Illustration from Top Up

Illustrations by Karl Owens.


 
 
 
 
 

Excerpt
2004
WEBSITE
The sight that greeted the pregnant mother’s eyes was alien. She had no idea how she'd arrived here. One moment the world was normal and she was climbing a tree, pushing between branches with the sole aim of creating a safe place for her family and the next she was in this strange landscape. There seemed to be no way back to her own familiar territory, no way home. Her heavy belly reminded her that she must build her nest without delay, but where to do this? Tentatively she began to explore this new place. Instead of the juts and curves of rocks and trees she saw straight lines, unyielding hollow blocks and rods poking out of the earth, connected to each other and to the mysterious blocks by sinuous fibres. Nothing looked right and she was in no condition to cope with such a major change. But the urge to survive is strong. A mother’s urge to ensure the safety of her young even stronger and she adapted.
Elma Mortimer stroked her small dog as she watched the giant spider from her armchair beside her front parlour window. It had built its web on a telegraph pole, using the wires that radiated from it as a framework and adding a spiral of steely thread. Large bundles tightly wrapped in thick gossamer filament dangled from the structure like sausages on strings. One had a smaller package attached by a leather strap that had one strand of the filament running down it securing the link between the two items. She saw a large vehicle pull up nearby. It was painted up all fancy with the words ‘Outside Broadcast’ across its flank and a car was pulling up alongside it. Elma's eyes narrowed to angry slits when she saw who was inside. The pale blue linen safari suit was the unmistakable trademark of the naturalist Carter Battenburgh. Elma could see the technicians attaching a small radio mike to his lapel and watched him as he crept towards the post that supported the spider’s nest. What a fool. Did he think himself immune? Irritably she flicked on her television set.
Battenburgh was transmitting live; something he rarely did. Elma was watching, which was an even rarer event since her divorce. Her former husband Arnold had been a great fan and had insisted on watching only Battenburgh all day, every day. He wouldn't work and wouldn't move from his chair except when the call of nature forced him to. He also had an inexplicable dislike of animals, particularly of Elma’s little west highland terrier Biddie, whom he referred to as ‘that scrawny little bitch’. Elma could never fathom the logic of watching animals on the television night and day, whilst complaining between programs about Biddie’s behaviour, which by any standards, was exemplary for a dog. She had found solace in her hobbies, but found herself still irritated every time she walked back into the sitting room to see him sitting in his sagging armchair, slack jawed and mesmerised by the cut glass Newtonian voice of Battenburgh. The divorce court had agreed that his behaviour was unreasonable and had upheld Elma's claim. Jack had left, taking his television and collection of five hundred and eighty three Battenburgh videos with him. For a few weeks Elma watched no television, grateful for the silence, but finally the quiet became too intense and she brought down the small portable set from the spare bedroom. She still watched no natural history programmes whatever.
Until today.
She could see the presenter from her window. He was directly beneath the web now, crouched down under a large umbrella. On the television his clipped, very English voice, hushed to a whisper informed the camera: ‘Here, in this sleepy English town of Basford Thirkettle in the middle of England, history is being made. Above my head is what must be the largest spider in the world. Nobody seems to know where she came from but experts believe her to be a gigantic form of wolf spider Lycosa [Pardosa] lugubris. She differs, though, from normal wolf spiders in that she has built a web similar to that of the garden spider Araneus diadematus and has placed what are believed to be eggs in the centre. Normal wolf spiders – and this could be called anything but normal - don't build webs as this female has done. Their eggs are rolled into a ball of gossamer and this is carried behind the female until the young spiders hatch and climb onto their mother’s back where she will carry them around until they are old enough to fend for themselves. It is uncertain whether this giant web is designed to trap prey or simply to support her nest, which might contain as many as a thousand eggs in the central spherical sheath that she has spun from the same titanic gossamer filament she used to build her web. We have no idea how long it will be before the eggs hatch. In the meantime the female, her maternal instincts overriding every other sense, will maintain a vigil, neither eating nor sleeping until the young hatch safely. She has stocked the larder for that moment, evidenced by those bundles you can see suspended from the strong structural threads of her outer webs.
‘Shockingly,’ he paused dramatically, ‘those bundles contain human victims of this fearsome predator. One bundle, the one almost directly above my head, contains a dog, attached to its owner by a lead. Even more shocking,’ he paused again, more dramatic effect, ‘they are all likely to be still alive, held in suspended animation until required to nourish the giant infants. All is in readiness. Her eggs laid, the larder stocked, she has moved to a nearby post to watch and wait.
‘The authorities have decided not to act yet – any rescue attempt is likely to prompt the spider to attack and the ensuing struggle might destroy the only living example of this new species. An expert is being flown in from Brazil as I speak and she will advise on the best way forward. Until then, like the spider, we must watch and wai……’
Battenburgh did not finish his sentence; he had become the latest victim of the she-wolf spider. Countless millions witnessed the spectacle of the supreme naturalist grasped in the jaws of nature.

Copyright 2003 Susan M Phillips

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