Our tale starts at the beginning as all good tales should.
Nestled at the foot of Pike’s Peak away from the hustle and bustle of a big city is the small town of Green Mountain Falls, and near the center of this town at the base of a valley between a babbling brook and the town’s main road is a little lake. In the lake near the west end is a small island, and it is connected by a short bridge to the surrounding park. The island is covered by thick green grass, and at the center of the grass is an old gazebo. This quaint gazebo, painted white with green trim, is the pride and joy of the town as well as hundreds of visitors who come from far and near to visit it year after year. High above Gazebo Lake, in a brilliant blue sky, a seagull gives us a birds-eye-view of the peaceful little place.
Now one spring day on this island is where our story begins. We find two young girls spinning around and around holding each other’s hands. They laugh and squeal as the cool grass is trampled under their bare feet. Heidi, almost seven years old and the youngest by only one year, can’t hang on to her sister’s hands anymore and lets Autumn fly, spinning away and right into Rudy the White Goose.
“Oh, pardon me!” exclaims Autumn, scrambling to her feet and brushing off the grass from her knees.
Rudy squawks and generally complains at the young hooligans, “Best get off my park and away from my lake!”
Autumn, still a bit dizzy, puts her hands on her hips and stares down the goose.
Rudy unfolds his wings to make himself look bigger than he really is and squawks again, “Go on now if you know what’s’ good for ya, and take your friend with you!” At that he flips his tail a time or two, and with-a-hop-skip-and-a-jump he plows into the cool water of the small lake.
Heidi stops spinning. “Your park? Your lake?” she questions, feeling a bit dizzy.
Autumn picks up a rock and is about to let Rudy have it when she is stopped by Heidi. “Hold on, Autumn. It is clear he does not know who we are.”
“Ah, shucks!” complains Autumn as she slips the rock deep in her left pocket for safe keeping.
“I have no time for little girls!” squawks the irritated big white goose while stretching out his neck.
The two girls stand together putting their arms over each others’ shoulders, and exclaim as one, “We’re not friends. We’re sisters!”
Rudy sticks his beak in the air and turns away mumbling to himself, “Friends or sisters; I don’t really care.” He swims away joining the other geese and ducks out in the lake.
High above it all, Raymond, a seagull circles around and around (as if he had been watching) imitating the girls spinning far below. Raymond makes large circles hardly flapping his wings at all. He spies a spot to land on the tip top spire of the gazebo. But, before he can land, Mrs. Robin lands there first! He swerves to not knock the robin off, but crash lands into the shingles with a thud and a bump, and rolls on off the roof.
“Oh dear!” cry’s the robin as she ducks from a dark shadow that passes overhead. She cowers thinking in must be the old owl from the Fountain Creek Gang, a band of varmints who live across the babbling brook.
Raymond recovers his balance veering off course and heads down into the lake. He quickly puts on the brakes, opening his wings and thrusting out his feet, but before he can do anything, he crashes directly into the unsuspecting Rudy.
Rudy lets out a thunderous blast, “HOOONK!” This sends twenty Canadian geese, ten Mallards, including four young hatchlings, into crazed flight, not to mention all the other woodland creatures scurrying for cover.
Along the road by the lake halfway up in a blue spruce tree, Sid a very clumsy squirrel has been watching it all. He is still laughing as he takes another step out onto the end of the limb not watching where he is going. Suddenly, he steps beyond the branch, and he is falling. Just as quick, he hits the ground with a thud, KIRPLOP! He lies there for a time hoping no one saw him fall out of his tree once again.
Rudy squeals at the newcomer, “Spinning, I suppose!” glaring at the interloper, “Friend of those little girls?” The goose continues flapping his wings at the seagull, “Or, are you lost?”
“Well, circling, but definitely not spinning, and what girls do you mean?” replies the seagull. “I was just lookin’ for the big sea I’ve been told about and was just stopping here for a little rest.”
Rudy squawks and generally complains again, this time at the seagull. “Best get off my lake and away from my park!” He spreads his wings again, “Take that robin with you as you leave.”
Raymond flies to the gazebo next to the Robin now on the roof edge and replies back to the irate goose, “Your Lake? Your Park? Ha!” He then turns to Mrs. Robin, “You don’t have to leave little lady.”
Mrs. Robin blushes and looks into Raymond’s dark eyes, “I was lost, but now I have found a good place to build a new nest. Would you like to help me, Mr. Seagull?”
Rudy calls out, “If you’re lost, get lost and be gone!” His patience now grows shorter every moment.
Raymond looks down at the goose, “I am never lost Mr. Goose, and who are you anyway? Are you the owner or the mayor of this place?”
Before Rudy can answer, a voice interrupts from under the gazebo. It is Heidi, “Oh, no. The mayor is an orange and white cat named Earl, and he lives in the parking lot at the end of the lake by the electrician’s place.”
Rudy sticks his beak in the air once again and turns away mumbling, “Friends or sisters, lost, or found; I don’t really care.” He swims away again honking up a storm as he gathers the ducks and geese swimming around the lake.
Sid climbs back into his tree watching the others with great interest; maybe someone is going to teach old Rudy a lesson. He walked out on a limb to hear a little better, but once again loses his footing and hits the ground with a KIRPLOP! “I hope no one saw that…” he says to himself lying flat on the ground.
Raymond looks back at Mrs. Robin, “Good luck with your nest, and don’t mind that old goose. Me, I best be on my way; I got an ocean to find.” With that he launches into the air, circles the lake once and soars over a large elm tree. As he passes it, he notices an old owl, but thinking only of the ocean he needs to find, he flies west into the sun and is gone.
Watching all the happenings in the park and on the lake is the Fountain Creek Gang. Ollie an old owl, high in his elm tree has called a meeting of the gang of seven together. Brad a braggin’ badger, Rick a raccoon that is always into somethin’, Pat a rat that is afraid of water, Betty a raven who always acts like she knows everything, Willie a weasel that is always hungry, and last but not least the leader of the gang Freddy a very cleaver fox. They all join Ollie for the meeting up in the tree.
The members of the gang are outcasts from the good parts of the wilderness areas that surrounded the little town with the lake in the middle. The owl isn’t really bad, but he isn’t very good, just like the rest of the gang. But let’s just say here, they didn’t eat vegetables... They form a brotherhood of like-minded creatures. They are hunters, and hunters hunt. Today is no different. They all, except the owl, climb down the tree, bound across Fountain Creek, using rocks as stepping stones, and creep up to the edge of the park with Freddy in the lead. Once hidden in the brush just behind the open of the cool green grass their stomachs begin to growl. The fox licks his teeth eyeing a young hatchling not far away.
Autumn hears a sound near the creek and investigates. “Did you hear that?” she asks her sister, but Heidi is not listening. So, she leaves her sister lounging on her back in the grass watching Mrs. Robin build her nest. Heidi turns her attention to the white puffy clouds rolling across the sky, noticing they are growing and getting darker, “It looks like rain.” she says with confidence for the rain is sure to come.
Meanwhile, back on the lake, Rudy is honking up a storm and herding all the Canadian Geese to one side of the lake; it is time for primping and cleaning of their soft down feathers, and besides they should look for cover to be out of the approaching rain. George, another goose who is not all white but the same size as Rudy, is busy trying to round up all the baby mallards, for it is past their nap time. He is the self-appointed nanny to all the little ones in the lake.
Mrs. Robin is still busy building her nest under the eve of the gazebo, a good spot out of the rain, because on Gazebo Lake the rain comes every day. Clouds move into the small valley and by three o’clock, they are bulging with water. Today it begins to sprinkle at one minute before three; falling droplets of water make small rings all over the lake. The young ducks are quick to find shelter as George spreads his wing over the hatchlings. Then the rain comes down with a rush. Many times the rain was in such a hurry that the sun would still be out. How funny nature works sometimes.
The bells of the Church in the Wildwood ring out the times, three chimes sounded as it was now three o’clock. With a very loud crack of thunder, Heidi runs under the gazebo for cover. Mrs. Robin cries out, “Oh Dear!” and fly’s onto the girl’s shoulder and hides in her hair. It tickles Heidi’s skin a bit but she was glad to help.
All the creatures in the lake scatter for cover as big drops begin to fall. But, the smallest of the hatchings that had been born with a limp and still had no name was separated from his siblings and George. When they had waddled south he had waddled north and dangerously close to fountain creek. He doesn't know that across the grass hiding in the bushes at the edge of the park is the fountain creek gang, all watching him with great interest as their stomachs still growl.
The only animal on the whole lake who sees the trouble brewing is Sid, clinging to the trunk of his tree, not willing to get out on a branch, so he would not fall thrice in one day. He tries to call out, but no one can hear being back under the thick spruce branches. He must go out on the branch and call for aid, fall or fall not! He carefully eases his way out to the tip of the limb and cries an earsplitting, “CHIRP! CHIRP! CHIRP!” Rudy looks to the spruce tree as he hears the warning.
Freddy is on the move as his companions, left behind, wait and drool at the upcoming feast of the no-name hatchling. Along the ground, the fox silently stalks his unsuspecting quarry. Freddy comes out of the brush, to behind a tree, to under a picnic table, to behind a lamppost, to behind the drinking fountain, and finally behind the rock at the edge of the lake where the duckling hides. The fox knows he is close and prepares to pounce. Just another step or two and he would have his dinner. The rain falls faster now and makes it hard to see.
TO BE CONTINUED...
