Page:Tarka the Otter.djvu/241

New Bridge (Torridge) rudder hanging over the rim of the wheel. He heard the shrill yapping of terriers on leash; the shuffle of feet on the road over the culvert; the murmur of voices. Poles were pushed among the layers of planks; feet of hounds pounded the deep water as they swam under the timber baulks. He listened to their whimpers; smelt their breath. After a time the noises receded, and he heard chik-ik, chik-ikthe cries of the parent wagtails, waiting on the roof with beakfuls of river flies. Tarka licked his paws and settled more comfortably in the sodden elmwood trough. Sometimes his eyes closed, but he did not sleep.

At two o’clock he heard voices in the gloomy wheelhouse. The men were returning to work after dinner. The hatch was lifted. Water gushed in and over the trough. The wheel shuddered and moved. Water gushed in and over each trough as it was lowered on the rim, and the wheel began its heavy splashing trundle. Tarka was borne down into darkness and flung on the rock. Under the troughs he crept, to the shallow stream that was beginning to flow through a lower culvert to the river. Sunlight dazed him. The bridge was ten yards below.

The parapet before and above him was a smooth line across the sky, except for a wagtail’s pied body, the tops of three polypody ferns, the head and shoulders of an old grey-bearded man in a blue coat, and a black empty beer-bottle.

Tally-ho!