Foremole waved her to a place between himself and a grizzled old mole whose
fur was completely gray.
"Set ee by yurr, maid. This be Owd Dinny, t'other young rip's granfer."
Old Dinny nodded and continued spooning honeyed oatmeal.
Obviously the moles liked a good solid start to the day. There was a variety
of cooked roots and tubers, most of which Columbine had never seen before. Ail
of them tasted delicious, whether salted, sugared or dipped in honey and milk.
(Some of the moles did all four.) The bread was wafer thin and tasted of
almonds, small cakes patterned with buttercups were served warm. There were
fluffy napkins and bowls of steaming rosewater to cleanse sticky paws. As
Columbine nibbled at a rye biscuit and sipped fragrant mint tea, she could not
help asking Foremole where all the huge deeper V ever pies and solid
trencherfbod the moles seemed to favor were.
Foremole chuckled. He gestured at the table with a massive digging claw. "Ho
urr, Combuliney. This yurr be on'y a loight brekkist for 'ee an' yurr friends.
We'm fancied it up a bit for 'ee. Moles be only eaten solid vittles at even
toid when they's 'ungered greatly."
Columbine nodded and smiled politely, trying to hide her amazement. "Oh, I
see, just a loight brekkist, er, light breakfast."
As Columbine ate, she remembered Gonff. If only he were here amid this
friendly company with her! She mentally wagered with herself that he would
know the name and taste of
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jgvery dish (and probably be jokingly chided for having stolen gaany of them
in bygone days). She pictured her mousethief jesting with everybody, imitating
molespeech and singing ballads as he composed them.
The young mousemaid heaved a sigh into her mint tea. It dissolved in a small
cloud of fragrant steam. Where, oh
• "Where, was Gonff on this beautiful morning? "*. It was nearly midmoming
when the "light breakfast" leached its conclusion. Then, guarded and guided by
the mole
•community, Columbine and her friends made their way back
•to Brockhall by a secret woodland route.
Martin, Gonff and Dinny were wide awake by daybreak. They crouched in the
small cave, eating breakfast as they watched a gray drizzly dawn. Packing the
food away, the travelers
.stamped life back into their numbed paws. Surprisingly, Gonff was first to
step outside.
\ "Come on, mateys. It'll brighten up by mid-morning. You
yijvait and see—I'm a Prince of Predictors."
•;;< Striding out, they left the low hills behind, to face yet more .
flatlands. Wakened grouse whirred into the damp morning
•air at their approach.
•
Sala-manda-stron,
^
Look where we've come from,
;."
Three of Mossfiower's best,"
Marching out upon our quest: ^
Sala-manda-stron.
J Scratch sighted the three dim forms through the layers of {frizzling rain.
|^ "There they go. Come on, you two. I've got a feeling that today's die day
we catch 'em. Come on, move yourselves, sooner it's done, the quicker we'll
get back to Kotir. good solid food again, a long rest, and maybe a bit of lor
and glory."
'Huh, I'm soaked right through!" Splitnose complained, too," grumbled
Blacktooth. "I never slept a wink Igain. Sitting out on top of a hill, miles
from anywhere in |pe pouring rain, stiff all over, cold, hungry, shiver—"
^'•"Shuttup!" Scratch interrupted bitterly. "Put a button on
t
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your driveling lip. Look at me, I'm weary, saturated and starved, but do you
hear me whimpering on about it all the time? Up on your paws, and try to look
like you're the Queen's soldiers from Kotir."
They trekked westward, pursuing the travelers.
Splitnose was muttering as he kicked a pebble along in front of himself.
"Honor and glory, huh. Cludd'll get all that, and he can keep it, too. Now if
it was honor cake and a mug of hot glory, that'd be a different thing."
"Honor cake and hot glory drink? Don't talk such rubbish, soggyhead,"
Blacktooth laughed.
"Soggyhead yourself, drippynose."
"Crinkleclaws!"
"Greasyfur!"
"Beetlebottom!"
"Stow the gab and get marching, both of you!" Scratch told them.
True to Gonff's prediction, the rain ceased. Above the plains the sun came out
to watch fluffy clouds sailing about on the breeze across a lake of bright
blue sky.
Dinny sniffed the air, wiggling his claws. "Buharr, they's watter nearby,
likely a pond or tarn. May'ap us'Il catcher a liddlefish. Be gudd eaten,
hurr."
Martin looked sideways at Gonff. "How does he know there's water near? I can't
smell a thing."
The mousethief shrugged. "Neither can he, matey. Moles probably feel it
through the earth with their digging claws."
Dinny nodded wisely. "O air, us'ns do smell lots o' things wi' us claws."
Gonff winked at the warrior mouse. "That's the nice thing about moles, they
always have a sensible explanation which we can all understand."
The three friends laughed aloud. Dinny proved as good at predicting as Gonff.
Midday found the travelers at the edge of a large pond. Bulrushes and reeds
surrounded the margin, small water lilies budded on the surface. The glint of
silver scales beneath the water promised good fishing. At first Martin was
loath to stop but, realizing the valuable addition a fish would make to their
supplies, he called a halt. While his
152
friends went about fishing, the warrior posted himself on guard to watch for
their pursuers.
Dinny sat on the edge of the bank, immersing his paws in the shallows with
exclamations of delight.
"Oo arr, oo bliss V joys. Hurr, this be the loif, Gonffen!"
The mousethief had cast a line baited with a tiny red mud-worm. In seconds it
was snatched by a voracious stickleback. "Ha, look, matey," he called. "IVe
got a bite! Come to Gonff, old greedyguts."
Martin crept up behind them. He placed a paw gently on each of his friends'
shoulders as he whispered to them, "Ssshhh. Listen to me. We are in great
danger. Don't make a sound, if you value our lives!"
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Skipper sat inside the curve of a big hollow log. He faced a slim gray otter,
trying hard not to look where the strange creature's tail had once been.
"So then, Mask, how are you keeping, my brother?" he asked.
The Mask nibbled at some otter delicacies that his brother had thoughtfully
brought along.
"Oh, I get by, Skip. Sometimes I'm a squirrel, sometimes a fox. Ha, I was even
a half-grown badger for a while."
Skipper shook his head in amazement, gazing around the hollow log where the
master of disguises lived alone. Many curious objects were carefully stowed
there: make-believe tails, false ears, a selection of various whiskers.
The Mask watched Skipper with his odd pale eyes. Seizing a few things, he
turned his back and made some swift secret adjustments. When he turned around,
Skipper's mouth fell open in disbelief.
"Look, Skip. I'm a squirrel again!"
The otter chieftain marveled; this creature in front of him was surely an aged
squirrel—thin, graying—but undeniably a squirrel, from its bushy tail and
erect ears, right to the two large front upper teeth.
"Strike me tops'Is, Mask. How d'you do it?"
"Oh, it's no great thing," the Mask chuckled quietly. "Actually, I'd look more
like a treeflyer if I took a little more
154
J time and care with this disguise. This is only a quick change "; to amuse
you."
; Skipper whacked his tail against the side of the log. "Well, ' you could