ed far ahead of him, and made him hesitate and want to
go back. As he halted in indecision it broke out on either side, and
seemed to be caught up and passed on throughout the whole length of
the wood to its farthest limit. They were up and alert and ready,
evidently, whoever they were! And he--he was alone, and unarmed, and
far from any help; and the night was closing in.

Then the pattering began.

He thought it was only falling leaves at first, so slight and delicate
was the sound of it. Then as it grew it took a regular rhythm, and he
knew it for nothing else but the pat-pat-pat of little feet still a
very long way off. Was it in front or behind? It seemed to be first
one, and then the other, then both. It grew and it multiplied, till
from every quarter as he listened anxiously, leaning this way and
that, it seemed to be closing in on him. As he stood still to hearken,
a rabbit came running hard towards him through the trees. He waited,
expecting it to slacken pace or to swerve from him into a different
course. Instead, the animal almost brushed him as it dashed past, his
face set and hard, his eyes staring. "Get out of this, you fool, get
out!" the Mole heard him mutter as he swung round a stump and
disappeared down a friendly burrow.

The pattering increased till it sounded like sudden hail on the dry
leaf-carpet spread around him. The whole wood seemed running now,
running hard, hunting, chasing, closing in round something or--somebody?
In panic, he began to run too, aimlessly, he knew not whither. He ran up
against things, he fell over things and into things, he darted under
things and dodged round things. At last he took refuge in the deep, dark
hollow of an old beech tree, which offered shelter, concealment--perhaps
even safety, but who could tell? Anyhow, he was too tired to run any
further, and could only snuggle down into the dry leaves which had
drifted into the hollow and hope he was safe for a time. And as he lay
there panting and trembling, and listened to the whistlings and the
patterings outside, he knew it at last, in all its fulness, that dread
thing which other little dwellers in field and hedgerow had encountered
here, and known as their darkest moment--that thing which the Rat had
vainly tried to shield him from--the Terror of the Wild Wood!

[Illustration: _In panic, he began to run_]

Meantime the Rat, warm and comfortable, dozed by his fireside. His
paper of half-finished verses slipped f