In the Brockery kitchen, Parsley and Primrose had been cooking and baking at top speed for several days. Parsley had made a honey cake and decorated it with some pretty blue violets that one of the visiting hedgehogs had brought from the woods, as well as the requisite number of blue candles, to match the violets. Primrose had made various kinds of sandwiches and was baking her specialty seed wigs, as well as shortbread and gingersnaps, scones made with dried fruits (raisins, dates, prunes, apricots), cheese scones, and vanilla slices, as well—rich, thick, vanilla custard layered on top of a baked pastry sheet, topped with baked pastry, and then frosted. For the scones and tea biscuits, there were all sorts of jams and jellies: pear and ginger jam, orange marmalade, bramble jelly, rose geranium jelly, and lemon curd. There was popcorn and nuts and bowls of dried berries. And for drinks, nettle beer and ginger beer for the elders, and lemonade for the youngsters. It was going to be a magnificent party.

Early in the afternoon, Bailey took the supposedly unsuspecting Bosworth out for a mushroom-seeking ramble through Penny Woods. This gave Hyacinth, Thackeray, and the rabbit twins the opportunity to decorate the dining hall with balloons and paper streamers and a large hand-painted sign over the mantle that said HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BOSWORTH! The hedgehogs had gathered armloads of early-spring daffodils, violets, and heartsease, and arranged them artfully in thimble vases, with curly fern fronds and pretty green leaves. When everything else was ready, Primrose and Parsley brought in the food and arranged it on the table, buffet-style, with plates and silverware and napkins. It was to be a stand-up party. As the guests arrived—friends, neighbors, and several special guests invited for this special occasion—they stacked their wrapped gifts on the mantle and around the fireplace. And since there were dozens of guests, the stacks of gifts were quite impressive.

As I said earlier, Bosworth had heard whisperings about the party (he might be old, but there was nothing wrong with his hearing), so it wasn’t a surprise. He knew that everyone around him was up to something, and tactfully chose to ignore it all. But when he walked into the dining room at two in the afternoon and saw the brightly colored balloons and streamers and the HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BOSWORTH! sign over the mantle, and the towering pile of gifts, and the food and the birthday cake and the candles and the flowers, and above all, the special guests, he was overwhelmed with astonishment. He had expected a birthday party, but not this sort of elaborate birthday party.

“Happy birthday, Bosworth!” rang out a happy shout from all of the guests in unison, at the top of their lungs. The shout was very loud because the room was so full that the guests were standing elbow to elbow, oh, so many of them! There were some whom we know: the Professor, naturally, and Reynard the fox (Jemima Puddle-duck’s friend); Fritz the ferret, in the company of his friend Max the Manx; Rascal, Tabitha, and Crumpet from the village; Thackeray and Bailey and Thorvaald. And a great number of other friends and acquaintances, besides: a pair of red squirrels, three brown hares, a prickle of hedgehogs, a bevy of beetles, a voluntary of voles, and a sleuth of spiders. All were happy to be invited, all had brought gifts (even if only an acorn or a berry or a curious rock). And all were on their best behavior.

“Happy birthday, Uncle Bosworth!” came another chorus, and at this, Bosworth had to blink back the tears. For these were the animals he held dearest in all the world, Parsley and Primrose and Hyacinth, and oh my goodness, Thorn and Buttermilk, as well! Thorn, Hyacinth’s brother, who had once lived at The Brockery (and whom Bosworth had for a time considered to be next in line for the Badge), and Buttermilk, his wife, had come all the way from their sett at Brockmoor, near Underbarrow. They had brought with them three cubs from their first litter: Tansy, Turnip, and Rhubarb. The cubs were now a year old and rowdy, but respectful of Uncle Bosworth, who was immensely charmed by them.

“Quite a delightful sight, isn’t it?” said Fritz to Max, nodding affectionately at Bosworth, who was surrounded by a babble of little badgers and happy hedgehogs, all of whom were helping him unwrap his presents. It did not, however, make Fritz want to surround himself with little ferrets. An artist, he was a confirmed bachelor. His burrow in the bank of Wilfin Beck was so full of his paintings and sculptures that it was rather like a gallery.

“A delightful sight, indeed,” said Max. He was now employed full-time by Major Ragsdale (Ret.) at tiny Teapot Cottage, in Far Sawrey, but the major gave him weekends off, to spend with Fritz. The two had become fast friends, if rather an odd couple. “Oh, by the way, old chap.” Since he had moved in with Major Ragsdale, Max had begun to sound like a military man. “Have you heard about the aeroplane crash this morning?”

“No!” exclaimed the ferret. “It crashed? What happened? Was anyone hurt? Is it done for? I hope,” he added. “Not that I wish anyone ill. It’s just that the plane is a wretched nuisance. One can’t sleep properly in the daytime.” This was important to the nocturnal ferret, who was making an exception to his no-daytime-outings rule to come to Bosworth’s party.

“The pilot and passenger got a good dunking,” Max said, “but the aeroplane isn’t permanently damaged. The crew is working on repairs.” Max went on to tell Fritz what he had learnt from the major, who had been waiting for the ferry when the aeroplane nosedived into the water, and had shared the news with a neighbor in earshot of Max.

In another corner of the room, the fox was hearing a similar report from Rascal, who had got it (secondhand) from the Dalmatian who rode on the seat beside the driver of the Coniston coach, who had got it from a passenger who had been among the spectators when the wrecked plane was brought in.

“Do they know why it crashed?” asked the fox curiously.

“The Dalmatian said that the passenger said that somebody heard there might have been water in the petrol,” Rascal replied. He grinned. “I can think offhand of a couple of dozen Big People who might have put it there. Can’t you?”

“And they call foxes sly,” said Reynard with a chuckle. “I wonder which of the villagers is the culprit.” Now that they mention this, I wonder, too. When we last saw Roger Dowling, in the company of Henry Stubbs and George Crook, it sounded as if he might be hatching a plot—or might know of someone one else who was doing so.

In another corner, Bailey and Thorvaald, sipping ginger beer, were observing the scene. The dragon had banked his fire as much as he could and was keeping a close eye on his tail, lest he inadvertently knock a picture off the wall, or disturb the spiders assembled in the corner, where they were not so likely to be trodden upon.

The Professor came up to them. “And whooo are yooou?” he asked the dragon. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“Well, I can fix that,” Bailey said, and introduced them forthwith. “You two have something in common, you know,” he added with a grin.

The owl eyed the dragon. “Oh? And what is that?” His tone suggested that he did not think that this large scaly beast was anything like his proudly feathered self.

“Why, you can both fly,” said the badger, and went off to wish Bosworth the happiest of birthdays.

The owl and the dragon regarded each other for a moment, pondering this unlikely likeness. The owl widened his eyes and flexed his wing feathers slightly, as if to suggest that there was a basic aerodynamic anomaly here, but the dragon immediately saw the similarity.

“Why, szso we can,” he said cheerfully. “Matter of fact, I’ve just returned from a little flying trip myszself.”

“And I have just flown back across Windermere,” replied the owl. “Quite bumpy out there this morning, actually.”

To his credit, the dragon did not boast that his “little trip” had been an around-the-world flight that had taken him to America, Hawaii, and Siberia, with only short stops for refueling—a distance that would have been impossible for the owl. Instead, he said, “I’ve just been hearing about the posszsibility of some szsort of large creature living in the lake. You wouldn’t have szseen it, by any chance?”

“I believe I have,” the owl replied. “Largish beast, about . . . oooh, about the size of the ferry boat, I’d say. Tail, fooour wings, very noisy. Is that what yooou’re looking for?”

“You’ve szseen it?” the dragon hissed with great excitement. When the owl nodded, his belly began to glow warmly. “You’ve actually szseen it! And you say it has four wings and a tail? Four wingszs!” He whooshed out a smoky breath. “The Grand Dragonszs will be astonished when they hear thiszs!”

The owl stepped back, fearing that his feathers might be singed. “Why, yes,” he said. “Indeed, I saw it crash, just a few hours ago. Right down intooo the water. Made a gigantic splash, it did. Broke a wing, wrecked the tail, nearly drowned twooo men.”

“Oh, my starszs!” breathed the dragon. His words were studded with exclamation points. “Oh, my scaleszs! Perhaps I shall be able to give the Grand Dragons an eyewitneszss report! Even arrange for an interview!” He paused for breath. “Bailey sayszs that one of his relatives saw this creature from Oat Cake Crag. Do you think that would be a good place for me to watch for it? Tonight, perhapszs?”

“You could certainly see it from there,” the Professor agreed. “I don’t believe, however, that the thing is likely tooo fly again anytime soon. The men have got tooo repair the wing, rebuild the tail, and get the motor working again, yooou see. It might be several days before—”

“The men?” The dragon was staring at him blankly. “The motor?”

“The hydroplane?”

“Indeed.” The Professor, with some justification, felt himself to be in the company of a backward student. He cleared his throat. “Hydroooplane.” He uttered the word carefully, to ensure that Thorvaald understood it. “That is hydrooo, as in water, from the Greek, ύδρ. Tooo wit: hydrooography, hydrooopathy, hydrooometer. There is also hydrooometer and hydrooophobia and hydrooosphere, which is tooo say—”

“Excuszse me,” broke in the dragon. “I’m not at all zssure we’re talking about the same thing, Professzsor. I am inquiring about a dragon-like creature that swimszs in the water. It may fly from time to time, but—”

“And I am talking,” interrupted the Professor stiffly, “about a dragonfly-like creature that swims in the water from time tooo time but otherwise flies through the air.”

As you can see, there is some confusion here. I think we should leave Thorvaald and the Professor to sort it out and drop in on one or two other conversations. It is, after all, a party, and the animals are sharing a few other tidbits of local news, some fact, some fiction.

In the corner near the fireplace, Hyacinth was regaling a rapt group of listeners with the true story of what had happened on Oak Cake Crag—Mr. Baum’s fall and rescue, as well as the doctor’s report that it was impossible to tell when or even whether the injured man would awaken.

“It’s a good thing for Mr. Baum that you and the others happened to be there,” Thorn said. “Otherwise, he might have lain there for days and days.”

“Too right,” said a brown hare. “He might never have been found.”

“People never really appreciate all that animals do for them,” the second brown hare said. “They think they do it all themselves.” This was a common lament when animals got together. Humans took them for granted, or abused them, or actively campaigned against them. It hadn’t always been that way, of course, but it was now.

“If Mr. Baum is out of the picture,” the third brown hare asked, “does that mean that the aeroplane will go away?”

“There might not be any aeroplane left,” a hedgehog put in excitedly. He had just been listening as Max the Manx and Fritz the ferret discussed the aeroplane crash, so he began to repeat what he had heard.

But since we already know that story, we’ll move on to another corner, where Parsley and the village cats have put their heads together over a subject of great interest—a romantic subject.

“I’ve just heard,” said Parsley excitedly, “that Miss Potter and Mr. Heelis are secretly engaged to be married. Flotsam and Jetsam went down to the Crooks’ garden for carrots around lunchtime, and overheard Mrs. Crook telling Bertha Stubbs all about it. Isn’t that lovely news?”

“Married!” squealed Tabitha and Crumpet in unison. “Is it true? Married?” They turned to Rascal, who had just walked up to them. “Rascal! Mrs. Crook says that Miss Potter is secretly engaged to Mr. Heelis! They’re going to be married! What do you think of that?”

Rascal knew the truth about Miss Potter’s engagement, for she had told him herself. But of course, he didn’t mention that part of it. What he said was, “Sorry to disappoint you, ladies, but I heard Miss Potter tell Mrs. Crook explicitly that there’s no wedding planned. If Mrs. Crook is saying otherwise, she is deliberately contradicting what Miss Potter told her.”

“You heard it?” Tabitha asked, wide-eyed.

“With my very own ears, in Mrs. Crook’s kitchen, where I was sitting under Miss Potter’s chair. This morning. No wedding.” He looked around the group. “You might want to tell the others,” he added. “There’s no point in spreading unfounded rumors.”

“No wedding,” Crumpet repeated sadly.

“No wedding,” Tabitha moaned.

“No wedding,” Parsley said in a disappointed tone. “I’ll tell the rabbits that they’re not to say another word to anyone.”

“And that goes for you two, as well,” Rascal barked to the cats. “Not a word. Got it?”

“Yessir,” said Crumpet. Tabitha nodded.

“Well, now!” Parsley said brightly. “I think it’s time to light the candles and sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to our favorite badger.” She raised her voice. “Everybody, gather round. We’re about to cut the birthday cake!”

Let’s make our exit while everybody is singing. I’m sorry to miss out on Bosworth’s birthday cake, but I’ve just remembered that something important is scheduled for four o’clock at Tidmarsh Manor, and I shouldn’t like to miss it.