Free The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford Page A

of the danger, and with incredible swiftness for such a clumsy-looking animal, spun round, whipping its terrible tail in the dog’s face. The dog yelped and leaped back with the unexpected shock of pain, and the porcupine ambled away, looking almost outraged.
    The Labrador was fortunate in that the tail had struck a sidewise, glancing blow, so that the quills had pierced only one side of his cheek, missing the eye by a fraction; but these quills were about two-and-a-half inches long, barbed at the piercing end, and were firmly and painfully embedded.
    Try as he might the dog could do nothing to remove the pliant quills; he only succeeded in pushing them farther in. He tore at them with his paws; he scratched at the sites until they bled; he rubbed his head and cheek along the ground and against the trunk of a tree. But the cruel, stinging barbs dugin farther, and their stinging torture spread through his face and jaws. Eventually he abandoned the attempt to free them, and they journeyed on. But every time they paused the Labrador would shake his head, or scratch frantically with his hind leg, seeking release from the pain.

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    T HE CAT by himself was a swift and efficient traveler. He had no difficulty at all in picking up the trail of the dogs from the point where they had turned off in a westward direction from the river, and the only thing that held him back was rain, which he detested. He would huddle miserably under shelter during a shower, his ears laid flat, his eyes baleful and more crossed than ever, waiting until the last drop had fallen before venturing out again. Then he would pick his way with extreme distaste through the wet grass and undergrowth, taking a long time, and stopping often to shake his paws.
    He left no trace of his progress; branches parted slightly here and there, sometimes there was a momentary rustling of dried leaves, but never a twig cracked, and not a stone was dislodged from under his soft, sure feet. Without his noisier companions he saw everything and was seen by none, many ananimal remaining unaware of the cold, silent scrutiny in the undergrowth, or from up a tree. He came within touching distance of the soft-eyed deer drinking at the lake’s edge at dawn; he watched the sharp, inquisitive nose and bright eyes of a fox peer from the bushes; he saw the sinuous twisting bodies and mean vicious faces of mink and marten; once he looked up and saw the otterlike head of a fisher high above him, framed in the leafless branches of a birch, and watched the beautiful tail stream out behind when the animal leaped a clear fifteen feet through the air into the swaying green obscurity of a pine; and he watched with disdain the lean gray timber wolf loping quietly along the trail beneath him as he rested on the limb of a tree above. Those that he encountered face to face would not meet his eyes and turned away. Only the beaver went about their business and paid him no heed.
    Age-old instinct told him to leave no trace of his passing; the remains of the prey he killed with such efficient dispatch were all dug into the ground and covered over; any excreta were taken care of in the same fashion, fresh earth being carefully scraped over. When he slept, which was seldom, it was a quick “cat nap” high in the thick branches of evergreens. He was infinitely cunning and resourceful always, and above all he feared nothing.
    On the second morning of his travels he came down at dawn to drink at the edge of a reed-fringedlake; he passed within a hundred feet of a rough, concealing structure of reeds and branches on the lake shore, in which crouched two men, guns across their knees, and a Chesapeake dog. A fleet of decoy ducks bobbed realistically up and down in the water in front of them. The dog stirred uneasily, turning his head and whining softly when the cat passed by, silent and unseen, but one of the men bade him be quiet, and he lay down, ears pricked and eyes alert.
    The cat stayed staring at him from