Trailing the Red Fox

I stood by a dense and lush paddy field. The plants were tall enough, I could see nothing beyond the green sea. At my feet granules of red clay clung to my curled-up toes. I wondered where my sandals were. Several green parakeets fluttered past so close I could see their red beaks.

Then I noticed the creature with reddish fur coat watching me from behind the rice stalks. Our eyes met, and a shiver went down my spine. A shuffling sound came from the nearby bushes.

"Run!" I gasped.

When I turned to look at the animal again, she was gone. I thought I had a fleeting glimpse of a spangled, bushy tail.

Even before I woke up, I knew it was a dream. I would never venture into the wilderness barefoot. Whenever I am running without shoes and feeling sharp pebbles cutting into the tender flesh of my feet, I know I am dreaming. There were no such pebbles in this one, but there were other signs, like the cool, clammy soil and a sense of urgency that told me to run. The paddy field seemed distantly familiar, very much like the one near my father's house in Kushtia. That was more than 30 years ago, and it still seemed more real than the world I was living in.

My eyes opened and the square shape of a window glimmered in the morning light. A half-open laptop with a blank screen was propped up on the bedside table.

It was summer 2020. Covid-19 was raging.

A teacher by profession, I taught full-time at a university. Even three months earlier, I was rushing off to classes and traipsing around the city like everyone else. Under lockdown, however, the mad rush of the world had been halted, even though we were still teaching classes and organizing events online. Work was in full swing, but it was a different and unreal world—almost like a dream. I was alone in a fifth-floor apartment, and my life suddenly consisted of screens of different shapes. As if Zoom and Google Meet classes were not dystopian enough, I found myself teaching Sophocles' King Oedipus. Explaining the riddle of the Sphinx and plague of Thebes in a world devastated by Covid-19 seemed uncanny, to say the least.

I was still thinking of Oedipus and trying to understand the connection between ancient Thebes and the modern world when I went to sit by my bedroom window. There was a clamoring sound as flock of rose-ringed parakeets flew by, an unusual scene in the bustling city of Dhaka. But they had lately become frequent visitors in the wooded area nearby.

The parakeets!

Were they the ones that made me dream of the fox and that summer in Kushtia? There were hundreds of parakeets making their noisy rounds every morning and evening in Kushtia. I encountered many wild animals there and almost befriended a fox. But why did I dream of the fox after so many years?

 

Back in 1985, my father, a government officer, was posted in Kushtia, a district in the western region of Bangladesh. My mother, my younger brother Sumit, and I remained in the capital city of Dhaka as we had school and Amma had her teaching job at a college. However, when the summer approached, we found ourselves transported to the small, rural town of Kushtia, where Abba lived in a spacious, British-era government quarters with extensive grounds. Coming from Dhaka, this place seemed almost wild. At dusk mosquitos swarmed overhead and cicadas chirped in the bushes. "I heard there are mongooses and foxes around here. Keep the outer doors closed," said Amma to her old maid Kulsum. My mother had brought her along with us to chaperone her two wayward children.

In that wild and silent place, I was put in a room by myself while lucky Sumit got to sleep with my parents. As I dozed off that night, an otherworldly hooting echoed outside my window. I drew the coverlet over my head and wondered how I would survive the summer.

 

Standing in the backyard the next morning, I could barely recognize the haunted look of the house from the previous night. There was a tall hydrangea bush in full bloom in a corner. It was charming, but what took my breath away was the untended greenery behind the house, ending in a distant paddy field.

Unlike the back, the garden at the front was well planned, with empty flower beds being prepared to grow sunflowers and chrysanthemums in the winter. I was sniffing the pink buds of madhabilata by the porch when a gruff voice said, "Be careful, little madam. There are insects in that creeper. They might crawl into your ears."

Abba's house staff were weird, I thought. They shuffled in silence and sprouted up without warning. Here was this fellow crouching among the bushes and undergrowth, warning me about creepy crawlies. I tiptoed towards him and saw he was weeding the flower beds with a khurpa. He glanced at me only briefly—an ageless, weather-beaten man who preferred to work quietly through the day. He spoke to the young plants lovingly and shielded them from the hot sun with pieces of bamboo.

I had to admit the place had its charm, and I walked about in a stupor. The charm intensified when Kulsum Khala came back from a walk one afternoon with a large green parakeet. Apparently, the long-tailed bird had landed on her shoulder when she was standing by the paddy field.

"I think the poor thing was chased by foxes," she said.

"Foxes? Where?" Sumit and I asked in unison.

"Oh, there are foxes in the paddy field."

"Really?"

Then we forgot the foxes as Kulsum Khala started to feed chickpeas to the bird. Soon we were bickering about a suitable name for our exotic guest.

 

I saw a fox the very next day as I sat on the swing some distance from the house. It had rained the previous night, and the weather was cool. Everybody seemed happy to have a respite from the steamy June weather. A rustling noise from the thickets nearby made me freeze. A small, furry creature with a wide muzzle and a reddish coat trotted out. Its eyes were not on me though; it was looking towards the kitchen quarters. I wondered whose dog it was when I noticed the tail—a bushy, shaggy fox tail.

My heart skipped a beat, and I recalled the only fox I had seen before—at the zoo. It was sickly and asleep in its cage the whole time. But this animal was alert and agile, its movements stealthy. When it noticed me, it went still and looked at me intently. Then, surprisingly, it sat on its haunches, and I thought, smiled.

I was totally taken aback. Hadn't I heard foxes run away at the sight of humans? But here was this fox seemingly at ease a few yards away from me. I was transfixed. It was strange to say the least—a fox and a teenage girl sat facing each other in the garden on a summer morning. I recalled all the fox fables I had read, and I half expected the intruder to speak up.

I am not sure how long our silent communion lasted. It could have been a few seconds or a few minutes. Then a gardener approached, the fox sprang up and bolted, and the spell was broken.

 

I arrived late at the lunch table. As I bit into a chicken leg, I heard Abba telling Amma, "You won't believe it, but a fox came up to the second floor."

"A fox? Where?" asked a wide-eyed Sumit.

"At my office."

"You have foxes in your office? Really?"

"It's the countryside. Wild animals seek shelter wherever they can, and office buildings are usually empty after 5:00 PM," Abba explained. "You may come across a fox even here."

I thought of the fox I encountered that morning, but I was reluctant to mention it in front of my mother since she was skittish about wild animals. I hadn't even told Sumit because he couldn't keep anything to himself.

As she bustled about the dining table, Kulsum Khala said, "Foxes have dug holes in the paddy field behind our house, you know!"

Amma was flabbergasted. "What nonsense! I haven't heard any fox calls here!"

Abba nodded. "Foxes call during wintertime only," he said. "But Kulsum might be right. They often make their home in the paddy fields and steal chickens from the locals."

Kulsum Khala spoke up again. "Foxes don't just eat chickens. Back in our village, the rascals once stole a newborn baby."

We looked at her in disbelief. She nodded knowingly, happy to have our full attention. "They found small bones in a ditch. After that, the men hunted down all the foxes around the village."

"Kulsum, go to the kitchen," Amma said sternly. "You're scaring even me."

I turned to my father and said, "Abba, you won't go foxhunting, I hope?" I had just finished reading a horror book with a description of Englishmen hunting foxes on horseback. They used hounds as well. I didn't like the idea at all.

Abba had read the book, too. He smiled wryly. "Can you really imagine me hunting foxes on horseback? But the locals do often hunt foxes."

"How do people hunt foxes here?" asked Sumit. "I haven't seen any horses."

Abba scratched his head and said, "They probably set traps. Gofur would surely know." By this time, we knew that Gofur was the head gardener, the sour-faced old man who worked silently in the garden. After a pause, Abba added, "Apparently, fox meat is an excellent remedy for asthma..."

Amma was furious. "What are you spouting?" she said. "You're no better than Kulsum."

Abba held up a hand in defense. "It's what people here believe, and they've killed many foxes because of this."

Amma continued to grumble through the rest of the meal.

 

Sumit and I decided we needed to know more about foxes, and asking Gofur Kaka seemed like the best idea. We found him playing intently with his khurpa near the porch. "Don't come any closer," he warned as we approached. We saw a small crawling thing in front of him. It was the size of an earthworm but wriggled like an eel.

"Whoa, what's that?" asked Sumit.

"A snakelet," came the gruff reply.

We sprang back just as he sliced the worm in two.

"But you just killed it! It's only a baby!" I shrieked.

"This baby will grow into a poisonous snake and bite somebody's child."

I didn't know how to counter that. After an awkward pause, Sumit said, "Tell us about foxes."

The old man's demeanor changed instantly, and a smile broke across his creased face. "Those little devils!" he said. "They are fun creatures, quite helpful for the paddy field as they eat the rodents. But they also bring a lot of trouble for the neighborhood chickens. When it becomes unbearable, we hunt them down." He raised his khurpa and pointed toward the back of the house. "I believe we have a few fox cubs there. That's why the adults are stealing so many chickens."

"When you hunt the foxes, you don't kill the cubs, right?" Sumit asked in a small voice. It seemed that like me, he too was troubled by Gafur Kaka killing the baby snake.

"It's not easy to slay a fox. But if the cubs are dead, the parents will leave the area." He seemed pensive. "This time, I may kill an adult fox, too. My uncle has come for a visit, and he suffers from asthma."

So, Abba was right.

 

The next few days were suddenly full of foxes.

Our cook grumbled that the foxes had become daredevils. They were chewing up the bones he kept for the stray cats. Both Amma and Kulsum Khala had seen foxes scurrying by our backyard in the evenings. The gardeners complained about foxes breaking through the fences.

Kulsum Khala became extra careful with Leju, our long-tailed parakeet guest. She allowed it to roam free in the backyard during the day, but always brought it inside the house before dark. She had even procured a cage for Leju.

One morning, a visitor came to see Abba. He was a neighbor who owned a chicken farm. I didn't see him, but later heard from Abba that he had asked to borrow Gofur Kaka to help him control the fox population.

Abba agreed something needed to be done. But he wanted to make sure that there was no law against foxhunting.

 

A few days later, we woke up to the sound of loud lamentation. Kulsum Khala was howling in the backyard. Leju was missing. She had put the bird in its cage the previous night, but instead of bringing it inside, she had left the cage hanging outside the kitchen. She hurried out at dawn to retrieve her pet parakeet, only to find an empty and mangled cage. There was no sign of Leju, except for a few green feathers.

Amma tried to placate her by saying that the bird had probably just flown away. But the old woman wouldn't listen. "I tell you a fox took my darling. Otherwise, how did the cage get mauled? O my poor birdie..." she wept inconsolably.

The foxhunt seemed imminent.

But I couldn't forget my silent encounter. So, while I was disturbed by the havoc they were causing, I also didn't like the idea of killing fox cubs. I approached our father for a solution.

Abba looked grave. "It's a sorry business," he said. "But the police said there is no law against foxhunting, especially if they are ravaging the chicken farms." He paused, then added, "Gofur says it's easier to kill the pups. If the cubs are gone, the adults will leave the area, too." He patted my head. "I'm sorry, my pet. But it's one of those necessary evils."

 

We saw them from a distance, across the paddy field—a rowdy mob with clubs and rattles. Gofur Kaka was among them. The others were probably from the chicken farm. Kulsum Khala was with us and had a determined look on her face. While Sumit and I were nervous and clasped each other's hands tightly, the old woman watched with anticipation. She was still mad about losing Leju. We heard the chase, but because of the thick paddy, we couldn't see much.

A few hours later, they brought back three small, lifeless bodies and laid them out in the open. By this time, Amma had taken Sumit away. She wanted me to go with her too, but I insisted on staying. But when I saw the dead cubs, I wished I had listened to her. The men were talking, and I learned that apparently there was more than one fox family.

"The red vixen ran off with one of the pups," said a lean man with a gamchha tied around his waist. "She's fast!"

"Do you know if anybody else is foxhunting?" asked Gafur Kaka. "I have to catch an adult fox for my uncle."

As the men were chatting and smoking, I saw something in the distance near the boundary wall. An animal with a red coat stood still, as if listening. Was that the female that got away with the one remaining pup? I almost blurted something out but stopped myself in time.

That night I developed a high fever. In my delirium, I apparently called out to the fox and cried for her dead pups. My mother scolded my father and regretted that she allowed me to watch the foxhunt. The fever lasted a few days, and after I recovered, my parents decided to take us back to Dhaka. Our vacation was cut short by a week.

Abba remained in Kushtia for another eight months, and we went to visit again in December after our final exams were over. There were fox calls for mating, and we sometimes heard shuffling noises behind the house. Perhaps they were other foxes, but I couldn't help thinking of my red fox. I wondered what happened to her and her pup. We heard and shared many fox stories, but I couldn't bring myself to talk about my encounter with her that summer morning.

 

When I dreamt of her during that pandemic summer more than 30 years later, I recalled the limp bodies of the dead cubs. In retrospect, it was my first brush with mortality. Is that why this memory had resurfaced now—during a time of plague?

I shuffled through my books and notes to prepare for my class on King Oedipus. Ours is not a time of heroes or demigods, nor of riddles or winged monsters, I thought. But surely Covid-19 has shown us that we, too, are blind creatures afflicted by hubris. My red fox was unafraid and inscrutable, like a messenger from another realm. "Why are some marked for death so that others get to live?" she seemed to be asking me across the decades.