The Chicken Gave It To Me (3 page)

And the noise! Roaring wind. Creaking tree tops. Deafening! The storm sounded like the world cracking in half, just for me, to wake me after a lifetime of having my ears stuffed with chicken cackle. I wanted to do my bit, so I joined in, clucking and squawking like something gone loopy.

Being outside in the fresh air was
great
.

And it was fresh. Fresh and cold. But what I'd never guessed was how many smells go to make up fresh air. Inside the shed was terrible – terrible! Too awful to describe. And at weekends, when we weren't cleaned out, it was even worse. The workers always wore masks, but even so, on some mornings they coughed and choked, and their eyes were red-rimmed.

(Imagine how
we
felt. We'd been in there all night!)

Outside, I smelled a thousand things I
couldn't even name until later – the leaf-mould underfoot, wet bracken, a thread of exhaust fumes from the road behind, cow parsnip, smoke from the chimney over the hill, the film of oil on the puddles.

A giant stew. Smells of the World! And I was breathing it for the first time. Me – a bedraggled, middle-aged feather baby.

But I felt
good
.

And there was so much to feel good about. Everywhere I looked were things I'd never seen. Inside the shed it's bright lights or total dark. Here, if I looked one way, I could see the eerie green glow of the spaceship. The other way, I saw the silver gleam of moonlight slicing through cloud, shadows and darker shadows. Ripples over the puddle. Dark grasses doubled in the wind, but still higher than my head. And, on the ground –

On the ground –

Peck! Peck! Peck! Peck!

Don't think I usually eat at night. (I hope I know better than that!) But if you've
never ever had the chance to pick your food out of the ground – dig out a seed here, spot a bit of root there, pounce on a grub . . .

And, boy, did it taste good! If you, like me, had spent your life eating the same old dry pellets day after day, you'd understand how something fresh, something juicy, something wriggling and alive, could taste so perfect. Perfect!

Oh, try to imagine! I was wet. I was cold. And (now I look back on it) I think I must have been terrified.

But I was ecstatic! I was
free
!

And like all the other hens, I was hoping to stay so. By now, of course, everyone else had sensibly taken off. Some hid in the bushes the farmer had planted to try to hide the sheds from the road. The ones that hadn't rubbed too many feathers off on their cage wire managed to get up in the tree to roost. And I, too,
staggered off in search of shelter.

(You'll not believe this.)

THE WRONG WAY!

Yes! Call me feather-brained! Call me chicken-dippy! Everyone else makes for the safety of black night. I go for the eerie green light! I make for the spaceship!

I have the thinking power of a vegetable, truly I do. I go and roost right under one of its gleaming sides.

And that is why I am the only one to hear, down the ventilation shaft, two of the little green men having a chat.

LGM 1: ‘So what's for dinner?'

LGM 2: ‘Not chicken, anyway!'

(They fell about laughing at this one, you could tell.)

LGM1: ‘People?'

LGM2: ‘You'll be lucky. We haven't even cleaned out the cages yet, let alone filled them up again.'

LGM1: ‘So it's boring old breads, seeds, grains, beans, cheese, eggs, salads and vegetables and stuff, is it?'

LGM2: ‘Don't knock 'em. Tasty and good for you.'

LGM1: ‘But people taste so much better!'

LGM2: ‘Oh, don't I know it! I agree. There's simply nothing to beat a nice roasting joint of –'

A metal door banged and I heard no more.

Oh, boy. Oh, boy oh boy!

Down on the muddy ground, under the ventilation shaft of the spaceship, I stood as if rooted, two totally different feelings fighting under my feathers.

(1) The sheer dancing joy of sweet revenge. See how you like it, people! Serves you right!

(2) Horror that others might suffer as I had.

Oh, which of these feelings would triumph? Which would win?

All morning Gemma had chicken on the brain. The moment the first lesson started, Andrew slid the little sacking book safely into his desk, and both of them were kept busy. But just from glancing at some of the mistakes in Andrew's workbook –

the cluck said 9.45

she put the coop on the saucer

Jane cycled feather than Jilly

– Gemma knew that he, too, wouldn't rest till he'd read on, and found out what had happened next on that black night at Harrowing Farm.

Would the chicken decide on revenge? Or on pity?

It wasn't easy to guess. What did
Gemma know about what a chicken thought or how a chicken felt? The closest she came to them was when she found one sitting quietly on her plate, crisply roasted or steaming in sauce.

She leaned across to nudge Andrew.

‘Do you realise,' she told him, ‘that there must be millions and millions of chickens all over the world, and I don't know anything about them.'

‘You should watch the animal programmes on telly.'

‘They never do chickens.'

Didn't they? Now Andrew came to think about it, Gemma was right. Almost every evening you could watch a
programme about penguins or cheetahs, whales or sharks. You saw them hunting, sleeping, giving birth. But when did you ever get to see the day-to-day life of a chicken?

Never.

‘You don't get stuffed chickens, either,' Gemma was telling him now.

‘Yes, you do. I ate one yesterday.'

‘No, no!' Gemma sounded quite angry with him. ‘I mean soft furry toys. You're given teddy bears and pandas. You get tigers and cats and ponies. You might even get three fluffy yellow chicks in a nest especially at Easter. But no one ever gives you a hen.'

True. Under his bed at home Andrew still had Snoopy and Topcat and Dobbin and Grizzly. But for the life of him he couldn't remember ever ripping the bright shiny paper off a present, and shouting: ‘Oh, goody! It's a hen!'

Gemma was getting angrier by the
minute.

‘In fact,' she was muttering, ‘when I come to think about it, I know more about
dinosaurs
than I do about hens. I know more about
hairy mammoths
. I know more about
pterodactyls
!'

Her usual little placid face had gone quite hard with rage. He knew her well enough to know what she was thinking. She couldn't bring the words out, so he said it for her.

‘Because people don't have to be so ashamed about those. They're already dead.'

And suddenly neither of them could wait a moment longer to find out what happened next. Carefully, under cover of his workbook, Andrew slid the chicken's testament out of his desk.

They took it in turns to keep watch, as they read on.

I show myself to be naturally chicken-hearted

Revenge! Oh, ho, ho, ho. The very idea was ridiculous. Chickens aren't built for revenge. We don't have it in us. We're not the sort to slink about for years, feeling bitter, and then, when the moment comes, plunge in the sharpened claw.

We're a bit bird-witted, really. We mess about, scratching through each day as it comes. By daylight the only thing on my mind was breakfast, and I was out there peck-peck-pecking. I wouldn't even have noticed I was back near the sheds, except for the horrible wailing . . .

‘Let me ooooouuuut!'

‘Heeee-eeelp! Heeee-eeeelp!'

Oh, it was ghastly. Some creatures
make your flesh creep when they cry. Rabbits, for example. And baby hares.

But people!

‘Saaaaave us, pleeeeaaase!'

Quick workers, these little green men. While I was roosting overnight, they must have pulled all the wire cages apart, and set them up again, exactly the right size.

(Of course, when I say, ‘exactly the right size' . . .)

You couldn't help feeling sorry for them. There they sat, squashed in so tight they couldn't stand. They couldn't stretch. They couldn't turn around. Their pale faces pressed up against the cage bars.