A Herring Gull, her colleague, messenger, and scout
25
Beavermead is a city park stretching along the east side of Little Lake. Generations of kids, including my partner, have walked there in groups in their flip-flops, wearing bathing suits and carrying towels and pocket money for snacks, to swim at its supervised beach. Older kids, including our son, have played city youth league soccer on its playing fields. Families come from as far away as the Greater Metropolitan Area to spend their summer holiday on its campground. Today, outdoor education classes for school children are held at its Ecology Park, while their parents come to pick up information about the use of native plants in gardening and to buy those shrubs and trees. At the north end of the park is the Canoe Museum, for this city is where the canoe was first manufactured in quantity using designs based on Indigenous models.
For as long as raccoons can remember, Beavermead has been the site of the original settlement of the River Clan. Several historic clan families live here at Creek Town, staying in touch with their relatives who have started colonies to the east along the meandering strips of wetland meadows or “meads” from which the park takes its name. What makes raccoon civilization possible here is the coming together of streams, a lake, a forest, and a picnic area.
The complex watercourse system needs to be described because it is central to Creek Town geopolitics. First, a stream named South Meade Creek on the map flows into the park from the east, then divides into one branch seeking its way to Little Lake by going north, the other seeking the lake by going south. The diverging waterways encircle Beavermead Park and act as its boundary. For canoers, they offer an idyllic tunnel overhung by tree boughs to paddle through. Green Herons are common here. I have seen Kingfishers, but not recently. If you look over the side into the deep, slow water, you might see a Beaver keeping pace with your canoe.
Then, a separate stream system flows into Beavermead from the northeast, also seeking the lake. This is North Meade Creek. It has the same idea as its southern sister about joining the delta to enter the lake, and where it joins it makes a beautiful lagoon. Lagoon is just the right word for what you’ll find here, because it comes from the Latin lacuna meaning a “cavity” or “hollow,” and then, by extension, a “pond” or “pool” that is made by a lacus or “lake.” The lagoon beside the Canoe Museum is a cavity in the shore of Little Lake. It is on one of these tributary creeks that Clutch found an elegant stone bridge over dark water with lily pads, overhung by trees. Here in this quiet reflective place, he climbed a river willow, relaxed into his habitual thoughtfulness, and fell asleep.
He was awakened by the voices of raccoon ladies.
“Oh, but this is thankless labour for the Clan Fathers, gathering food for their community bins!”
“They intend such work to be for women and those feeble and infirm of wit. It is meant to keep us busy so that we don’t conceive Idle Notions.”
“While they lie on their backs in the shade, reciting epic poems and guarding their precious bins,” the first woman replied.
“Those bins are all that feeds us now. No personal hunting or scrounging is permitted. What they control in bins is portioned out equally by Fathers.”
“Thereby making us equally grateful.”
“And denying sources of nourishment to Migrants, who would otherwise flock here in numbers.”
The second speaker sounded a note of weary resignation. In contrast, the mood of the first speaker seemed to Clutch to be one of resigned weariness. The difference between tonalities of oppression is subtle. The second woman had come to accept the condition. The first hadn’t.
“Nevertheless,” came the first voice, “I have conceived an Idle Notion.”
“Pray, share it.”
“Tip the contents of the effing bins into the lake bottom and run like your tail’s on fire.”
Muffled laughter.
“Sssh! There’s a male hereabouts. I can smell him.”
Silence.
“Look! He’s up there. Asleep on that branch over the water.”
“Is he one of them?”
“He must be. There are no full-grown males in the Town except Clan Fathers whenever they drop by.”
“But they run in twos. He’s alone.”
Clutch, without lifting his muzzle from the branch, opened one eye.
“Hapticia save us! Now we’re for it. He’ll report us for Idle and Inappropriate Notions.”
“We’ll be nailed by our tongues to a goalpost.”
Clutch stretched and yawned, partly because he needed to, partly to convey an attitude of unconcern to the ladies. They were waiting for him to react.
“Good morning, gentlewomen. I am a visitor to your community.” Did he need to make the Hand Acknowledgment gesture? No, it was useless in the state of tyranny which the women described. In fact, it was useless in all circumstances. “I am seeking someone.”
“It is our duty to report you,” the second woman said.
“Hear me out first. Then decide if you should report me.” The women were surreptitiously sniffing him from below, trying to determine who he was. He could hear their whispering.
“We might as well find out what he wants. It wouldn’t do any harm.”
“Consider: he could very well report us.”
“Go ahead, monsieur. Tell us whom you are seeking.”
“I am seeking a brother and a sister, Sleekfoot and Lightfinger by name.”
“They are escapees, monsieur. They were captured and returned here by a pair of Fathers.”
“What will happen to them?”
“Sleekfoot will be trained to serve in a war band, as soon as his wounds heal. Lightfinger will be groomed to be someone’s mate for when she comes into season. Until such time, they must perform the most lowly of tasks: licking the collective food bins clean and monitoring the communal latrines so as to prevent an outbreak of seditious gossip. And …” – the lady raccoon broke into a moist lament – “it is a cruel misfortune because they are my cousin’s cubs, and she died of sorrow when they fled the colony, so she did, and they do not yet know she died.”
The other raccoon caught the mood of her companion. “Their misfortune is all the more poignant, considering that they were rescued from death themselves by a hero who stepped out of a brilliant light and vanquished a mighty Drooler. He destroyed the monster just with his hands, they say, whereupon the hero vanished back into the blazing light.” The speaker paused to let the immensity of the deed be appreciated.
“Only to have two slimeballs from the Clan Fathers take Sleek and Light away.”
