Nimbalo sat up, rubbing his eyes and lying in his teeth. "I'm awake, I'm awake! Been awake fer blinkin' ages, watchin' youse two makin' breakfast. Fooled yer, eh?"
Ruskem passed him a steaming bowl. "Then try foolin' yore stomach wid some o' this, Bongbul!"
When they had breakfasted, the old shrew sat back in his chair. Reaching down among the cushions, he pulled out two pieces of slate, with fair likenesses of Tagg and Nimbalo etched on them. He displayed them proudly.
"Hah! I was up long afore youse pair. Well, wot d'ye think?"
Tagg studied them. "They're very good, sir, very good!"
Ruskem was pleased with the otter's verdict. "Heeheehee! Thankee, Blogg. I'll put 'em up on me wall after yore gone. Youse kin be part o' me family, eh!"
"I don't wanna be part o' no fa"
Tagg clapped his paw over Nimbalo's mouth and picked him up. "Let's go outside and stretch in the fresh air, matey!"
Ruskem put the portraits aside. "Wot's wrong wid young Bimbo?"
"Tummy trouble. He bolted down that hot breakfast."
Tagg swept Nimbalo out onto the sunlit bank. "No need to be insulting to the old fellow. He was honoring us by putting our pictures on the walls with his kin."
The harvest mouse looked shamefaced. "I better go back in an' say I'm sorry to Ruskem."
Tagg patted his friend's paw. "No need to. I don't think he heard you. Just remember to be nice to him. He wasn't obliged to help us, but he did."
Blinking against the sunlight, the ancient shrew hobbled out. "Heehee! See, I told ye. 'Tis a mornin' to be alive on. Nothin' looks prettier'n these 'ere flatlands after a summer storm!"
Nimbalo politely helped the old fellow to sit at the stream edge. "Yore right, sir. It certainly is!"
Ruskem waved his stick back at the den. "Yell find some liddle fruit loaves that I baked an' two flasks o' dannelion an' burdock cordial in there. I take it yore bound fer the mountain? I was up there once. A strange an' wunnerful place 'tis, but mind 'ow you go, especially you, young Bungalo."
Nimbalo seemed a bit distracted as he answered. "Aye, sir, we'll take care . . . Tagg, can you 'ear a bumpin' sound?"
The otter listened carefully, turning downstream. "Sounds as if it's coming from down that way. What d'you think?"
Ruskem turned in the opposite direction. "I think 'tis a-comin' from upstream, but yore ears are younger an' better than mine, Trigg."
They chose to search downstream, around a bend. A gaunt pine tree trunk was floating there, its thick end bumping the bank, trapped in the shallows as the stream rushed swiftly by.
Tagg tested it with his footpaw, leaning down hard.
"Good fortune for us, mate, a ready made boat. This'll save our footpaws for a day or so. We can make it to the foothills on this."
Ruskem pointed up the mountain's north face. "Stream starts up there, in the north foot'ills. When there's been a storm it swells, an' one part branches off to loop down here before circlin' 'round t'the mountain again. Dries up after a score o' days. Yore right, though, Cragg; if ye can free that trunk while the flood's this high it'll take ye close t'the west face in no time."
Tagg trimmed spare branches from the pine and held the trunk steady, whilst Nimbalo boarded with their provisions. Wading waist deep, the otter pushed the makeshift craft out into the current and leaped aboard. Ruskem waved his stick as they were swept speedily away.
"Fare ye well, Frogg an' Numble. May yore stummicks be full an' yore path smooth!"
They shouted back as the log raced downstream.
"Goodbye, Ruskem. Take good care o' yourself!"
"Aye, an' thankee for yore 'ospitality, mate!"
The ancient shrew watched until they were out of sight, waving his stick and murmuring to himself, "Wish I was a-goin' with ye. Heehee, there's two young rips bound off adventurin'. Ah no, I'm 'appy where I am. Did enough rovin' in me younger days. Oh well, time fer me nap."
Ruskem went into his den without bothering to look beyond the upstream bend, where he thought the noise had come from. Had he taken a glimpse there he would have seen the bloated carcass of Grobait, washed up and stuck to the bankside as the sun dried the mud, baking it hard as rock.
Chapter 16
Broggle had been on breakfast duties in the kitchen. Filorn watched him hastily stacking dishes and wiping tables. The kindly ottermum relieved him of his tasks.
"I'll finish off here. You're anxious to be with your friends in Cregga Badgermum's room, aren't you? Go on, off with you!"
Wiping his paws on his apron, Broggle backed off, bowing politely. "Thankee, marm, very kind of you, marm, you're a real mal, parm, er, I mean a real pal, marm!" He turned and dashed away upstairs.
Boorab, who was last at table, rose and began collecting dishes. "Allow me to assist you in these menial chores, O fair one."
Filorn smiled at him and curtsied deeply. "My thanks t'you, kind sir. Pray, what's the reason for this sudden rush of helpfulness?"
The hare winked broadly as he loaded a tray with bowls. "Just my sense o' duty, marm, an' of course there's always lots o' nice leftovers from brekkers, wot!"
Filorn picked up a tray of beakers and followed him out to the kitchens. "Oh, I'm sure we can find you somethin' to tickle your palate, sir. I'll put the kettle on and we'll have a nice cup of rosehip tea together."
Bells tinkled on Boorab's ears and cap as he shook his head in admiration of Filorn's understanding nature. "You, marm, are an opal among otters, if you'll allow a chap t'speak poetically. A diamond midst the dreary dross of daily duties, wot!"
Fwirl placed her paw on the windowsill, judging it as accurately as she could. "There, that's about dead center, I'd say."
Mhera approved her decision. "Right, put the nail right on that spot, please, Broggle."
With a stone-headed hammer, Broggle drove a small clout nail into the woodwork, to about half its length. Fwirl explained her plan as she worked. "This is how you make a plumb line. I tie one end of the thin cord to this knife hilt, and now I let it out over the windowsill."
Gundil scrambled up onto the sill. "Ee knoife be's goen' daown an' daown on ee corder, miz."
Fwirl played the cord out slowly. "Tell me when 'tis almost near the ground, Gundil."
The mole watched the knife's steady descent. "Jus' ee likkle bit more, miz . . . Stop! That be furr enuff!"
Fwirl tied the cord around the nail as Cregga called from her chair, "What's going on? Keep me informed, please."
Brother Hoben did the explaining. "Fwirl has made a plumb line. It runs straight and true, right from the center of your window to the ground below."
Cregga levered herself up out of the chair. "Of course! The clue that Song could see through the monocle before the ash tree grew will be somewhere on that line, probably between the cracks or on the wall itself!"
Gundil thought he had found a flaw in the plan. "Oi' bain't a-climberin' oop ee gurt 'igh walls. You'm be needen summ turrible long ladders furr ee job!"
Cregga lifted Gundil down from the windowsill. "Who needs ladders when we've got our Fwirl?"
"But that'n be ee flatted wall, et bain't ee tree," Gundil protested. "Miz Furl be a-fallin' off on she'm skullbones. Hurr!"
Fwirl reassured the doubting mole. "Don't fret, Gundil. I can walk up a wall as easily as you can walk about on the ground, you wait and see."
Gundil scurried to the bed. Burying his head beneath a pillow, he cried out in a muffled voice, "Ho no, luvly mizzy, oi cuddent burr to watch ee. Moi 'ead wudd be assidurably dizzied a-wurryin' abowt ee. Burr, lackeeday!"
Redwallers gathered on the grass below, necks craned upward, while those in the bedchamber leaned over the windowsill to stare downward. All eyes were on the squirrelmaid, searching the wall, spreadeagling herself parallel with the plumb line as she moved back and forth. Broggle was practically bursting with pride and admiration.
"Now that's what I call a champion climber. Skillful, magnificent!"
Fwirl stopped moving, concentrating on one particular block of wallstone. She studied it for a moment, her bushy tail twirling with excitement, then she shot upward like an arrow, straight back through the window and onto Cregga's lap.