"Any culling needed?" Tendril lowered his voice.
"Just the one, Sir."
"I'll deal with it myself, straight after we've all unpacked and had a nice cold drink," said Tendril.
"What's culling, Dad?" asked Fern, who was eight, as she walked past carrying her own luggage into the house on her head.
Tendril was startled. "Nothing for you to worry about, my darling."
"Why not?" The young broucci stopped in her tracks and fixed him with one of her steady stares. Tendril cursed himself for his unguardedness. He had always known she was insatiably curious, but in addition, his little daughter's hearing must have lately become as sharp as an adult's while on holiday.
"Just a job Dad's got to do, sweetheart," Mrs Tendril butted in. "How about a nice cold ice? It's baking out here on the lawn! Come and help me unload the car, then we can go in the kitchen and cool down.
"What job?" repeated Fern.
The three adults exchanged glances.
"OK, then: if you are old enough to ask, you are old enough to know," said Tendril. "Culling is what we do when one of the piglets is too small and weak to get to the food-holes easily. A piglet like that doesn't fatten up."
"So - you're going to help the piglet by feeding him extra? Is that what culling means?"
"No, darling. That's not at all what culling means. We can't afford to have an unsaleable animal in the pen, so..."
There was an exquisitely tense silence.
"You mean - you're going to KILL it?"
The Separator snorted with amusement and looked away. He didn't have children, but over the years of visiting the Tendril place he had become wary of the way the Tendrils brought theirs up. It was all expensive art and music lessons, poetry and sensitivity. Leaf was doing multi-dimensional sculpture and Fern played six instruments. No preparation for a farming life, and now Tendril was learning the hard way.
Fern took a step towards her father. "Dad, answer me!"
"Fern, the piglet is having a horrible time. All I am doing is putting it out of its misery."
"Misery? How do you even know it's miserable? What business is it of yours to decide if it's unhappy or not?" Fern turned to the Separator. "Do you think the piglet is miserable?"
"Hell," he began. "It ain't my job to worry about if a pig's happy or not - "
Tendril, who loved his daughter deeply, interrupted the Separator quickly. "Fern, this is an animal we are talking about. I don't think it knows about being happy or unhappy. But it can't get enough food, and if you think about it, for any animal that cannot be a happy situation. So yes, I am going to be putting it out of its misery. I am doing it a kindness."
A long intake of breath, quivering features, antennae moving wildly.
"NOOOO!!!!!!!!!"
She threw her luggage to the ground, burst into tears, hot angry tears, and clung to her father with all her legs.
"Daddy, you mustn't! Please, please! It is so unfair. If the piglet isn't getting enough food, it isn't his fault! Why should he be punished?"
"You tell me, Fern," said Tendril gravely, "just what else I can do. I can't hand feed the little blighter myself every day, can I?"
"But - but I can! Me, Daddy! Let me look after it! I can do it!" The child trembled as the wonderful idea took hold of her. "I'll look after him, Daddy. I'll feed him and keep him safe. I'll keep him in my bedroom."
"You most certainly will not, young lady," snorted Mrs Tendril, who was half in and half out of the car clearing it of discarded food wrappings, which she rolled up together into a neat ball for recycling. "We aren't having a farm animal in the house. And that's flat."
"You most certainly will not, young lady," snorted Mrs Tendril, who was half in and half out of the car clearing it of discarded food wrappings, which she rolled up together into a neat ball for recycling. "We aren't having a farm animal in the house. And that's flat."
"The outhouse, then," said Fern. He can have Pilot's old kennel." Pilot, the family's fine, loyal, intelligent border collie, had died the previous winter and left a gaping hole in Mrs Tendril's heart.
"I don't like to think of one of the livestock using Pilot's bedding," said Mrs Tendril. "And it mustn't come in the house like Pilot did." Mr Tendril looked grave. "Fern, darling, this is what farming is like. It's fun sometimes, but at other times it is a little hard. It's much more -
- cruel to make the creature live apart from its own kind," Mr Tendril was about to add, but something in Fern's face made him stop short.
Tendril loved his daughter beyond words. She was a bright girl and full of passionate feeling. She wasn't especially pretty but there was a vividness about her. She had an independence of thought which gave the farmer enormous pleasure. He was spending a lot of money on music and art lessons for her and had long been aware that sometimes she would have ideas which were not the same as his. And even while he found her ways of thinking strange, even disconcerting, he loved her all the more for it. Why not let her have her way? Let her find out what troublesome beasts the pigs were. He would not dream of allowing it to grow to adulthood but there was probably not much harm in allowing Fern to care for the thing for a few months.
"Fern," he said out loud. "I will accept your offer. I will let you look after the runt. But you must come with me and help me to get it out of the pen."
Fern clapped her hands over her mouth and her dark, huge eyes seemed to glisten with amazement and joy. She hugged her father again.
"He won't be any trouble, Daddy. I promise you. I will get up way every morning to feed him and I will clean out the pen and everything."
- cruel to make the creature live apart from its own kind," Mr Tendril was about to add, but something in Fern's face made him stop short.
Tendril loved his daughter beyond words. She was a bright girl and full of passionate feeling. She wasn't especially pretty but there was a vividness about her. She had an independence of thought which gave the farmer enormous pleasure. He was spending a lot of money on music and art lessons for her and had long been aware that sometimes she would have ideas which were not the same as his. And even while he found her ways of thinking strange, even disconcerting, he loved her all the more for it. Why not let her have her way? Let her find out what troublesome beasts the pigs were. He would not dream of allowing it to grow to adulthood but there was probably not much harm in allowing Fern to care for the thing for a few months.
"Fern," he said out loud. "I will accept your offer. I will let you look after the runt. But you must come with me and help me to get it out of the pen."
Fern clapped her hands over her mouth and her dark, huge eyes seemed to glisten with amazement and joy. She hugged her father again.
"He won't be any trouble, Daddy. I promise you. I will get up way every morning to feed him and I will clean out the pen and everything."
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