"You don't look very old to me", said Babe politely.
A look of pleasure came over the sheep's mournful face, and she lay down in the straw.
"Very civil of you to say so", she said. "First kind word I've had since I were a little lamb", and she belched loudly and began to chew a mouthful of cud. Though he did not quite know why, Babe said nothing to Fly of his conversation with Ma. Farmer Hogget had treated the sheep's foot and tipped a drench down its protesting throat, and now, as darkness fell, dog and pig lay side by side, their rest only occasionally disturbed by a rustling from the next-door box. Having at last set eyes on a sheep, Babe's dreams were immediately filled with the creatures, all lame, all coughing, all, like the ducks, scattering wildly before his attempts to round them up.
"Go here, go there, do this, do that!" he squeaked furiously at them, but they took not a bit of notice, until at last the dream turned to nightmare, and they all came hopping and hacking and maa-+ after him with hatred gleaming in their mad yellow eyes.
"Mum! Mum!" shouted Babe in terror.
"Maaaaa!" said a voice next door.
"It's all right, dear", said Fly, "it's all right. Was it a nasty dream?"
"Yes, yes".
"What were you dreaming about?"
"Sheep, Mum".
"I expect it was because of that stupid old thing in there", said Fly. "Shut up!" she barked. "Noisy old fool!" And to Babe she said, "Now cuddle up, dear, and go to sleep. There's nothing to be frightened of".
She licked his snout until it began to give out a series of regular snores. Sheep-pig indeed, she thought, why the silly boy's frightened of the things, and she put her nose on her paws and went to sleep.
Babe slept soundly the rest of the night, and woke more determined than ever to learn all that he could from their new neighbour. As soon as Fly had gone out on her rounds, he climbed the straw stack.
"Good morning, Ma", he said. "I do hope you're feeling better today?"
The old ewe looked up. Her eyes, Babe was glad to see, looked neither mad nor hateful.
"I must say", she said, "you'm a polite young chap. Not like that wolf, shouting at me in the middle of the night. Never get no respect from they, treat you like dirt they do, bite you soon as look at you".
"Do they really?"
"Oh ar. Nip your hocks if you'm a bit slow. And worse, some of them".
"Worse?"
"Oh ar. Ain't you never heard of worrying?"
"I don't worry much".
"No no, young un. I'm talking about sheep-worrying. You get some wolves z'll chase sheep and kill 'em".
"Oh!" said Babe, horrified. "I'm sure Fly would never do that".
"Who's Fly?"
"She's my more... she's our dog here, the one that brought you in yesterday".
"Is that what she's called? No, she bain't a worrier, just rude. All wolves is rude to us sheep, see, always have been. Bark and run and nip and call us stupid. We bain't all that stupid, we do just get confused. If only they'd just show a bit of common politeness, just treat us a bit decent. Now if you was to come out into the field, a nice well-mannered young chap like you, and ask me to go somewhere or do something, politely, like you would, why, I'd be only too delighted".
Chapter 5
"Keep yelling, young un"
"Keep yelling, young un" Mrs Hogget shook her head at least a dozen times.
"For the life of me I can't see why you do let that pig run all over the place like you do, round and round the yard he do go, chasing my ducks about, shoving his nose into everything, shouldn't wonder but what he'll be out with you and Fly moving the sheep about afore long, why dussen't shut him up, he's running all his flesh off, he won't never be fit for Christmas, Easter more like, what d'you call him?"
"Just Pig", said Farmer Hogget.
A month had gone by since the Village Fair, a month in which a lot of interesting things had happened to Babe. The fact that perhaps most concerned his future, though he did not know it, was that Farmer Hogget had become fond of him. He liked to see the piglet pottering happily about the yard with Fly, keeping out of mischief, as far as he could tell, if you didn't count moving the ducks around. He did this now with a good deal of skill, the farmer noticed, even to the extent of being able, once, to separate the white ducks from the brown, though that must just have been a fluke. The more he thought of it, the less Farmer Hogget liked the idea of butchering Pig.
The other developments were in Babe's education. Despite herself, Fly found that she took pleasure and pride in teaching him the ways of the shepp-dog, though she knew that of course he would never be fast enough to work sheep. Anyway the boss would never let him try.
As for Ma, she was back with the flock, her foot healed, her cough better. But all the time that she had been shut in the box, Babe had spent every moment that Fly was out of the stables chatting to the old ewe. Already he understood, in a way that Fly never could, the sheep's point of view. He longed to meet the flock, to be introduced. He thought it would be extremely interesting.
"D'you think I could, Ma?" he had said.
"Could what, young un?"
"Well, come and visit you, when you go back to your friends?"
"Oh ar. You could do, easy enough. You only got to go through the bottom gate and up the hill to the big field by the lane. Don't know what the farmer'd say though. Or that wolf".
Once Fly had slipped quietly in and found him perched on the straw stack.
"Babe!" she had said sharply. "You're not talking to that stupid thing, are you?"
"Well, yes, Mum, I was".
"Save your breath, dear. It won't understand a word you say".
"Bah!" said Ma.
For a moment Babe was tempted to tell his foster-mother what he had in mind, but something told him to keep quiet. Instead he made a plan. He would wait for two things to happen. First, for Ma to rejoin the flock. And after that for market day, when both the boss and his mum would be out of the way. Then he would go up the hill.
Towards the end of the very next week the two things had happened. Ma had been turned out, and a couple of days after that Babe watched as Fly jumped into the back of the Land Rover, and it drove out of the yard and away.
Babe's were not the only eyes that watched its departure. At the top of the hill a cattle-lorry stood half-hidden under a clump of trees at the side of the lane. As soon as the Land-Rover had disappeared from sight along the road to the market town, a man jumped hurriedly out and opened the gate into the field. Another backed the lorry into the gateway.
Babe meanwhile was trotting excitedly up the hill to pay his visit to the flock. He came to the gate at the bottom of the field and squeezed under it. The field was steep and curved, and at first he could not see a single sheep. But then he heard a distant drumming of hooves and suddenly the whole flock came galloping over the brow of the hill and down towards him. Around them ran two strange collies, lean silent dogs that seemed to flow effortlessly over the grass. From high above came the sound of a thin whistle, and in easy partnership the dogs swept round the sheep, and began to drive them back up the slope.
Despite himself, Babe was caught up in the press of jostling bleating animals and carried along with them. Around him rose a chorus of panting protesting voices, some shrill, some hoarse, some deep and guttural, but all saying the same thing.
"Wolf! Wolf!" cried the flock in dazed confusion.
Small by comparison and short in the leg, Babe soon fell behind the main body, and as they reached the top of the hill he found himself right at the back in company with an old sheep who cried "Wolf!" more loudly than any.
"Ma!" he cried breathlessly. "It's you!"
Behind them one dog lay down at a whistle, and in front the flock checked as the other dog steadied them. In the corner of the field the tailboard and wings of the cattle-lorry filled the gateway, and the two men waited, sticks and arms outspread.