Delphine Fernside's Arc

Chapter 6 of 11

Della worked fast at the patch's edge. The chipmunk had been joined by two more, and a vole nosed at the crumbs near the log pile. Her fingers moved between leaves, plucking the ripe ones, dropping them into her basket. She had filled it twice already and tipped each load into Grampy's crate. Then she heard the crack of wood from the tree line, and the small animals scattered back into the gaps. A moose stepped out of the forest. He was huge. His antlers spread wide above his long face, and his shoulders rose higher than Della's head. Behind him she saw the path he had made, a torn stripe of broken branches and trampled fern leading straight from the woods to the patch. He had drifted in without thinking, the way a cow drifts toward salt. His nose worked the air. His front hoof lifted and set down again, closer to the strawberries. Della stood very slowly. The richest corner of the patch lay right in his line of step. She had marked it that morning with a stone she had painted, a red berry on a smooth grey rock, set among the thickest fruit. The berries there hung so heavy they bent the stems. One more pace and his hoof would come down on all of it. She could not shout. A shout would send him bolting, and a bolting moose would crush more than one corner. She needed him to turn, not run. Her hand went to her pocket and closed on the bluebell stem she had picked at the spring that morning, meaning to bring it home to Grans. The little bells gave a soft chime against her fingers. She drew it out. Della stepped sideways, away from the ripe corner, and swung the stem gently at her hip. The bluebells rang, a thin tinkling sound, clear in the quiet. The moose lifted his head. His ears swivelled toward her. She took another slow step, ringing the flowers, drawing his eyes with the small bright noise. His hoof settled back where it had risen. He turned his great body to follow the sound. She walked him three paces, four, around the edge of the patch and onto the moss beyond. He lowered his nose to a clump of willow shoots and began to eat. Della let out her breath. The painted stone sat untouched among its berries. She looked back at the torn path the moose had made through the ferns, a wide open road running straight from the deep woods to her patch. Anything could follow it now. She tucked the bluebell behind her ear and knelt to pick again, faster this time, one eye on the trampled gap in the trees.