Page:Tarka the Otter.djvu/94

Corffe Green broken, the river murmured, and the twin amber dots were gone.

Beside the stream was a public footpath and an illuminated building wherein wheels spun and polished connecting-rods moved to regular pulses which thudded in the air like the feet of men running on a bank. Tarka dived. He could not swim far, for by the electric power station the river slid over a fall. He swam to the right bank, but it was a steep wall of concrete. Again he dived, swimming upstream and crawling out on the bank. For many minutes he was afraid to cross the railway line, but at last he ran swiftly over the double track, and onwards until he reached the stream flowing deep under a footbridge.

He had been travelling for an hour, searching the uvvers of the banks for fish as he had learned in cubhood, when on a sandy scour he found the pleasing scent of otter. He whistled and hurried upstream, following the scent lying wherever the seals had been pressed. Soon he heard a whistle, and a feeling of joy warmed his being.

A small otter was waiting for him, sitting on a boulder, licking her coat with her tongue, the white tip of her rudder in the water. As Tarka approached, she looked at him, but she did not move from the boulder, nor did she cease to lick her neck when he placed his forepads on the stone and looked up into her face. He mewed to her and crawled out of the water to stand on hindlegs beside her and touch her nose. He licked her face, while his joy grew to a powerful feeling, so that when she continued to disregard him,