Chapter 7: As If In a Dream

x

The wood was quiet. Oh so terribly quiet and his sneeze had been so terribly loud. Mole froze and, when the water rat turned to seek for the source of the sound, he couldn't stop himself from locking eyes with the Riverbanker.

Perhaps it was too dark. Perhaps the fog was too thick, perhaps the water rat had only glanced his way–

The animal approached and Mole scarpered back as best he could, his route hindered by the confines of his impromptu hiding place. His frantic action only spurred the water rat to near quicker, shrugging off the last of his monstrous façade as he bundled the chequered rug into his paws. After all the grief Mole had given him – intentional or not, imagined or not – after all the cross words that had been slung his way, Mole could only imagine what the Riverbanker had going through his mind now that he'd finally cornered the Wild Wooder whose paths he'd crossed no fewer than thrice. It was sure to be something quite terrible, something–

"Hello?" The water rat crouched down by Mole's hiding spot. "Are you okay?"

x

The woods were full of wild wooders, but not all of them were Wild Wooders, and some were friendly enough in their own way. The squirrels were alright. The rabbits were… well, Rat had only really regularly encountered the rabbits who worked up at Toad Hall, and they were a little odd (any animal who willingly put up with Toad had to be) if mostly harmless. The animal before him though…

They certainly weren't a weasel or stoat, and definitely not a fox, although beyond that Rat couldn't be sure of anything in the twilight gloom.

Whatever they were, regardless, he'd undeniably given them the shock of their life. He discarded the picnic rug from his shoulders, hoping the return to a more commonplace silhouette might do something to calm the animal's nerves but, if anything, it only distressed them further, provoking them to scramble back quicker. At his greeting, however, they stilled.

"It's alright," Rat continued. "The weasels are gone. And, as you can see," and he ruffled the blanket, giving what he hoped was an amused smile, "no monsters here, just a water rat and his picnic rug."

As the animal considered the proffered paw Rat held out, Rat spared a glance to the rapidly darkening woods. If he was dealing with a wild wooder, perhaps they would know the best route back to the Riverbank – or, heck, even back to Toad Hall. It was probably best to ask for the Riverbank first, for a myriad of reasons – not least of all that Toad was hardly the most popular animal among the Wild Wood, especially given his recent reckless fad. Rat knew some of the paths in and out of the wood, but after an accidental joyride like that…

A paw took hold of his, larger than expected and tipped with long digger claws. Rat jolted, momentarily recalling another animal with claws such as those, but then quickly discarded it as he helped the creature up out of the hole they were sheltered in and into the dwindling daylight.

(Had Mole still been wearing his signature Wild Wooder coat or his weasel mask, things would have proceed much differently but, as luck would have it, both had slipped from him in his attempt to flee earlier, so all Rat saw was a small undergrounder who had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time.)

Out of both their typical habitats, it took Rat a moment to place the other animal's species so that, when he said, "You're a mole, aren't you?" it came out as more of a question than he had planned.

"And you're a rat," the mole replied. There was a tilt the end of his words, as if only remembering to make it an almost-question at the last second. Rat didn't blame him; there was a distinction between a rat and a water rat, but it often took animals a moment to identify it.

"I'm a water rat," Rat corrected. He appraised the mole, trying to recall what he knew of the species. They were undergrounders, that he was sure of, but he was fairly sure they preferred open fields rather than the tangled roots of woodland earth. "You're not from around here, are you?"

He thought, for a moment, he saw something like panic creep into the other animal's gaze, before it was lost with a quick shake of the head. "My home is," and the mole hesitated, glancing round to gather his bearings, "off that way, in one of the fallow fields."

"Then that makes the two of us out of our usual waters," Rat said. He considered their situation. He might not have found a guide, but he had found a companion, and that was a good deal better than going alone through the Wild Wood. "Look here, it seems we're both heading out of this place and, around here, animals such as ourselves should stick together. Why don't we keep company until we're safely out of its depths?"

x

It was surprisingly kind, Mole thought, the manner in which the water rat had instinctively taken the animal he assumed to be a little lost undergrounder under his wing – if entirely misplaced. But now the die had been cast and Mole couldn't unsettle that assumption without raising fresh questions that might reveal his Wild Wooder year.

He did his best to subtly nudge the rat's route in a riverbank direction, although it was not without its difficulties. Twice he had to divert them from the more Wild Wooder parts of the wood, and on one occasion he had to pull the rat up short before he could venture across a hollow where the remains of human quarries still lay hidden beneath the grassy bank. When the rat mentioned that he hadn't had cause to brave the Wild Wood in some time – "My father drilled its lessons into me, but I confess I've had little reason to revisit them over the years" – Mole did his best to sound supportive, rather than wholly unsurprised.

So distracted was he that he didn't register where they had wandered until he slammed his shin into something sharp, hidden beneath a layer of autumnal leaves.

It was silly, really, he grumbled as he cradled his foot and curbed the desire to say something very undergrounderlike, that after all his worrying that Rat would do himself an injury in the woods, it would be Mole who who wound himself first. The water rat, who had been nominally leading the way, worriedly rounded back on his walking companion before Mole had a chance to recover. "What is it?"

"I've cut myself," Mole lamented, nursing his leg in both his front paws. "I must have tripped on a branch or a stump." He shifted his shin to get a better look at the injury, wondering if it would be terribly out of character as an oblivious undergrounder if he were to start applying moss to the wound, when he was struck by the smoothness of the scratch.

"It's a very clean cut," Rat remarked, coming to the same conclusion just as Mole did. "As if it were done by something–" and here the well-meaning animal began to pace the dell they had found themselves in – "done by something metal."

All too late, the wind shifted and Mole caught a scent he'd only encountered once before: in the tunnels running on the way to Toad Hall. Earthy and musky, he'd paid little heed to it previously, save to afford the owner a wide berth. Only now did it properly occur to Mole just who the owner of just such a scent might be–

Oh.

Oh no.

"Never mind what done it," said Mole hurriedly in an attempt to throw Rat off his curiosity. "It hurts just the same whatever done it."

But the water rat was not to be discouraged, and so he went shuffling through the fallen leaves where Mole had tripped, until suddenly he leapt back with a cry of triumph and a jig. "Just as I thought! Look!"

Mole looked around Rat to see the cause of his injury. "It's a boot-scraper," he said.

"Yes!"

Mole's mind whirled on several details. If it hadn't been for that familiar scent hitting him, he might well have been ignorant to just where they had ended up but, as things were, he wasn't ignorant and thus he had a pretty good idea of just whose doorstep they had found themselves at. The other, more pertinent detail, was that Wild Wood pups (and sometimes the adults) liked to play knock-and-run with Badger's front door and, as an honorary Wild Wooder, Mole wasn't sure what kind of welcome would await him.

He decided he didn't wanted to find out.

"Why dance a jig around a boot-scraper?" he asked irritably.

"'Cause don't you see what it means, you–" and here the water rat faltered, mouthing several less-than-complimentary words until he managed to settle on, "you animal, you?"

"Of course I do," Mole replied back, doubling down onto his feigned obtuseness. "It means a careless and inconsiderate person has left a boot-scraper lying around in the woods to trip up unsuspecting moles. Really, Rat, this has been a rotten day and I'm in no mood for this. My shin is giving me grief and all you want to do is a silly song and dance over some domestic litter and – and, what are you doing?"

He watched as the Riverbanker scurried to and fro across the dell, shifting the hillocks of fallen leaves from one side to the other, and just as Mole was beginning to hope Rat was going to accept the search as a wild goose chase, the water rat jumped up with another triumphant (and somewhat smug) cry. "Now, what do you make of that?"

Originally hidden by the autumnal debris sat a rather shabby doormat, looking sorry for itself. It had presumably once said 'welcome' but the seasons had worn its greeting away into a gently ominous 'w – o – e.'

"He obviously dropped a doormat at the same time," Mole said.

His answer seemed to infuriate the water rat, who hopped from foot to foot as if all that frustrated energy had to go somewhere and he'd opted his feet as the safest option. "Do you really mean to say," he asked, incredulous, "that this doormat doesn't tell you anything?"

"Really, Rat," Mole said, who was enjoying the show of obliviousness, now that he was getting into it. "Whoever heard of a doormat telling anyone anything? They simply don't do it."

"And I suppose that he dropped a doorbell as well?" Rat swept away the branches that had become tangled up in the bell pull, until a small brass plate came into view above what was obviously now a door. "Read it!"

The brass plate was tired in places, but it had evidently been smartly made in its youth, the name of MR BADGER engraved in square capital letters still legible even now. That, Mole admitted, was going to be a little bit more difficult to explain away.

"Mr Badger," he conceded.

"Exactly."

Rat looked expectantly at Mole, who realised, a tad belatedly, that he was meant to respond to this epiphany with something more than reluctance. "Oh." And then, when that didn't feel like that was sufficiently compensating for his lack of enthusiasm, added, "Oh! Rat, you're a wonder! A real wonder, that's what you are!" He might not have been able to dance a jig with his jiggered shin, but he could certainly give it a verbal attempt. "I see it all now! You argued it out, step by step, from the very moment that I fell and cut my shin, and you looked at the cut, and at once your mind said to itself, 'Door-scraper!' And then you turned to and found the very door-scraper that done it! Did you stop there? No."

"But we are," Rat said, cutting short what Mole felt like was the beginnings of a very promising monologue. "Going to stop there, I mean." He shivered and afforded the Wild Wood a disparaging glance. "It may not be out of these woods, but Badger's place will be warm and dry, and we might even be treated to a hot meal, if he's so inclined."

"Go there?" Mole asked. He fell back on his little lost undergrounder routine that, admittedly, was easier than he had expected. His head swam with all the stories the Wild Wooders had told which, while many were probably tall tales made to scare the pups, felt all too possible right now, standing before the infamous Mr Badger's door as he was. "Aren't badger's meant to be terribly fierce, though?"

"The fiercest, I'm sure," Rat replied, who realised a little too late that this wasn't the reassurance Mole had been looking for. He added, "But only as far as the Wild Wooders are concerned," and completely missed Mole's distraught expression. "You and I will be quite fine."

"Oh. Is he a friend?" Mole asked, thinking of all the rotten luck; he had to get caught up with an animal on easy speaking terms with Badger, of all animals–

"I hope so," Rat said. He hesitated. "It's hard to tell sometimes."

The two animals stood there, regarding the bell. Un-rung.

Despite himself, Mole leant over to Rat and whispered, "If he's a friend, why are we still standing here?"

Rat shot him a look which, Mole admitted, he probably deserved, and rang the bell. Beyond the door and into the earth, a deep-toned bell responded in kind, echoing along the kind of padded dirt walls that Mole had spent so much of his life along until he had ventured out into the Wild Wood. It made him think thoughts of home and tunnels and where the two had begun to fissure in his time amongst the Wooders – and then there came the shuffling of feet and Mole's mind became quite preoccupied with other thoughts.

Then there was the noise of a bolt shot back and a long snout accompanied by a pair of sleepy blinking eyes peering through the gap, and even those thoughts of Mole's scattered.

"Now the very next time this happens," said a gruff and suspicious voice (just the kind of voice that Mole had envisioned for the infamous Badger), "I shall be exceedingly angry. Who is it this time, disturbing people on such a night? Speak up!"

Mole shrank back and noted that even his newfound friend, for all his earlier surety, had taken a few precautionary steps away.

"Let us in, please, Badger," called Rat. "It's me, Rat, and–" there was only a passing hesitance, before the Riverbanker shot Mole a grin and continued, "my friend, Mole. We're very sorry to disturb you, but we've completely lost our way."

The snout snuffled forward, and now Mole could see it was attached to a long stripy head and high shoulders. There was age in the animal's demeanour, but one that had grown more robust, not frailer, for the years, and as he spoke, sharp canines caught the light. This was an undergrounder, like Mole, but one whose teeth and claws were on a much grander scale.

The badger was also, and this was crucial to Mole's first impression, wearing slippers and a dressing gown.

"Ratty?" (And Mole would have grinned at the unexpected nickname, if not for the suddenly affectionate tone in the badger's voice. Apparently, yes, he had somehow fallen into step with one of few acquaintances of the infamous Mr Badger.) "My dear fellow, come along in!" He opened wide the door and motioned for the Riverbanker to enter, pausing only momentarily when he turned to Rat's newfound friend.

The two undergrounders regarded each other and Mole was just beginning to feel like he was standing under a very large flashing neon sign reading 'Wild Wooder Ahoy' when the badger grinned and gestured for him to follow suit. "And Mole, of course. Both of you, make yourself warm by the fire."

Mole scampered inside and counted his lucky stars his unintentional deceit hadn't been rumbled just yet.

x

This, Badger decided as he watched the two animals make themselves at home, was either going to end fantastically or in disaster, and there was going to be no middle ground about it.

He hadn't twigged at first what was quite off about the mole. Not until he had welcomed both animals into his sett, and by the time he realised that the scent of woodland earth and leather car seats was coming from the tiny undergrounder and not some remnant breeze, both mole and water rat were already warming themselves up by the fire. It felt a little after-the-fact to kick up a fuss now.

And besides, his curiosity (and his amusement) had been piqued.

The mole wasn't what he'd expected from a Wild Wooder – being, as things stood, of the quiet and polite kind – and evidently that was the saving grace which had kept Ratty from figuring out just who he had befriended. That and Ratty's sense of smell – which was all fine and good, but nothing compared to an undergrounder.

Even so, when Ratty went on to recall the recent events which had led them to Badger's doorstep, the water rat had paused and remarked how he could, even now, still smell the car fumes. It was at that point that Badger had refuelled the fire and sent them all coughing with the sudden plumes of smoke.

Accidentally, of course.

"And that's what it's been like," Ratty said, recovering enough to reach the end of his most recent Toad spiel. "One ridiculous speed machine after another. One hideous, ludicrous crash after another."

"How many have there been?" Badger inquired.

"Smashes or machines?" asked Ratty. "'Cause I've lost count of both."

"He's been in hospital," the mole said, "and as for the fines he's got to pay, it's too awful to think of. He's going to be ruined." There was a pause in which the surprise at an undergrounding knowing such things was almost palpable. "Or so one would imagine," he added weakly.

"And if he is?" Ratty snapped. "He richly deserves it."

"But aren't you his friends?" the mole asked. His eyes had gone wide. "Aren't you going to help?"

"Help?" Ratty echoed incredulously. "And what good would that do? I could talk my whiskers off but he never listens to a word I say." He turned to appeal to Badger for support, seemed to recall that Badger had had very little to do with Toad in the passing years, and settled on asking the mole, "Have you ever encountered a motor car before?"

"I… nearly got run over by one once."

"I rest my case."

"Now, Ratty," Badger said, "there's no guarantee that was Toad. There are plenty of human drivers who pay little heed to our kind."

"How many other reckless drivers do you get in this part of the country?" Ratty turned to the mole. "Was it a toad?"

"It… may have been."

"See?"

"Now, Ratty, gloating does not become you."

"But it becomes Toad well enough, doesn't it?" Ratty muttered, in such a way that almost made Badger smile for the memories it prompted of a much-younger Ratty. He didn't remark upon it though; he didn't think Ratty would appreciate the comparison.

The conversation floundered somewhat then, so Badger moved them on to the next matter of business which was, naturally, supper. Now, Badger was not an animal prone to entertaining guests, but underground food tended to have a long date, and what it didn't possess in freshness it made up for in seasoning, so he had enough to offer his impromptu visitors.

At this point, the conversation shuffled on to pleasanter affairs. This wasn't due to Badger doubting the severity of Toad's motor mania (indeed, from what he had heard down the grapevine, it all seemed very in-character) but more to do with the simple fact that it was quite against animal-etiquette to dwell on possible trouble ahead. And so they didn't.

Also, it wasn't as if anyone had asked him for his help in the matter, so he didn't feel the need to go poking his nose into someone else's business with invitation.

Instead they discussed the state of the riverbank (which Ratty assured them was all too crowded nowadays) and the seasons (Badger reckoned they had an early winter ahead of them) and the Wild Wooders (both he and Ratty thought they had grown bolder in the past year, while the mole stayed sheepishly quiet) and by the end of it, Badger felt he had gotten a handle on the mole's character.

He had also forgotten how comfortable a conversation between two undergrounders could be, enabling him to tarry on the minutiae of tunnel-living that would lose an animal like Ratty in minutes. It was almost enough to make him forget the scent of the Wild Woods still lingering on the tiny mammal.

He was aware that he should probably inform Ratty of the nature of his newfound friend… but as Mole thanked him for the food and assented heartily on the advantages of living underground, Badger found himself more and more tempted to just let things play themselves out.

He probably shouldn't.

But he was going to anyway.

x

After several hours of conversation and good food and not being thrown out into the cold, Mole began to think that maybe this meeting wouldn't all end in tears. That was until supper passed and Rat fell asleep in an oversized armchair, leaving Mole to be the sole occupant of conversation with Mr Badger.

The larger mammal took up residency in a chair across from Mole, and glanced pointed over to their sleeping companion. "He seems to have taken quite a shine to you," he said, startlingly direct.

"I didn't really do anything," Mole said, thinking that what he had done – accidentally dragging Rat into the Wild Wood through stealing Toad's motor car – would actually count against him, if anyone were to know.

"You got him safely through the wood," the badger said.

"He was the one leading the way."

"Of course, of course." There was a beat in which Mole was allowed to think the conversation had passed, when, "Still, it's lucky the two of you made it to my door, all things considered. The wood can be a dangerous place to those unfamiliar with its ways, and Ratty has had little need to enter its depths over the years."

The two animals stared at one another. "Yes," Mole said hollowly. "Very lucky."

"Lucky indeed that you didn't fall foul of any of the locals."

"Indeed."

There was another pause in which Mole considered that the only local he was wary of falling foul of was the one currently sitting opposite him, still in slippers and a dressing gown. The other cause for unease was currently curled up in armchair and snoring gently. Mole glanced to the water rat. He supposed all animals must sleep sometime, but after his previously… quarrelsome encounters, Rat's peaceful state surprised him.

The badger caught his gaze and said, "His father was much the same. Could never spend more than an hour underground before he fell asleep."

"You know his father?" Mole asked, thinking that that explained a few things.

"Knew," the badger corrected.

"Oh." And then, because that didn't seem like enough, he added, "I'm sorry. Were you close?"

"Like family." The badger leant forward in his armchair. "So you see, I would hate for anything untoward to come to the son of my late friend."

Mole's smile wavered. "Understood, Mr Badger."

The badger held his gaze for a moment longer, and then grinned. "Fantastic. And it's simply Badger to my friends." He rose to his feet and patted Mole on the shoulder as he went to clear up the empty glasses. "After all, any friend of Ratty's is a friend of mine."

Mole grinned weakly back and, with less surety than before, counted his lucky stars that his Wild Wooder identity was still a secret.

x

Mole's plan to scamper quietly off back into the Wild Wood was scuppered when the tunnel that Badger had bade them take led them to an edge of the wood Mole was thoroughly unfamiliar with. He glanced up, hoping to orientate himself by the sun, only to remember that the day had passed into evening and he was staring up at a clouded night sky.

He noticed he was being watched by Rat and, by way of explanation, said, "I didn't realise it was so late."

The water rat followed his gaze, seemed to come to some realisation, and grinned. "Don't worry about that, pal – you can stay at my place."

"Oh, I wouldn't want to impose–" Mole began hurriedly.

"You wouldn't be, I've got plenty of room."

"It's really not that far back to mine."

"You're in the fallow fields, right?" asked Rat, who was really being unhelpfully helpful at that moment; it would be a lot easier if he was being his usual (in Mole's experience) grumpy self. "That's all the way on the other side of the Wild Woods."

"And if I get going now, I can be back before…" Mole trailed off, unsure what kind of time milestone he could offer when the moon was already rising. "Well, before too long."

"Back through the Wild Woods, after the day you've had? Nonsense."

"It really is no hassle."

"And I'm telling you it's really no hassle for you to borrow a room for the night."

The two animals stared at each other, stuck in the impasse of Rat's hospitality and Mole's awareness that he was about one wayward comment away from the truth coming tumbling down around him.

In the end, it was Rat's hospitality that won out, and Mole conceded, allowing himself to be shown along the riverbank.

("If we were rowing, it'd be a fair bit quicker," Rat apologised as they took the long route over the packhorse bridge, "but my boat's back at my place and, even at this time of evening, it's safe enough.")

It was only later, once he was comfortably settled into the little riverside house and the whole evening feeling rather like a dream, that Mole remembered his mask and coat, which he had hastily discarded back in the Wild Wood. He made a mental note to collect them back up soon and let the Wild Wooders know that he was fine.

After all, it wasn't as if he was terrible at time-keeping.