A game too far

"Ratatatat! Ratatatat! Ratatatat!" The insistent hammering of the back door knocker crashed through the peace of a sunny Saturday afternoon.

"Your piglets are running all over the track"! said our very unamused not-very-neighbour when I went to investigate.

Such is the way all true adventures begin.

Over the past few days Delila's Delinquents have been, increasingly boldly, going where no piglets have gone before. The rum-pum-pum-pum of ten sets of little trotters has become a familiar sound in the stable yard as has the sight of ten 'can't-stop-now-very-busy' little bodies streaming up and down and through and around everywhere.

As Linda remarked "Wherever you turn, there they are"!

On Friday afternoon Mangal, now separated from Ginger, was back in his old pen and by Saturday morning Delila's Delinquents had found their way to Grandpapa Boar. And he, being The Grand Patriarch and very aware of his duties in passing on The Lore had been entertaining them with Tales of The Past and other such things. Obviously included in his Tales was the one about 'The Search (by his and Ginger's first litter) for The Big Nasty Giant who Lives Down The Track'.

Big Mistake.

What are 10 little piglets to do on a quiet, sunny afternoon?

So there they were, having a gay old time, running up and down and round and about looking for The Giant and going ever further down the track when - shock, horror - a scary blue motor screeched to a halt and The Giant himself exploded out of it and in the direction of the House.

"Eek, eek, eek" they panicked and darted off into the hedgerow in search for a quick way back home.

By the time The Big Boss and The (now) Bestest Pigdog in all the World and I arrived on the scene there was Chaos. The Blue Car complete with angry Giant; a bunch of innocent walkers and their dog watching with amusement; and piglets everywhere.

Luckily 3 of the little black ones quickly found the conventional way home and - none of the others being in sight at that point - it was assumed they were the last to return so off went the walkers and The Giant (muttering something about a shotgun being a good way to keep a piglet quiet!).

But that was when the fun really began: we rapidly discovered the other 7 were not at home. On the contrary. They were still scampering hither and thither in the bridleway hedgerow looking for a way home and becoming more and more confused and scared as time went on.

Gunner found them and did an excellent job of herding them back in the right direction. Slowly but surely and a little way at a time he got them back on familiar ground and round the right fences and through the best gaps until they were back in the yard and then it was just a case of reminding them where Their Place was. And down the field they charged and scrambled back under the fence and through the other pigs' pens and back to Mum.

The Dog was exhausted. The Piglets were exhausted. We were exhausted. And then we had to fix the fences to stop them repeating the Adventure all over again - which they were bound to think of once they'd recovered! And maybe the Nasty Giant would invoke the Terror of the Shotgun. So we barricaded the piglets in, which all the other pigs thought was a Good Game and made lots of encouraging noise whilst the little adventurers were collapsed in heaps in the shade, doubtless thinking what a Jolly Good Game they'd had and What Fun they could get up to when they got their breath back.

Meanwhile, the sun shone on and we laboured on and, finally finished to the best of our ability, gave the herd their tea and got the horses (who'd been watching all this amusing to-do over the Rectory Field gate) up and fed them and collected the eggs and checked all the poultry and eventually found our way back to the sunny and peaceful quiet of the Snug where we sighed and sank into a dishevelled heap over a bottle of cool white wine and slowly recovered.

"We'd never have got those piglets back without Gunner's help" said the Big Boss.

Looking at the Dog flat out and fast asleep under the table I couldn't help but think that even for him it was almost a game too far......

(By the way, the photos were taken on an altogether different and less stressful morning!)