Souligner dans votre cahier le rôle de Mr Fox en rouge et de Mrs Fox en vert pour les chapitres 3 et 4, comme ci-dessous . Merci.
Chapter three
The shooting
Well, my darling, says Mr Fox. What do you want for dinner tonight?
I think we will have duck tonight, says Mrs Fox.
Bring us two fat ducks, if you please. One for you and me and one for the children.
But be careful, says Mrs Fox.
My darling, says Mr Fox, I can smell those horrible crooks a mile away. I can even smell one from the other. Boggis gives off a filthy stink of rotten chicken-skins. Bunce reeks of goose-livers, and as for Bean, the fumes of apple cider hang around him like poisonous gases.
Yes, but be careful, says Mrs Fox. You know they will be waiting for you, all three of them.
Don't worry about me, says Mr Fox. I'll see you later.
The three farmers wait outside the entrance of the hole, each one crouching behind a tree with his gun loaded. Mr Fox creeps up the dark tunnel to the mouth of the hole, pokes his face out into the night air and sniffs once. He moves an inch and stops. He sniffs again. He inches forward a little more. The front half of his body is now in the open. He sniffs for the scent of danger but he finds none. He hears a tiny noise. Mr Fox flattens his body against the ground and waits for a long time. He hears nothing more.
Perhaps it's a field-mouse or some other small animal, he says.He looks carefully around. The wood is very still. He sees something bright behind a tree .
What on earth is it? Good heavens!! It is the barrel of a gun!, he says.
Mr Fox jumps back into his hole and at the same instant the entire wood seems to explode around him. Bang-bang! Bang-bang! Bang-bang!
The smoke from the three guns floats upward in the night air. Boggis, Bunce and Bean come out from behind their trees and walk towards the hole.
Did we get him? says Bean.
Bunce holds a flashlight and there on the ground in the circle of light is the fox's tail. Bean picks it up.
Boggis answers: We got the tail but we missed the fox.
Dang and blast! says Bunce.
Bean pulls a flask from his pocket and takes a swig of cider. Let's dig him out, he says.
Boggis: We can dig him out in a couple of hours. We know he is here.
Bunce: Yep!
Bean: Get the shovels!
Chapter four
The terrible shovels
Mr Fox arrives down the hole.
It hurts, says Mr Fox.
I know it does, sweetheart, replies Mrs Fox. But it will soon get better.
And it will soon grow again, Dad, says one of the four small foxes.
It will never grow again, says Mr Fox. I will be tail-less for the rest of my life.
There is no food for the foxes that night and soon the children doze off. Then Mrs Fox dozes off.
But Mr Fox can't sleep because of the pain. Well, he thinks, I suppose I'm lucky to be alive. But now they know where we live , we need to move as soon as possible. We will never get any peace if...What is that?
The noise he hears now is a really terrible noise, the noise of shovels digging into the soil.
Wake up! he shouts, they are digging us out.
Mrs Fox sits up and cries: they will kill my children.
Never, says Mr Fox.
Scrunch, scrunch, scrunch,go the shovels above their heads.
Mrs Fox holds her four children tight. Suddenly there was a loud crunch and they can see a shovel.
Mr Fox shouts. I've got it. Come on. There's not a moment to lose. Let's dig.
The mother and the father and all four of the children are digging together.
Go downwards, Mr Fox orders, We've got to go deep. As deep as possible.
After an hour, they stop digging. All is quiet now.
Phew! says Mr Fox, I think we've done it. Well done, everybody.
They all sit down, panting for breath. Mrs Fox says to her children. Without your father, we would all be dead by now. Your father is a fantastic fox.
