“Redwaaaalll! Come on, you lousy-feathered fleabags. I’m Thrugg, the Warrior of the Waterways! Redwaaaaalllll!”

Little Dumble tugged the thistle from his footpad, seized a long stick which lay nearby and stood alongside the haversack where Rocangus was perched, ready with beak and talon. Together they sang out their battle calls.

“I’m Dumble from Reedddwwaaaaallll!”

“Ah’m Rocangus, son o’ the great Laird Mactalon! Kreeegaaarr!”

Two crows landed and came hopskipping fiercely toward Dumble, their vicious beaks like dirty yellow daggers. Dumble thwacked out hard, cracking the spindly legs of the first one. Rocangus bowled the other one over, tearing madly at it with his hooked beak. Thrugg took several sharp pecks in his back. Laying one crow senseless with a hefty smack of his rudder-like tail, he whirled about, kicking one high in a cloud of black feathers as he thudded the loaded sling into the chest of another. Rocangus was scrabbling in the sand against three more crows, ripping with his talons and stabbing with his beak. He did not see the crow that pecked Dumble’s paw. The little dormouse squeaked with pain and dropped his stick. Immediately two huge crows seized him and began bearing him aloft. He hovered in the air, shrieking.

“Mista Thuuuuuggg!”

With a bellow of rage, the brawny otter grabbed the haversack by its straps. Swinging it round, he threw the laden pack and smashed the two crows out of the air.

Dumble fell, did a tumble and snatched up his stick. Falling on the two crows, he beat them mercilessly, pounding beaks, tails, legs and wings furiously. “Ya nasty ol’ crones, takin’ Dumble up inna sky!”

The three friends fought so fiercely that they drove off the crows. The birds cawed angrily, perching on low bushes and performing a curious hopskip dance on the ground as they chanted, “Krak krak, yah yah, killa beast, eata mouse, killa ’ookbeak!”

*   *   *

From the slight cover of the streambed Rocangus stood with Thrugg and Dumble, watching the performance.

“Have ye ever seen sich a bunch o’ cowards?” The falcon clacked his beak contemptuously. “If mah wing was better Ah’d go o’er there an’ send ’em weepin’ tae their mammies!”

Thrugg wrapped a hasty dressing round Dumble’s pecked paw. “They’ll be back, mate. You can bet on it. They’re just gettin’ their nerve up agin. Look, there’s more o’ the villains comin’ out o’ the pines.”

Dumble brandished his stick in a warlike manner. “Let them come, Mista Thugg. Dumble’ll smack their bottoms wiv this big stick!”

Rocangus set his beak in a grim line. “Ah’ve nae doubt ye will, laddie, but they crows can come doon like leaves in autumn wind. Yon’s only a few of ’em!”

“Stand by, mates. Here they come agin!”

“Aye, an’ there’s more o’ the blaggards circlin’ in from behind!”

“Come on, crones. Dumble’s ready. Redwaaaaalllll!”

*   *   *