Gil-Gandel 4 day.ago

As he finishes, he notices Reynard the fox watching him. Chanticleer looks down loftily. "How did you enjoy my song?" he asks. "No more than middling well," yawns Reynard. "Your father was better. I doubt you will ever meet his measure." "Why?" bridles Chanticleer. "In what respect was my performance lacking?" "In all respects," says Reynard. "But in the fundamentals, you simply lack the commitment that your sire showed. When he crowed the sunrise, he put his heart and soul into it." "How so?" says the cockerel. "Whatever you can put a name to, I can match, and outmatch at that." "Item the first," says the fox. "He took the deepest breath, right down to his toes." "Like this?" says Chanticleer, inhaling mightily. "Aye, something like," says Reynard. "And then he screwed his eyes tight shut and opened his beak wider than the mouth of your coop itself." "Like this?" says Chanticleer, suiting the action to the word. "Aye," says Reynard, "and then he wound himself up to the fullest, as the archer draws the arrow to its very tip." "Like this?" says Chanticleer, drawing up every fibre like the bowstring. "Aye," says Reynard, "and then he stretched out his neck as far as it would reach, and let fly with every ounce of his strength." "Like this?" says Chanticleer, beginning to let rip with the mightiest crow that was ever crowed. \--But he was cut off in the flow of his note as the fox's jaws closed around his throat, and at once Reynard was out and away with his prize, with every creature in the farmyard setting up a hue and a cry of "Thief! Butcher! Murderer!" Three parts strangled, Chanticleer felt his sight dimming and, with the last of his vision, saw the woods drawing near where Reynard would carry him away to dinner with the fox's mate and cubs. He croaked out, "Much good will it do them to pursue you now, clever one. Do kindly give their useless selves an earful with my blessing." "I will at that," growled Reynard. "HEY, LOSERS...!" And as the fox opened his mouth wide to yell, Chanticleer gave an urgent wriggle and a flap of both wings, and moments later was safely a-roost in the lower branches of a sturdy tree.