Bambi by Felix Salten Page A

die. Perhaps I shall be one of them.” No one listened to her, for a mad terror
had seized them all.
    Bambi tried to think. But His savage noises grew louder and louder and
paralyzed Bambi’s senses. He heard nothing but those noises. They numbed him while
amidst the howling, shouting and crashing he could hear his own heart pounding. He felt
nothing but curiosity and did not even realize that he was trembling in every limb. From
time to time his mother whispered in his ear, “Stay close to me.” She was
shouting, but in the uproar it sounded to Bambi as if she were whispering. Her
“Stay close to me” encouraged him. It was like a chain holding him. Without
it he would have rushed off senselessly, and he heard it at the very moment when his
wits were wandering and he wanted to dash away.
    He looked around. All sorts of creatures were swarming past, scampering
blindly over one another. A pair of weasels ran by like thin snakelike streaks. The eye
could scarcely follow them. A ferret listened as though bewitched to every shriek that
desperate Friend Hare let out.
    A fox was standing in a whole flurry of fluttering pheasants. They paid no
attention to him. They ran right under his nose and he paid no attention to them.
Motionless, with his head thrust forward, he listened to the onrushing tumult, lifting
his pointed ears, and snuffed the air with his nose. Only his tail moved, slowly wagging
with his intense concentration.
    A pheasant dashed up. He had come from where the danger was worst and was
beside himself with fear.
    â€œDon’t try to fly,” he shouted to the others.
“Don’t fly, just run! Don’t lose your head! Don’t try to fly!
Just run, run, run!”
    He kept repeating the same thing over and over again as though to
encourage himself. But he no longer knew what he was saying.
    â€œHo! ho! Ha! ha!” came the death cry, from quite near
apparently.
    â€œDon’t lose your head,” screamed the pheasant. And at
the same time his voice broke in a whistling gasp and, spreading his wings, he flew up
with a loud whir. Bambi watched how he flew straight up, directly between the trees,
beating his wings. The dark metallic blue and greenish-brown markings on his body
gleamed like gold. His long tail feathers swept proudly behind him. A short crash like
thunder sounded sharply. The pheasant suddenly crumpled up in mid-flight. He turned head
over tail as though he wanted to catch his claws with his beak, and then dropped
violently to earth. He fell among the others and did not move again.
    Then everyone lost his senses. They all rushed toward one another. Five or
six pheasants rose at one time with a loud whir. “Don’t fly,” cried
the rest and ran. The thunder cracked five or six times and more of the flying birds
dropped lifeless to the ground.
    â€œCome,” said Bambi’s mother. Bambi looked around. Ronno
and Karus had already fled. Old Nettla was disappearing. Only Marena was still beside
them. Bambi went with his mother, Marena following them timidly. All around them was a
roaring and shouting, and the thunder was crashing. Bambi’s mother was calm. She
trembled quietly, but she kept her wits together.
    â€œBambi, my child,” she said, “keep behind me all the
time. We’ll have to get out of here and across the open place. But now we’ll
go slowly.”
    The din was maddening. The thunder crashed ten, twelve times as He hurled
it from His hands.
    â€œWatch out,” said Bambi’s mother. “Don’t
run. But when we have to cross the open place, run as fast as you can. And don’t
forget, Bambi, my child, don’t pay any attention to me when we get out there. Even
if I fall, don’t pay any attention to me, just keep on running. Do you understand,
Bambi?”
    His mother walked carefully step by step amidst the uproar. The pheasants
were running up and down, burying themselves in the snow.