Season 1 · Episode 8
The Dawn Has Two Voices
Published 7th September 2026
The Square had opinions about drainage.
The Rain Makes Its Case
The rain had been falling since before lunch, with the focused persistence of somebody who had been waiting all week for their turn to speak.
Batman Smith stood on the Fence Post looking personally betrayed by it. Around the Bird Table, his brothers, cousins and assorted Smiths conducted business with wet feathers, lowered heads and several strongly held opinions about drainage.
“This is not a crisis,” Batman said.
“The entire lawn is a sponge,” said one of his cousins.
“A sponge is useful,” said Batman.
“Not when you are standing on it.”
From the Oak, Mr Jack Daw called down, “There is a distinction between a complaint and a report.”
“And which is that?” Batman asked.
“A report is a complaint delivered with a straight face.”
The Jacks, who had been sheltering in the dripping branches, received this as if it were a constitutional principle. They began a loud and damp debate on whether the Square ought to appoint somebody in charge of weather.
Gary the Magpie arrived from the Fruit Tree, sleek with rain and clearly pleased to have entered during a dispute.
“I hear there have been failures,” he said.
“You hear anything,” Batman replied.
“That is because I listen.” Gary tilted his head toward the Vegetable Garden. “Unlike certain people who merely splash about in public.”
At this, the Smiths all looked at one another. Nobody had seen Stirling all day. This was not, in itself, unusual. But it was unusual enough for Gary to make something of it.
“Perhaps the Colonel is on manoeuvres,” offered Batman.
“Perhaps,” said Gary. “Or perhaps he has finally realised the intelligence in this garden is being passed to the wrong people.”
“What wrong people?”
Gary looked wounded. “I was speaking in general terms.”
The Garden Delegation
The rain pressed on through the afternoon. At the foot of the Hedge, a chiffchaff tried to sing through the drizzle and seemed surprised to find the weather did not stop for it. Long-tailed tits hurried through in a tiny, soggy procession, their urgent little family business apparently too important to postpone. A crow took the Pine with great solemnity, watched everybody suffer, and appeared to find the arrangement satisfactory.
The Outdoor Consultation
By the time the light began to loosen, the rain had softened to intermittent showers. The greenhouse shone through the wet leaves. The paths reflected the sky in broken strips. For a brief, breathless while, it looked as though the Square might forgive the day.
The Jacks promptly held an outdoor consultation.
Mr Jack Daw took the central branch. “The question before us is whether the rain has changed anything.”
“Everything is wet,” said Gary.
“That is not a change,” Batman said. “That is a condition.”
“Very good,” said Mr Jack Daw. “We have established the first point.”
At once, the Jacks began calling over one another. Gary watched them with the concentration of a gossip who had found a cupboard full of unlocked diaries. Batman looked ready to intervene, but a wren burst from the Hedge, shouted a short, furious objection, and vanished beneath the leaves before anyone could ask what it had meant.
“Second point,” said Mr Jack Daw, slightly shaken. “Apparently controversial.”
The evening cleared only halfway. A pale break opened in the clouds, then closed again, leaving the garden soft-edged and uncertain. One by one, the Smiths settled into the Hedges. Gary remained on the Fruit Tree, guarding his preferred view of everybody else’s business.
“Go home,” Batman told him.
“I am home.”
“Then go somewhere else at home.”
Gary thought about this and stayed exactly where he was.
The Square fell quiet. No tall visitor crossed the paths. No secret squad marched from the Vegetable Garden. Even the Jacks eventually ran out of things to say, which was the most alarming development of the day.
Two Voices Before Dawn
Before dawn, beneath low cloud and a sky with no stars in it, a female owl called from beyond the Hedges.
Gary woke at once.
“There,” he whispered to nobody. “You heard that.”
Another call came back, close enough to change the shape of the dark but too hidden to name. It was not a challenge. It was not quite an answer either. The two voices hung over the wet garden, each apparently waiting for the other to explain itself.
On the Fence Post, Batman lifted his head from beneath one wing.
“Is it an emergency?” he asked.
“It is two ladies with questions,” Gary said gravely. “Those are the most serious kind.”
“Go to sleep.”
“I cannot. There are voices.”
From the far side of the Oak, the first caller spoke again. A second answered. Neither showed herself. The Square listened in the peculiar stillness of creatures who know something is happening but have not yet chosen a version of it.
Then, after a pause, a third call arrived: younger, brisker, with all the impatience of a person arriving late to a conversation and immediately demanding to know why nobody had started without her.
Gary drew himself up.
“Marlboro?” he called softly.
The dark declined to confirm anything.
Batman did not look convinced. “You are guessing.”
“I am recognising a pattern.”
“You have heard three noises.”
“Exactly. A pattern of three.”
The voice did not call again. Somewhere in the unseen branches, something shifted; then the garden returned to rain-heavy silence.
The Morning Committee
Morning arrived in a pale, reluctant wash. The Smith family were first to reclaim the Bird Table, pouring into the Square with all the energy of a household that had spent the night storing up complaints.
“Has anyone seen the Colonel?” Batman asked as he shook rain from his feathers.
“No,” said a Robin.
“No,” said another.
Gary looked toward the Vegetable Garden. “Maybe he has gone underground.”
“He is a squirrel,” Batman said.
“That is what makes it convincing.”
Steve appeared from the hedge, glossy black even under the grey sky, followed by Mrs Steve, who took one look at the Bird Table and began inspecting the ground beneath it with far greater practical sense. A dunnock appeared nearby, composed and faintly disappointed. Great Tits flashed through the branches. The long-tailed tits returned, now looking less like a soaked procession and more like a minor delegation with somewhere urgent to be.
The Jacks came down late, then came down in numbers. They occupied the Oak, the Bird Table, the greenhouse roof and any nearby object that could be called a platform.
Mr Jack Daw cleared his throat.
“The question before us,” he began, “is whether last night’s voices require a response.”
“No,” said Batman.
“Maybe,” said Gary.
“Absolutely not,” said Batman.
“You did not hear them properly,” Gary protested.
“Neither did you.”
This was true, and Gary disliked it very much.
As the morning wore on, the drizzle returned. The garden blurred at the edges once more. A goldcrest flickered through the Pine, tiny and brilliant in the grey, then disappeared before anyone had time to involve it. Crows took their places high in the branches. The Jacks continued their consultation in steadily worsening weather.
At last, Batman climbed back onto the Fence Post and looked across the Square: wet Hedges, dripping greenhouse, anxious family, gossiping Magpie, no Colonel, and three unanswered voices still caught somewhere in the back of the mind.
“Nobody is to make this into a scandal,” he announced.
Gary smiled.
“Too late,” he said.