‘Right away, Dad,’ Jonty said quickly, and Tess, who knew him very well, guessed that he would check the horses first, for of all the farm animals the horses were his favourites. But Mr Bell was still talking.

‘And if you catch so much as a glimpse of Crippen make a note of where he is and come and tell Keith, Adam or myself. Likely he’d make mincemeat of you.’

‘Oh aye, you’re right there, master,’ Adam said lugubriously. ‘Likely he’ll make mincemeat out of us an’ all, ’cos that there boar ain’t a lover of folk. Once, when I were cleanin’ his pen, thinkin’ he were shut in the other half of it, mind, he come rushin’ out and tried to crush me agin the wall. If I hadn’t had a couple of turnips in a bucket for to bribe him, I reckon I’d ha’ been a dead man.’

‘Yes, yes,’ Mr Bell said impatiently, for they had all heard the story of Adam’s escape from death by Crippen many times. Indeed, it was the reason why the boar had been christened Crippen, for even as a young pig he had shown definite signs of hostility towards humans.

The search party set out. The two big carthorses came eagerly over from where they had taken shelter in the lee of a small wood, but Rufus and Biddy, wild-eyed and trembling, kept their distance, so Jonty rushed back to the barn to find a couple of turnips and returned waving the food enticingly. The ponies delicately approached, tiptoeing across the field, and Tess saw, with relief, that the hailstones were actually melting quite fast, and guessed that by the following day they would all have gone.

But in the meantime she and Jonty had work to do, and it proved to be hard work, too. One of the store cattle lay dead in the cut, or at least Tess assumed it was dead, until she slithered down the bank and saw that its eyes were open and blinking. Horrified, she and Jonty tried to get it to its feet, but the poor beast expired whilst they were still struggling, so they left the carcass and returned to the farm, where Mr Bell told them that his guess was wrong, or at any rate if Crippen had gone to his sows he was there no longer. Tess guessed that, having won his freedom, Crippen had taken off for pastures new. Unfortunately they could not follow his trail as they would have done normally because the fast-melting ice had left the lane little better than a muddy morass. However, there were two sizeable holes in the hazel hedge which even Tess guessed must be Crippen’s entry and exit holes, so it was fairly safe to assume that the great boar would have followed the lane and might not be very far ahead of them. Mr Bell and Adam, who knew the animal best, warned Tess and Jonty to get well out of the way and not to try to intercept Crippen if he decided to return to the familiar farmyard. Adam, nervously clutching a mangel, said that he would try to tempt the creature with the food he most enjoyed, and Mr Bell waved the walking stick which he had seized as they left the farm kitchen and said grimly that he would not hesitate to defend himself should the need arise.