Invasion
I was in the garden for a long spell this afternoon, a topic not without interest (to me, anyway, which means blog), and then tonight was one of Wild Robert’s occasional next-step-up ringing seminars—I hesitate to call them upper level, although they’re upper level to the likes of me, who wasn’t originally planning to get even this far—and I actually made it to this one. There are gremlins between me and Wild Robert’s seminars but we FOILED THEM AT LAST tonight and I went and it was brilliant and I was going to tell you all about it.
So I went back to the cottage on a high of Kent, Cambridge, Stedman and Little Bob, brain dead, but who cares? It was worth it.*
I went back to the cottage because Peter was playing bridge tonight, and I don’t leave hellhounds to their own devices at the mews. If there’s going to be a nasty accident, I’d rather it happened at my house. At a little after nine, leaving the tower, it was still daylight; twilight was finally arriving as I got home. I turned the hall light on as I went upstairs. I pulled curtains closed. I was thinking about bells, and the amazing, the fabulous excellence of Wild Robert, who can haul me through Cambridge.
There was a funny noise.
It seemed to be coming from the attic.
It was a sort of whirring noise.
I had opened the attic hatch this morning, you know.** And closed the window. Just to be, you know, sure. Sure that Atlas’ bat-blocking manoeuvres had been successful.
I stood at the foot of the ladder and looked up. There was enough twilight coming in through the big Velux roof window to see . . . little flying things. Lots of little flying things. Lots and lots of little flying things. Zapping back and forth. With, I might add, every evidence of enjoyment. These were not the poor lost solitary things I’ve had downstairs, bouncing off my geraniums and getting mixed up in the bed canopy. These were bats doing what bats do, which is whizz around. Hilariously. While this does, unfortunately, put paid to EMoon’s attractive theory that my one-at-a-time visitors heretofore have all been only a single hero-worshipping adolescent bat dazzled by the hellgoddess schtick, I would have no trouble believing that these were the original adolescent rebel and her eighty-four closest friends. There were high jinks being expressed in my attic. There were aerial acrobatics of a majestic order. There was also some semaphoring of frustration: bats kept landing—with tiny pattery whups—on the window and creeping briskly along the sill as if to say, where’s the frelling exit? I know there was one here yesterday. . . .
Lots. And lots. And lots. And lots of little flying things. Quite amazing numbers of little flying things. There were four hundred and ten of them last year. And let us not forget—I have not forgotten—that the returnees are all pregnant.
And I was going to have to go up there. And open the window. And CLOSE THE HATCH.
Different people have different breaking points, of course. I could have simply grabbed the hellhounds and shot out the front door, never to return, at least not until morning. Not as if I don’t have two other houses to choose from. Or I could have (maybe) found something to hook round the handle of the hatch and slammed it shut from floor level. But . . . that’s my house. That’s where my bed is, not to mention the hellhound crate: sleeping anywhere else is going to be a large frelling nuisance, and will probably involve the stealthy self-insertion of hellhounds at some untoward hour. And—speaking of breaking points—there is no way I’m going to close the hatch on (apparently) ever-increasing numbers of bats in my attic with my All Stars and my cashmere sweaters with no exit. I mean, yes, the bats could turn around and go back the way they came, but they clearly aren’t going to: on the contrary, there are more and more of them coming in.
Do it before you have the chance to think about it too much. I climbed the ladder. I crouched at the top. Given the aerobatic fantasies this lot are performing their echolocation whatsit is working fine and they can just avoid me. I’m sure they could.
They didn’t.
You know that hoary old urban myth about how low-flying bats can get tangled in your hair? Well, keep your hair combed. They won’t get tangled in it, they’ll just fly through it. I HAD BATS ON ME. None of them stayed longer than a wingbeat, but they touched me as they brushed past, and when I finally forced myself to stand up to open the window—and, just by the way, I have to stand on tiptoe, reach up as far as my gorilla-length arms will reach, and yank repeatedly on a horrible stupid bar to get that ungleblarging window*** open—THIS IS NOT A COMFORTABLE POSTURE WHEN YOU’RE BEING DIVEBOMBED BY HUNDREDS OF BATS—when the beastly bar finally unlocked and I could push the bottom out, I had several bats patter swiftly over my hands . . .
I don’t know about bats. I don’t know what they thought they were doing. I didn’t feel assaulted or attacked. I felt totally freaked out, but that’s a different issue. What I felt like was the new vaulting horse for the third-grade gymnastics class. Ooooooh, look at this one—I bet I can do a triple somersault and a back flip. . . .
I also don’t know how many bats were in my attic tonight. A dozen? Twenty? Seventy-six thousand and twelve? But even with several of them on each of the two windows—the smaller, end window is the other side of the attic and I wasn’t even going to try to get over there and open it—there were still enough of them to be simultaneously scorching around the attic and parting my hair.
Lots.
I went back down the ladder and closed the hatch, and please, Kindly Bat God, the nice one responsible for pregnant adolescent bats having a really good time, let none of them be downstairs exploring further when the hellhounds and I return to the cottage†. Yes, I rang Atlas, and he’s coming back tomorrow, bless him. And tomorrow I am so ringing the national bat people. Block Visible Holes indeed. Because the thing that is worrying me most is my sense, tonight, that the reason they were so jolly is because they’re colonising up there. My attic is now part of the bat nursery. Because I’m almost sure I saw a few bats fly in the opened window as well as out. . . . ††
* * *
* And while I still want to sing tonight, I haven’t yet learnt to engage my brain with the process, so I won’t miss it.
** Anyone who follows me on Twitter does know.
*** It’s on the list for replacement. It’s been a ratbag since I moved in. But I hadn’t realised how crucial its ratbaggery was going to be.
† After I finish this very large bar of chocolate.
†† A good half dozen came steaming around the corner of the house and sped up the cul de sac as I was locking the front door. Hellhounds looked at them interestedly. I may have whined a little.
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