Danny the Champion of the World

The clearing was about a hundred yards ahead of us. We stopped behind a big tree while my father let his eyes travel very slowly all round. He was checking each little shadow and every part of the wood within sight.

'We're going to have to crawl the next bit,' he whispered, letting go of my hand. 'Keep close behind me all the time, Danny, and do exactly as I do. If you see me lie flat on my face, you do the same. Right?'

'Right,' I whispered back.

'Off we go then. This is it!'

My father got down on his hands and knees and started crawling. I followed. He moved surprisingly fast on all fours and I had quite a job to keep up with him. Every few seconds he would glance back at me to see if I was all right, and each time he did so, I gave him a nod and a smile.

We crawled on and on, and then at last we were kneeling safely behind a big clump of bushes right on the edge of the clearing. My father was nudging me with his elbow and pointing through the branches at the pheasants.

The place was absolutely stiff with them. There must have been at least two hundred huge birds strutting around among the tree-stumps.

'You see what I mean?' he whispered.

It was a fantastic sight, a poacher's dream come true. And how close they were! Some of them were not ten paces from where we knelt. The hens were plump and creamy-brown. They were so fat their breast-feathers almost brushed the ground as they walked. The cocks were slim and elegant, with long tails and brilliant red patches round the eyes, like scarlet spectacles. I glanced at my father. His face was transfixed in ecstasy. The mouth was slightly open and the eyes were sparkling bright as they stared at the pheasants.

'There's a keeper,' he said softly.

I froze. At first I didn't even dare to look.

'Over there,' my father whispered.

I mustn't move, I told myself. Not even my head.

'Look carefully,' my father whispered. 'Over the other side, by that big tree.'

Slowly, I swivelled my eyeballs in the direction he indicated. Then I saw him.

'Dad!' I whispered.

'Don't move now, Danny. Stay well down.'

'Yes but Dad...'

'It's all right. He can't see us.'

We crouched close to the ground, watching the keeper. He was a smallish man with a cap on his head and a big double-barrelled shotgun under his arm. He never moved. He was like a little post standing there.

'Should we go?' I whispered.

The keeper's face was shadowed by the peak of his cap, but it seemed to me he was looking straight at us.

'Should we go, Dad?'

'Hush,' my father said.

Slowly, never taking his eyes from the keeper, he reached into his pocket and brought out a single raisin. He placed it in the palm of his right hand, and then quickly with a little flick of the wrist he threw the raisin high into the air. I watched it as it went sailing over the bushes and I saw it land within a yard of two hen birds standing beside an old tree-stump. Both birds turned their heads sharply at the drop of the raisin. Then one of them hopped over and made a quick peck at the ground and that must have been it.

I looked at the keeper. He hadn't moved.

I could feel a trickle of cold sweat running down one side of my forehead and across my cheek. I didn't dare lift a hand to wipe it away.

My father threw a second raisin into the clearing... then a third... and a fourth... and a fifth.

It takes guts to do that, I thought. Terrific guts. If I'd been alone I would never have stayed there for one second. But my father was in a sort of poacher's trance. For him, this was it. This was the moment of danger, the biggest thrill of all.

He kept on throwing the raisins into the clearing, swiftly, silently, one at a time. Flick went his wrist, and up went the raisin, high over the bushes, to land among the pheasants.