The stems of the furze have swept off his cap; so bareheaded, but triumphant, he goes straight to Sir Bevil, holding up between the forefinger and the thumb of his right hand the precious evidence. The men crowd round Squire and Earthstopper with amazement written on their faces as they behold the white bristle—for such it is—and ready for whatever exertion may be needed to secure the trophy. The Squire, suppressing the excitement he feels, orders the bushes that screen the earth to be cleared away. When Trevaskis and Shellal have done this, Andrew gets permission to send in one of the terriers to make sure that the badger is at home. On being released by the keeper from the chain that holds her, Vixen runs to where Andrew is lying at the mouth of the set, and, after being patted and encouraged, enters the hole and disappears from view. With his head in the tunnel and with one hand raised to silence the chatter of the farmer and coachman, who are standing a few yards away, the old man listens to the bitch as she makes her way along the galleries of the subterranean fastness. After some seconds, neither he nor Sir Bevil, who is lying at full length with his left ear to the ground—he was slightly deaf in the right—can detect any sound of her movements.
CHAPTER X
The White Badger of Cairn Kenidzhek—Continued
THE BADGER’S CAPTURE AND ESCAPE
Presently they hear a faint bark and that peculiar thumping noise which a badger makes when moving along its underground passages.
“He’s theere, sir,” says Andrew. By way of response the Squire winks his right eye as though to say “I can hear him.” A sharp struggle succeeds, and the yell of the dog echoes along the winding way. At last the Earthstopper catches what he has been listening for, the welcome yap, yap, yap . . . coming always from the same spot, which tells him that the terrier is face to face with the badger in an end of its earth.
Without a moment’s delay, Sir Bevil instructs the miners where to sink a shaft to intercept the badger and cut it off from its galleries. The surface is littered with boulders, but fortunately there is a clear space some four feet wide between two outcropping rocks, and there the men set to work. Whilst they ply pick and spade, Andrew listens anxiously to the sounds that reach him from below, his fear being that the badger may force its way to some remoter part of its earth and render their labour of no avail. Hour after hour, six men working in reliefs continue to sink the shaft through the soft ground between the two walls of granite. No child’s play is this. As the pit gets deeper and deeper, the effort required to throw the earth to the surface begins to tell on the miners, who are working away as energetically as if some of their mates were entombed below. And here let it be said that digging out a badger, always an arduous operation, is frequently impracticable. Some of the sets in use to-day, such as those at Toldavas, Bosistow and Boscawen-un, are of considerable depth and extent, and defy all efforts of the spade. Whether they are hundreds or thousands of years old must remain a matter of conjecture, but as the badger is one of the oldest of living mammals there is little room for doubt that it has had its earths in the Cornish hillsides from a very remote past. Andrew is wondering as he lies there whether the set below him is one which will baffle all their efforts. As long as the terrier can keep the badger where it is there is hope of bagging it. But Vixen has already been for three hours in that stifling den, and during that time has been throwing her tongue almost incessantly. Incited by her yaping and an occasional cry of pain, the miners—they can hear her now—work bravely, despite their aching arms and backs. Suddenly the sound ceases, and shortly after, the Earthstopper hears Vixen as she makes her way slowly along the passages to the surface. Panting and exhausted out she staggers at last, and the next instant Turk, who has long been straining at his chain, is sent in to continue her work. Fatal interval! Alive now to the insecurity the holt it had deemed impregnable, and unable to dig its way farther on account of the rocky nature of the ground, the harried creature has stolen quietly away—at least neither Earthstopper nor miners heard it—and by means of a side gallery reached another stronghold on the far side of the Cairn. The Earthstopper, ignorant of this strategic move, is wondering why it is that Turk, so long gone and generally so noisy, is not giving tongue. What he fears as he continues to listen is that the badger has buried itself during the few seconds it was left, in which case all hope of securing it is gone. . . . Ah! what was that? a very faint yap, a mere echo of a yap, reaches his ear. It seems to come—does come—from far away under the Cairn.
“Wonder if the men down below can hear anything, sir,” says Andrew to Sir Bevil.
“Not a sound,” is the Squire’s response after inquiry.
“The badger’s shifted, sir; I can hear Turk, and that’s about all.”
Then the Squire takes the Earthstopper’s place and listens. “It’s a long way off, Andrew, it comes from under the Witch’s Cauldron.”