All quiet on the western front

If there's one think foxes love, it's heat. And if there's one thing that they hate, it's rain.
So that might explain why we have seen so little of our fox family this summer.
Barring a couple of glimpses which I have not yet described:

Once, for instance, I went down the garden to the compost bins and tossed my bucketful of scraps into its container. I noticed the foxy smell and glanced at the hollowed-out places under the nearby shed. They are well worn by now...
Outside one of these runways a straggly end of marmalade fur lay limply on the earth:
-Oh no, I thought, one of the little brutes has killed a cat!
(you always hear of this but never seen it...)
Bending over to look closer, the "end of fur" was hastily pulled under the shed to the sound of agitated clonks and scuffles from below...an overcrowded home with no room to stow a tail away!

That was a couple of weeks ago and not much has been seen since.

However last week there was a fine hot day, a nice novelty, and there sure enough, punctual as clockwork, lay a young fox on Mary Martin's concrete path, blissfully snoozing in the sunshine!
I couldn't see which one it was, but one of the Middles is likeliest.
Mama fox has not been sighted, and Sandy has not been seen either.
But today, a very small fox appeared on my terrace while we prepared lunch. She checked the dishes and scampered away.
Small, dainty and a bit thin, it was certainly Charmer.
Didn't I say that the small ones are often survivors?