‘Is that Peter Knox?’ came Doc’s voice from somewhere close at hand. ‘Your shape and walk give me only a 42% cenrtainty.’
I said that I was indeed Peter and he stepped out of the shadows.
I smiled, but instead of shaking hands/paws, he gave me a hug.
‘You got out of Hemlock Towers, then,’ I said.
‘Singed a few whiskers when I went back for the Kyffin Williams painting in the downstairs loo,’ he said. ‘Nearly forgot. What a twit. But otherwise no ill effects. I heard they took your thumbs?’
I showed him my hands.
‘That’s what comes of playing with scissors,’ he said, grinning broadly.
‘Is Pippa here?’ I asked.
‘Safe and well. We followed your court case on the wireless. Lance deBlackberry has quite a mind, hasn’t he?’
‘The best. He said you wanted my help.’
‘Yes indeed. Follow me, and bring the box.’
We walked towards the Lago meeting house.
‘When are they planning on attacking?’ asked Doc.
‘Eight o’clock.’
‘Yes, we heard the same. So long as they attack first and we are defending ourselves, then everything is fair game.’
He flicked his incisors with a claw and they pinged like expensive porcelain.
‘They have guns,’ I said, ‘big ones.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘None of us have high expectations of the outcome, although that’s not to say Constance and the Venerable Bunty don’t have a few ideas up their sleeves. Smarter rabbits than I, those two. Which reminds me,’ he said, ‘there is still the question of our duel. Constance said it was OK, so do you want to challenge me, or shall I challenge you? It’s traditional as the appropriating husband for you to do it, but I’m flexible.’
‘Is this really the time and place?’ I asked. ‘Besides, nothing happened.’
‘Even if it didn’t,’ he said with a sigh, ‘I’ve seen you look at each other in that way. You think it might be doing no harm, but when you’ve lusted after bacon and eggs, my friend, you’ve already committed breakfast in your soul.’
‘That’s amusingly deep.’
‘It was C.S. Lewis,’ mused Doc. ‘Terrific writer but for one thing: did you know there’s not a single talking rabbit in all of the Narnia series? He didn’t think we were deserving enough, clearly. And don’t get me started on Gus Honeybun or the Duracell Bunny: demeaning stereotypes and patronising beyond belief. Br’er Rabbit and Bugs Bunny are about the closest you’ll get to a genuine rabbit, although in film and theatre, Harvey is the gold standard. Just the right mix of compassion, erudition and insouciance.’
‘I didn’t know that,’ I said, glad that, for the moment at least, the subject of duels seemed to have slipped his mind. ‘What about Roger Rabbit?’
‘My uncle? Runs a hookah den in Ross that specialises in readings of Voltaire.’
‘No, I meant the film.’
‘Ah – the jury’s still out on that one. Rabbit psychologists hold entire conferences based on him, and we still have no idea what he saw in Jessica. So, do you have a duelling pistol, or do you want to borrow my spare?’
‘It’s less than two hours before you get hit with every fox RabCoT can muster, backed up by thousands of Compliance Officers and the British Army,’ I said. ‘Is this really the time to be duelling?’
‘Mais oui, my little furless friend. You’re in love with my wife so it’s about you and me making this right. Don’t be afraid, I’m an excellent shot: you fire, you miss really badly, I fire, I miss by a hair. Honour is restored, simple. Here.’
He opened his jacket to reveal his duelling pistols, both stuffed inside his belt.
‘Loaded,’ he said, ‘and since it’s my challenge, you get to choose.’
I looked at the pistols. One had a silver crocodile on the handle, and the other a mother-of-pearl rabbit elegantly set into the stock. The gun with the bun has the aim that is lame, but the shot’ll hit the spot if you’ve a croc on the stock. If I hadn’t been a good shot myself, all of this would have been academic. But I’d won prizes at school with a .22 pistol, and once represented the county and got a bronze.
‘Is this why you wanted me in Colony One?’ I asked.
‘Unfinished business,’ he said, ‘so yes, partly.’
He was right in that I was in love with Connie. I think I always had been, and I think she felt the same. But she was a warrior and so was Doc – fearless and focused, utterly committed to the cause. They belonged with each other. But Doc was a good rabbit, and I would have to go through with this for the sake of his honour, so I chose the gun with the bun, the aim that was lame. If I was about to lose a duel, I needed Doc’s marksmanship to be as good as possible.
‘Wait a minute,’ I said, realising that to win a rabbit duel one has to hit the opponent’s ears without actually killing them, ‘I’ve got no ears – well, none to speak of.’
‘I thought of that,’ said Doc, handing me a folded chef’s hat from his jacket pocket.
‘If it’s OK with you,’ he said, quite enthused by the idea of a duel, ‘we’ll dispense with the foggy heath at dawn and just get on with it. Twenty paces sound all right?’
I put on the chef’s hat and we stood back to back, paced off and then turned to face one another. A .22 pistol has very little kick, but a duelling pistol – which I’d never fired – would be loaded with heavy ball, and the kick would make the shot run high. Plus I had the gun whose aim was lame. I couldn’t possibly hit him.
‘You first!’ yelled Doc, holding his pistol at his side. He was almost in silhouette, his ears tall and erect, his stomach quite large.
I pulled back the hammer, aimed just above Doc’s head and fired. The muzzle of the pistol erupted in a ball of fire but, annoyingly, the charge was weaker than I expected and my aim not as errant as I’d thought. I saw a nick appear in the very top of Doc’s right ear where the ball just caught it.
‘Good shot, sir!’ cried Doc. ‘My turn.’
I held my breath as he pointed the pistol in my direction, then, at the very last moment, he pointed it to the left of me, and fired. The ball thudded harmlessly into the door frame of a shop that sold second-hand hookahs. He lowered the pistol and smiled.
‘Honour is restored,’ he said. ‘Connie is yours. Pick up your cardboard box and let’s get you to the meeting house. We have some vital work we need you to undertake.’
I ran to catch up with him as he strode off.
‘What was that all about?’ I said. ‘You deliberately shot wide.’
‘I most certainly did not,’ he said in a shocked tone, ‘and to suggest I had would impugn my good name. Besides,’ he added, ‘I volunteered to lead first wave against the attack this evening and it will all end for me tonight. Some of us won’t get to go home.’
He stopped and turned to look at me.
‘There are unsuitable bucks about, and I’d rather you and she had a chance. I know she loves you, always has, and she’ll want you to go home with her. She’d like that, and I’d like it too, knowing she was in good hands.’
He put out his paw and I passed back the pistol.
‘I worked at the Taskforce for fifteen years,’ I said. ‘I enabled their appalling work. I’m not a good person.’
‘But you proved that you can be,’ said Doc, ‘and that’s what’s important. You took the heat off Constance, and a thousand rabbits were spared. You’re repaired, Peter. Not everyone gets that. Count yourself fortunate.’