Watership Down
by Richard Adams

29. Return and Departure

He which hath no stomach to this fight,

Let him depart, his passport shall be made

And crowns for convoy put into his purse.

We would not die in that man’s company

That fears his fellowship, to die with us.

Shakespeare Henry V

The following morning all the rabbits were out at silflay by dawn and there was a good deal of excitement as they waited for Hazel. During the previous few days Blackberry had had to repeat several times the story of the journey to the farm and the finding of Hazel in the drain. One or two had suggested that Kehaar must have found Hazel and told Fiver secretly. But Kehaar denied this and, when pressed, replied cryptically that Fiver was one who had travelled a good deal farther than he had himself. As for Hazel, he had acquired, in everyone’s eyes, a kind of magical quality. Of all the warren, Dandelion was the last rabbit to fail to do justice to a good story and he made the most of Hazel’s heroic dash out of the ditch to save his friends from the farmers. No one had even suggested that Hazel might have been reckless in going to the farm. Against all odds he had got them two does: and now he was bringing their luck back to the warren.

Just before sunrise Pipkin and Speedwell saw Fiver coming through the wet grass near the summit of the down. They ran out to meet him and waited with him until Hazel came up to them. Hazel was limping and had evidently found the climb a strain, but after resting and feeding for a short time he was able to run down to the warren almost as fast as the others. The rabbits crowded round. Everyone wanted to touch him. He was sniffed and tussled with and rolled over in the grass until he felt almost as though he were being attacked. Human beings, on occasions of this kind, are usually full of questions, but the rabbits expressed their delight simply by proving to themselves through their senses that this was really Hazel-rah. It was all he could do to stand up to the rough play.’ I wonder what would happen if I lay down under it?’ he thought. ‘They’d kick me out, I dare say. They wouldn’t have a crippled Chief Rabbit. This is a test as well as a welcome, even though they don’t know it themselves. I’ll test them, the rascals, before I’m done.’

He pushed Buckthorn and Speedwell off his back and broke away to the edge of the wood. Strawberry and Boxwood were on the bank and he joined them and sat washing and combing himself in the sunrise.

‘We can do with a few well-behaved fellows like you,’ he said to Boxwood. ‘Look at that rough lot out there – they nearly finished me off! What on earth do you make of us and how are you settling down?’

‘Well, of course we find it strange,’ said Boxwood, ‘but we’re learning. Strawberry here has been helping me a great deal. We were just seeing how many smells I could tell on the wind, but that’s something that’ll only come slowly. The smells are awfully strong on a farm, you know, and they don’t mean much when you live behind wire. As far as I can make out, you all live by smell.’

‘Don’t take too many risks to begin with,’ said Hazel. ‘Keep near the burrows – don’t go out alone – all that sort of thing. And how about you, Strawberry? Are you better?’

‘More or less,’ answered Strawberry, ‘as long as I sleep a lot and sit in the sun, Hazel-rah. I’ve been terrified half out of my wits – that’s the bottom of it. I’ve had the shivers and the horrors for days. I kept thinking I was back in Efrafa.’

‘What was it like in Efrafa?’ asked Hazel.

‘I’d rather die than go back to Efrafa,’ said Strawberry, ‘or risk going anywhere near it. I don’t know which was worse, the boredom or the fear. All the same,’ he added after a few moments,’ there are rabbits there who’d be the same as we are if they could only live naturally, like us. Several would be glad to leave the place if they only could.’

Before they went underground Hazel talked to almost all the rabbits. As he expected, they were disappointed over the failure at Efrafa and full of indignation at the ill-treatment of Holly and his companions. More than one thought, like Holly, that the two does were likely to give rise to trouble.

‘There should have been more, Hazel,’ said Bigwig. ‘We shall all be at each other’s throats, you know – I don’t see how it’s to be helped.’

Late in the afternoon Hazel called everyone into the Honeycomb.

‘I’ve been thinking things over,’ he said. ‘I know you must all have been really disappointed not to have got rid of me at Nuthanger Farm the other day, so I’ve decided to go a bit further next time.’

‘Where?’ asked Bluebell.

‘To Efrafa,’ replied Hazel, ‘if I can get anyone to come with me: and we shall bring back as many does as the warren needs.’

There were murmurs of astonishment, and then Speedwell asked, ‘How?’

‘Blackberry and I have got a plan,’ said Hazel, ‘but I’m not going to explain it now, for this reason. You all know that this is going to be a dangerous business. If any of you get caught and taken into Efrafa, they’ll make you talk all right. But those who don’t know a plan can’t give it away. I’ll explain it later on, at the proper time.’

‘Are you going to need many rabbits, Hazel-rah?’ asked Dandelion. ‘From all I hear, the whole lot of us wouldn’t be enough to fight the Efrafans.’

‘I hope we shan’t have to fight at all,’ replied Hazel, ‘but there’s always the possibility. Anyway, it’ll be a long journey home with the does, and if by any chance we meet a Wide Patrol on the way, there have got to be enough of us to deal with them.’

‘Would we have to go into Efrafa?’ asked Pipkin timidly.

‘No,’ said Hazel, ‘we shall –’

‘I never thought, Hazel,’ interrupted Holly, ‘I never thought that the time would come when I should feel obliged to speak against you. But I can only say again that this is likely to be a complete disaster. I know what you think – you’re counting on General Woundwort not having anyone as clever as Blackberry and Fiver. You’re quite right – I don’t think he has. But the fact remains that no one can get a bunch of does away from that place. You all know that I’ve spent my life patrolling and tracking in the open. Well, there are rabbits in the Efrafan Owsla who are better at it than I am – I’m admitting it: and they’ll hunt you down with your does and kill you. Great Frith! We all have to meet our match some time or other! I know you want only to help us all, but do be sensible and give this scheme up. Believe me, the best thing to do with a place like Efrafa is to stay as far away from it as possible.’

Talk broke out all over the Honeycomb. ‘That must be right!’ ‘Who wants to be torn to pieces?’ ‘That rabbit with the mutilated ears –’ ‘Well, but Hazel-rah must know what he’s doing.’ ‘It’s too far.’ ‘I don’t want to go.’

Hazel waited patiently for quiet. At last he said, ‘It’s like this. We can stay here and try to make the best of things as they are: or we can put them right once and for all. Of course there’s a risk: anyone knows that who’s heard what happened to Holly and the others. But haven’t we faced one risk after another, all the way from the warren we left? What do you mean to do? Stay here and scratch each other’s eyes out over two does, when there are plenty in Efrafa that you’re afraid to go and get, even though they’d be only too glad to come and join us?’

Someone called out, ‘What does Fiver think?’

‘I’m certainly going,’ said Fiver quietly. ‘Hazel’s perfectly right and there’s nothing the matter with his plan. But I promise you this, all of you. If I do come, later on, to feel any kind of misgiving, I shan’t keep it to myself.’

‘And if that happens, I shan’t ignore it,’ said Hazel.

There was silence. Then Bigwig spoke.

‘You may as well all know that I’m going,’ he said, ‘and we shall have Kehaar with us, if that appeals to you at all.’

There was a buzz of surprise.

‘Of course, there are some of us who ought to stay here,’ said Hazel. ‘The farm rabbits can’t be expected to go: and I’m not asking anyone who went the first time to go back again.’

‘I’ll come, though,’ said Silver. ‘I hate General Woundwort and his Council with all my guts and if we’re really going to make fools of them I want to be there, as long as I don’t have to go back inside the place – that I couldn’t face. But after all, you’re going to need someone who knows the way.’

‘I’ll come,’ said Pipkin. ‘Hazel-rah saved my – I mean, I’m sure he knows what’s –’ He became confused. ‘Anyway, I’ll come,’ he repeated, in a very nervous voice.

There was a scuffling in the run that led down from the wood and Hazel called, ‘Who’s that?’

‘It’s I, Hazel-rah – Blackberry.’

‘Blackberry!’ said Hazel. ‘Why, I thought you’d been here all the time. Where have you been?’

‘Sorry not to have come before,’ said Blackberry. ‘I’ve been talking to Kehaar, as a matter of fact, about the plan. He’s improved it a good deal. If I’m not mistaken, General Woundwort’s going to look remarkably silly before we’ve finished. I thought at first that it couldn’t be done, but now I feel sure it can.’

‘Come where the grass is greener,’ said Bluebell,

‘And the lettuces grow in rows,

‘And a rabbit of free demeanour

‘Is known by his well-scratched nose.’

‘I think I shall have to come, just to satisfy my curiosity. I’ve been opening and shutting my mouth like a baby bird to know about this plan and no one puts anything in. I suppose Bigwig’s going to dress up as a hrududu and drive all the does across the field.’

Hazel turned on him sharply. Bluebell sat up on his hind legs and said, ‘Please General Woundwort, sir, I’m only a little hrududu and I’ve left all my petrol on the grass, so if you wouldn’t mind eating the grass, sir, while I just give this lady a ride –’

‘Bluebell,’ said Hazel, ‘shut up!’

‘I’m sorry, Hazel-rah,’ replied Bluebell in surprise. ‘I didn’t mean any harm. I was only trying to cheer everyone up a bit. After all, most of us feel frightened at the idea of going to this place and you can’t blame us, can you? It sounds horribly dangerous.’

‘Well, look here,’ said Hazel, ‘we’ll finish this meeting now. Let’s wait and see what we decide – that’s the rabbits’ way. No one has to go to Efrafa who doesn’t want to, but it’s clear enough that some of us mean to go. Now I’m off to talk to Kehaar myself.’

He found Kehaar just inside the trees, snapping and tearing with his great beak at a foul-smelling piece of flaking, brown flesh, which seemed to be hanging from a tracery of bones. He wrinkled his nose in disgust at the odour, which filled the wood around and was already attracting ants and blue-bottles.

‘What on earth is that, Kehaar?’ he asked. ‘It smells appalling!’

‘You not know? Heem feesh, feesh, come from Peeg Vater. Ees goot.’

‘Come from Big Water? (Ugh!) Did you find it there?’

‘Na, na. Men have heem. Down to farm ees plenty peeg rubbish place, all t’ings dere. I go for food, find heem, all smell like Peeg Vater, pick heem up, pring heem back: make me t’ink all about Peeg Vater.’ He began to tear again at the half-eaten kipper. Hazel sat choking with nausea and disgust as Kehaar lifted it entire and beat it against a beech-root, so that small fragments flew round them. He collected himself and made an effort.

‘Kehaar,’ he said, ‘Bigwig says you told him you’d come and help us to get the mothers out of the big warren.’

‘Ya, ya, I come for you. Meester Pigvig, ’e need me for ’elp ’im. Ven ’e dere, ’e talk to me, I not rabbit. Ees goot, ya?’

‘Yes, rather. It’s the only possible way. You’re a good friend to us, Kehaar.’

‘Ya, ya, ’elp you for get mudders. But now ees dis, Meester ’Azel. Alvays I vant Peeg Vater now – alvays, alvays. Ees hearing Peeg Vater, vant to fly to Peeg Vater. Now soon you go for get mudders, I ’elp you, ’ow you like. Den, ven you getting mudders, I leave you dere, fly avay, no come back. But I come back anudder time, ya? Come in autumn, in vinter I come live ’ere vid you, ya?’

‘We shall miss you, Kehaar. But when you come back we’ll have a fine warren here, with lots of mothers. You’ll be able to feel proud of all you did to help us.’

‘Ya, vill be so. But Meester ’Azel, ven you go? I vant ’elp you but I no vant vait for go Peeg Vater. Ees hard now for stay, you know? Dis vat you do, do heem queek, ya?’

Bigwig came up the run, put his head out of the hole and stopped in horror.

‘Frith up a tree!’ he said. ‘What a fearful smell! Did you kill it, Kehaar, or did it die under a stone?’

‘You like, Meester Pigvig? I pring you nice liddle pit, ya?’

‘Bigwig,’ said Hazel, ‘can you go and tell all the others that we’re setting off at day-break tomorrow? Holly will look after things here until we get back and Buckthorn, Strawberry and the farm rabbits are to stay with him. Anyone else who wants to stay will be perfectly free to do so.’

‘Don’t worry,’ said Bigwig, from the hole. ‘I’ll send them all up to silflay with Kehaar. They’ll go anywhere you like before a duck can dive.’