his audience were paying full attention, then continued.
“From there, my fine an’ fearsome Hircumen, we will leave the River Quaggy and head on across the Kyd Brook, deep into the South-eastern woods and straight onto the meeting place at the Royal Green-Acre; are we all understood and agreed?”
A thunder of hooves erupted in reply, along with a loud and bleating chorus of “agreeeed,” the Satyr troop answered as one.
“Very well Hircumen, forward trot!” Caprinus commanded.
(*Hircumen: The name the Goat-men or Satyrs have for themselves.)
Then, just as they were all setting off and charging down to the riverbank and weaving their boisterous way through the rocks and the reeds, in order to get to the River Quaggy as their new pathway onwards, a terrible thing happened.
Mary slipped!
She had been leaning too far over, and her hand had suddenly skidded from under her and she now fell heavily across Roger; banging her head on the edge of the rock as she did so.
Roger cried out “Ooof,” as Mary gave out a short screech of alarm.
The Satyrs all froze in place. They were all suddenly as still as statues, standing among the scattered rocks, their eyes scanning along the edge of the river. Not one made a single sound.
Roger and Mary lay as stiff as two statues themselves, frozen with shock as they hid.
Then Caprinus called out, “Hircumen, there is somebody here, it could well be a spy! Watch out for any worm-Minions or spy-snakes; now fan out lads… and find ‘em!”
Roger gulped, his skin crawled with fear; sweat was beading and trickling down his neck. He had absolutely no idea what a worm-minion or a spy-snake was, but he didn’t think that they’d be all that friendly to two uninvited Humans either. He really didn’t know what to do; there was nothing that he could do. These Hircumen were bound to find them.
Mary lay, huddled up beside him, holding her smarting and bleeding head; she was in despair at being so clumsy; she felt very guilty at putting them both in such terrible danger.
“They probably shoot spies, don’t they?” she quietly groaned.
Then, just as one of the searching Hircumen got very close to where they were lying, Captain Caprinus, called out to his troop again.
“It’s alright, men. Look over there, it’s just that inky old Night Imp, up to his usual tricks. Let’s get on again, an’ leave him to get on with his, always up to something, that one is.”
Roger looked right where Caprinus had indicated and just caught sight of a slim, shadowy shape, flitting up and away through the trees, just above the rocks where they’d been hiding.
“Whew, talk about a lucky escape,” he sighed softly and with great relief.
“Oh, I’m so sorry, Roger, I should have been more careful!” Mary whispered, tearfully.
“Don’t worry about it, it could’ve happened to anyone,” he told her.
The troop of Satyrs now returned to the river and noisily made their way along its waters, following their noble Captain, who galloped on ahead, signalling for them all to keep up with him. The din of their passing slowly faded away into the distance as they cantered onwards.
The two human youngsters had somehow escaped, but luck had nothing to do with it!
Mary sighed thankfully, and asked, “What do you think we should we do now then, Roj?”
“Well we’d b-b-better wait a bit, I think, we don’t want to run into those Cold Arbor yobs again, and we know roughly where those Goat-men have gone to at least,” he replied, sitting up and stretching himself. “Anyway, it’s well p-p-past lunch-time now. I’m getting hungry, let’s find something to eat, O.K.?”
“Well, that’s no problem,” Mary told him. “We’ll find some clean water from the Quaggy, just have to keep an eye out for any poisons an’ pollutants though; Remember what that Otter said, somethin’ about us Humans poisoning their rivers!”
“Yes, I do, and I wonder what that was all about? And they called us Humdrums too, us Humans I mean, and they seemed to think we’d been purposely poisoning it!”
“We don’t do that, now do we, Roj? And according to the Psychonomy, all the territory of the Great Forest of Lundun is illegal and off bounds to Humans. Anyway, I’ll find us a few juicy fruits and some tasty roots that are safe to eat. You can come an’ help me find ‘em too. The woods always have stuff you can eat. I’ll show you where to look.”