Jasper Fforde - The Constant Rabbit

‘I didn’t know that,’ I said, glad that, for the moment at least, the subject of duels seemed to have slipped his mind. ‘What about Roger Rabbit?’

‘My uncle? Runs a hookah den in Ross that specialises in readings of Voltaire.’

‘No, I meant the film.’

‘Ah – the jury’s still out on that one. Rabbit psychologists hold entire conferences based on him, and we still have no idea what he saw in Jessica. So, do you have a duelling pistol, or do you want to borrow my spare?’

‘It’s less than two hours before you get hit with every fox RabCoT can muster, backed up by thousands of Compliance Officers and the British Army,’ I said. ‘Is this really the time to be duelling?’

‘ Mais oui , my little furless friend. You’re in love with my wife so it’s about you and me making this right. Don’t be afraid, I’m an excellent shot: you fire, you miss really badly, I fire, I miss by a hair. Honour is restored, simple. Here.’

He opened his jacket to reveal his duelling pistols, both stuffed inside his belt.

‘Loaded,’ he said, ‘and since it’s my challenge, you get to choose.’

I looked at the pistols. One had a silver crocodile on the handle, and the other a mother-of-pearl rabbit elegantly set into the stock. The gun with the bun has the aim that is lame, but the shot’ll hit the spot if you’ve a croc on the stock. If I hadn’t been a good shot myself, all of this would have been academic. But I’d won prizes at school with a .22 pistol, and once represented the county and got a bronze.

‘Is this why you wanted me in Colony One?’ I asked.

‘Unfinished business,’ he said, ‘so yes, partly.’

He was right in that I was in love with Connie. I think I always had been, and I think she felt the same. But she was a warrior and so was Doc – fearless and focused, utterly committed to the cause. They belonged with each other. But Doc was a good rabbit, and I would have to go through with this for the sake of his honour, so I chose the gun with the bun, the aim that was lame. If I was about to lose a duel, I needed Doc’s marksmanship to be as good as possible.

‘Wait a minute,’ I said, realising that to win a rabbit duel one has to hit the opponent’s ears without actually killing them, ‘I’ve got no ears – well, none to speak of.’

‘I thought of that,’ said Doc, handing me a folded chef’s hat from his jacket pocket.

‘If it’s OK with you,’ he said, quite enthused by the idea of a duel, ‘we’ll dispense with the foggy heath at dawn and just get on with it. Twenty paces sound all right?’

I put on the chef’s hat and we stood back to back, paced off and then turned to face one another. A .22 pistol has very little kick, but a duelling pistol – which I’d never fired – would be loaded with heavy ball, and the kick would make the shot run high. Plus I had the gun whose aim was lame. I couldn’t possibly hit him.

‘You first!’ yelled Doc, holding his pistol at his side. He was almost in silhouette, his ears tall and erect, his stomach quite large.

I pulled back the hammer, aimed just above Doc’s head and fired. The muzzle of the pistol erupted in a ball of fire but, annoyingly, the charge was weaker than I expected and my aim not as errant as I’d thought. I saw a nick appear in the very top of Doc’s right ear where the ball just caught it.

‘Good shot, sir!’ cried Doc. ‘My turn.’

I held my breath as he pointed the pistol in my direction, then, at the very last moment, he pointed it to the left of me, and fired. The ball thudded harmlessly into the door frame of a shop that sold second-hand hookahs. He lowered the pistol and smiled.

‘Honour is restored,’ he said. ‘Connie is yours. Pick up your cardboard box and let’s get you to the meeting house. We have some vital work we need you to undertake.’

I ran to catch up with him as he strode off.

‘What was that all about?’ I said. ‘You deliberately shot wide.’

‘I most certainly did not,’ he said in a shocked tone, ‘and to suggest I had would impugn my good name. Besides,’ he added, ‘I volunteered to lead first wave against the attack this evening and it will all end for me tonight. Some of us won’t get to go home.’

He stopped and turned to look at me.

‘There are unsuitable bucks about, and I’d rather you and she had a chance. I know she loves you, always has, and she’ll want you to go home with her. She’d like that, and I’d like it too, knowing she was in good hands.’

He put out his paw and I passed back the pistol.

‘I worked at the Taskforce for fifteen years,’ I said. ‘I enabled their appalling work. I’m not a good person.’

‘But you proved that you can be,’ said Doc, ‘and that’s what’s important. You took the heat off Constance, and a thousand rabbits were spared. You’re repaired, Peter. Not everyone gets that. Count yourself fortunate.’

We had reached the door of the circular Lago meeting house.

‘OK,’ he said, ‘this is where we need your help.’

‘You want me to address the Grand Council of Coneys?’ I said. ‘And try and broker some sort of eleventh-hour deal? I can take offers back and forth to Smethwick, and even, perhaps, have a few ideas of my own.’

‘Perish the thought,’ he said, finding my comments somehow amusing. ‘Better rabbits than you have tried and failed on that score. You’re not here to help us, rescue us, lead us to freedom or otherwise give us the benefit of your wisdom. We’re not going to see any hoary old “Hominid Saviour” bullshit this evening, thank you very much – we’ve got troubles of our own.’

‘Then what am I here to do?’

Doc opened the meeting-house door to reveal a large room with about two hundred rabbits inside, all either elderly, young or infirm. There was also a smattering of humans, but Pippa was not amongst them. The tables were arranged seven long in five rows, and in the centre of each table was a huge pile of sliced bread. On the table in front of each workstation were tubs of dandelion-oil margarine, and the air was full of gossip in English and Rabbity.

‘You’re on sandwich-making duty,’ said Doc. ‘It’s important everyone gets to eat before the attack.’

‘You wanted me in the colony to make cucumber sandwiches?’

‘Each contributes according to the level of their abilities. Besides, we were getting low on doilies. You can’t serve cucumber sandwiches on a plate without doilies. 62 62. In case you’re not conversant with teatime etiquette, a ‘doily’ is the round ornamental mat cakes and sandwiches are served upon. It’s just not the done thing.’

I opened the box Lance had given me, and it was indeed full of doilies. Quite nice ones, too. Plain white. Ornate.

‘Hello, Mr Knox,’ said Kent, who seemed to be in charge, ‘you can be on cucumber-slicing duty. It’s more efficient with fingers – even without thumbs you’re more dexterous than us. We can slice, but not slice thin , and that’s the secret of really good cucumber sandwiches.’

I turned to say goodbye to Doc, but he had already gone. I think he removed himself quietly on purpose. The dialogue between us was done, our understanding was complete. I wouldn’t see him again, nor ever know what happened to him, although it was likely he faced his death with more courage than I would ever possess. I took my place next to a young woman who was also missing her thumbs, and she nodded politely, gave me a sharp knife and I started slicing, although not without some difficulty. I’d only recently lost my thumbs and it was the first knife I’d handled since getting out of custody.

‘You came prepared,’ she said with a smile.