Bump in the night

Being a proper fey town mouse, with a strong strain of sympathy for Buddhism, I am especially squeamish about killing things. After a few months of regular country weekends, however, I began to learn that you just can't be this way in the hinterlands. First it was the spiders, sucked up by the hoover. I don't mind spiders but I do mind their sticky webs coating every nook and cranny in the house. Not long after that, I ordered poison to be poured onto the wasps' nest – it was just too close to my favourite picnic spot in the garden.

But Friday was the night of the first big kill. Driving back to our house from the station in our heavy Land Rover we saw a rabbit run out. Too late, it hesitated and too late we braked. There was the unmistakable bump of a newly squashed Peter Rabbit beneath the tyres. I am sorry, but we left it for dead. I have been reassured that rabbits die quickly (they easily get heart attacks) and perhaps a fox would eat it, so its life wasn't entirely without purpose. Not to mention that there are more rabbits breeding than even Brangelina can manage to adopt – we can spare one or two to the tarmac.

Oddly, the thing I was surprised to note was that I didn't cry or even get too upset. I must be more country than I thought...