Red Ben, the Fox of Oak Ridge

by Joseph Wharton Lippincott

On the first very chilly night of the season, Red Ben, trotting briskly along the woods path towards Cranberry Swamp, came face to face with Gray Fox. According to the law of the woods the old fellow had no right to hunt on another fox’s home ground; but what cared he, where the despised red fox was concerned? This time, however, he did grow a trifle worried. Red Ben was beginning to look very different from the thin, long legged pup he used to be.

Each slowed down to a cautious walk and resolved that the other should get out of his way. The result of course was that they met, and in an instant were locked in furious battle. On their hind legs and on the ground, they tussled and rolled and bit and scratched until fur flew.

Once again Red Ben’s training helped him. He fought with the speed of lightning—the kind of fighting his mother had taught him. He tore Gray Fox on this side and that, mauled and pummeled him, threw him down; and when the snarling old enemy tried to get away, Red Ben followed with speed that was irresistible, nipping, worrying and driving him on. There had probably never been a more bitter fight in the history of the Barrens.

When the completely whipped gray reached his own range there was not a particle of courage left in him. Never would he dare to face again the Red Fox of Oak Ridge. But Red Ben was not so happy as he might have been. As his enemy vanished in the woods, he felt more than ever before the loneliness of his life.

“A turkey buzzard had been circling over him”

This feeling surged over him until it became unbearable. He wandered over to Cranberry Swamp, and finally to the very end of his hunting territory, where he had seen the mangy little she-fox; but this time she was not there, so he did not stop. Something drove him on, into the land of the unknown in the direction of the rising sun, whence the faint night breeze was coming, bearing innumerable scents. It was then he heard, far behind him, probably all the way from the Ridge, the bay of a hound. He stopped to listen; sitting there in the lonesome Barrens, he picked out, one after another, the joy notes of Farmer Slown’s big brute, following his trail. That decided him. There would be no turning back.

Full of bitterness now, he hastened on until broad daylight came. Fortunately he had caught a few crickets and two deer mice on the way. These had helped to sustain his strength, but he was very tired. For nearly an hour a turkey buzzard had been circling over him; now close, now far, but always within sight. It was like a bad omen.

Badly as he needed a rest, it was not for him to enjoy one that day. Scarcely had he found a soft bed in a pepper bush thicket, when once more he heard the hound. Evidently the patient dog had been unravelling the trail for hours; now he was coming close.

Up jumped Red Ben and once more loped off towards the East. He was soon skirting farms he had never seen before, and crossing cement roads lined with prickly hedges, or wire. Behind him the noise was growing. Other dogs, picked up from the farms, were joining in the chase. Each time he looked back over the fields he could see several of them, running in loose pack formation, with Ben Slown’s black and white hound in the lead.