If I’m coming home from the Gloucester direction on the A40 then I’ll reach a junction just outside Huntley in which either route is about the same distance and time to get home. I can either continue along the A40 and head towards Lea or take the left turning onto the A4136 and head towards Mitcheldean and the slightly more scenic route. I will alternate my route depending on my mood, the traffic lights and my whims.
One particular night I was heading home after an excellent show with the Temple Brothers on the south coast. Colin and Steve Temple produce a fabulous Everly Brothers and friends tribute show which I have the great fortune to appear in in the guise of that first wildman of rock Jerry Lee Lewis. Guitarist Colin and drummer Steve are two of the hardest working and most professional musicians I have ever worked with, we travel all over the country with the show and invariably have a lot of fun.
It had been a late finish on Hayling Island and I was reaching the junction just after 3 in the morning, tired and looking forward to climbing into bed. As I neared the traffic lights I played the usual game in my head – left or straight on? Left or straight on? Left or straight on? Still undecided I said to myself that I would go with the first light to turn or be on green, but as I got to within striking distance both lights were green. On a whim I signalled left and turned off the A40. I was now just a little over 10 miles from home and I drove the familiar route without paying a great deal of attention to anything other than my lights on the road. There were no other vehicles around and it was a perfect time to be travelling towards the Forest of Dean. I idly wondered if perhaps I would see a wild boar or two as I meandered slowly up Harrow Hill and kept my eyes peeled to the sides of the roads. Then, as I reached the peak I noticed something in the middle of my lane, a small mammal was lying on its side clearly the victim of a recent vehicle accident. I slowed still further then carefully drove round the body not wishing to feel it under my car wheels. As I passed I took a good look at the body and realised that it was a juvenile fox, clearly more than a cub but not yet an adult, probably its life had been cut short in its first summer. I regained my side of the road and was about to push the accelerator down further when the thought jumped into my head that the fox’s body didn’t really look damaged, it certainly wasn’t squashed and with my cursory glance there had been no obvious sign of blood. Wanting to be sure that the animal was dead and not vulnerable to being run over by the next vehicle, I turned the car around and drove the few yards back up the hill and parked opposite the prone vulpine.
Looking at the fox as I got out of my car it seemed like it was simply taking a nap, sprawled haphazardly in the middle of the lane. Keeping as aware as I could for any oncoming vehicles, especially the juggernauts which are often the sole other machines that I meet on the country roads in the early hours, I stepped softly and slowly towards the fox. It didn’t stir for a moment. I knelt down, scanning as I did so its body for any signs of injury. There was nothing to imply that this fox was damaged in the slightest. I placed a hand on its chest and there, ever so softly I could feel a gentle heart beating beneath the warm fur.
There was no way that I was going to leave this creature alone and vulnerable in the forest let alone in the middle of the road so I scooped it carefully up in my arms and took it back to my car. The animal didn’t react at all to my touch or by being picked up and in my heart I felt that it most likely had been struck a glancing blow by a vehicle and was slowly passing away. With some difficulty and awkwardness I got the passenger side door open and placed the near-lifeless body carefully on the floor.
As I got back into the driver’s seat and closed the door I looked instinctively at the satnav in my car, 6.9 miles to home, they would probably be a long 6.9 miles but at least I hadn’t far to go.
I had the roads to myself apart from the occasional rabbit and roe deer, but I drove slowly and as smoothly as I could, taking care to avoid the multitude of potholes and unevenness in the lanes so that the journey of my tiny passenger wouldn’t be overly disrupted. The few miles seemed to go on forever as I had one eye on the fox and one eye on the road, but eventually I drew up to our gates. All the time the fox hadn’t stirred, hadn’t whimpered, hadn’t made a sound at all.
Parking in front of the garage I had already formulated a simple plan for the night. I would make up one of our dog crates, line it with towels and allow the fox to pass away quietly and safely in our garage. I had no doubt that by the morning the little chap would no longer be with us.
Completing my preparations I returned to the car, scooped up the fox once again and brought it into the garage and placed it respectfully and gently onto the towels in the crate.
‘Goodnight fella,’ I whispered to it, ‘sleep well.’
Exhausted, I then closed the garage door and went to let myself into the house. As soon as my key turned in the lock Dotty erupted with fury and in response Kelly shouted angrily at her. I pretended that I hadn’t heard either and slowly pushed open the door. Immediately Dotty’s black ball of fur body careered around the corner barking and snarling, then with realisation that I was the intruder she abruptly stopped and without a second glance or wag of the tail at me turned and ponced her way back to the bedroom.
As quietly as I was able, which in reality is probably not very quietly at all by most people’s reckoning, I completed all that I needed to do in the bathroom and crept into our bedroom.
‘Noisy!’ Kelly muttered at me in a half sleepy voice.
‘Sorry darling did I wake you?’ I whispered as I eased into the bed.
Dotty answered my question by growling menacingly from the dark depths of the room.
I shuffled my body closer to Kelly’s, closed my eyes and then decided I should mention our new visitor.
‘If I forget,’ I started quietly, ‘there’s a fox in the garage.’
Silence.
Then, ‘A what?’ Kelly was awake and loud.
‘It’s fine,’ I whispered, ‘it’s in a crate, and will probably be dead in the morning, but there’s a fox in the garage.’
‘You brought a fox back here! With all our chickens and rabbits, what were you thinking?’ Kelly clearly didn’t think that whispering was still necessary, but I did so answered in an undertone.
‘It’s fine, don’t worry, I just couldn’t leave it in the road alone.’ And then I promptly fell asleep.
I have no idea when Kelly fell back to sleep.
When I awoke the next morning there was a nagging in my mind that I had to do something important and pressing, but for a few minutes I couldn’t for the life of me remember what. Then the blurriness of sleep gradually eased and my brain kicked halfway into gear. The fox!
I wasn’t overly enthusiastic to get dressed and go and check on the animal as in my heart of hearts I knew that I would find a pitiful lifeless body waiting for me in the garage and that wasn’t really how I wanted to start my day. Nevertheless I knew that I had a responsibility to the dead as much as to the living so duly threw on some clothes and stepped out into the warm morning air and headed to the garage.
I eased open the garage side door and groped my hand in to flick the light switch on. The darkness illuminated, I stepped in anxiously looking towards where I had placed the dog crate.
There, sat upright with a dazed and puzzled expression on its face was the young fox that a few scant hours previously had been lying prone across a forest highway.
‘Hello lovely,’ I whispered joyfully and shamelessly ignoring all protocols to avoid imprinting on a wild animal, ‘this is a wonderful surprise, how are you doing?’
The fox looked at me suspiciously, with confusion and with an obvious amount of fatigue. Common and responsible sense struck me and I pursed my lips together to avoid any more unnatural interaction. From now on I had to do this right and not emotionally. The fox was alive, now we had to keep it alive, allow it to recuperate and ultimately rewild it. Anything less would be a failing to the animal and an act of shameful irresponsibility.
So, quietly but with a heart pounding with happiness that this little soul was breathing, awake and at least aware of its surroundings, I opened up a pouch of dog food, squeezed it into a feed bowl and returned to the cage. Carefully, wordlessly and with eyes trained on the inhabitant I opened up one of the side doors and pushed the small bowl inside. I then locked up the door and went and grabbed a large towel which I draped over half of the crate so that there was at least some privacy for the fox from prying eyes.
I stepped backwards and watched. The fox stared back at me weighing up the situation. I dropped my eyes so that we weren’t looking directly at each other and waited. After a minute or two the fox relaxed, but rather than investigate the bowl as I had hoped and expected, it merely slumped back down on its belly, closed its eyes and fell asleep. With a smile etched on my face I exited the garage and went to find Kelly to tell her the wonderful news.
‘You can’t keep it you know,’ she stated as I told her my exciting news.
‘I don’t want to keep it,’ I stated categorically and a little crossly, ‘aren’t you pleased that it’s alive?’ I questioned.
‘Yes, that’s brilliant,’ Kelly replied flatly, ‘But I know you, you’ll want to keep it and you can’t.’
‘I don’t want to keep it,’ I countered, ‘not if it’s able to fend for itself, it’s a wild animal, and you know that’s what I think.’ I was feeling a little peeved.
‘Hmmm,’ she responded, sounding unconvinced, ‘I do know that, but I also know that you would want to keep it if you could, and you can’t, we’ve got chickens and rabbits and ducks, it would have them all if it was given half a chance.’
I grunted, annoyed that she thought that I might make an excuse not to do the right thing and then I realised how she was really feeling.
‘Go and have a quick look at it,’ I suggested.
‘No I don’t want to, I’m too busy’ Kelly answered haughtily.
Kelly can often be perceived as a little hard-hearted. But the truth is she has the biggest heart imaginable but often feels that she has to protect that heart by building a wall around it. The truth of the matter was that she knew that once she had laid her eyes on the young fox then her heart would be lost to it, the wrench of then setting the fox free was something that she wanted to protect herself from.
I smiled, went and kissed her gently on the cheek and quietly muttered,’ no problem darling in your own time.’
Well done for saving the fox 🦊