A secret entrance to the riverbank seemed just the thing the Toad needed to complete his plans for a life of gentlemanly hermitage. After all, an animal could not remain cooped up underground the whole time, not an animal such as Toad. He needed fresh air and sunlight to warm him, and the stars to shine on him at night, and what better place to get it than here, where no one could see him coming and interrupt his peaceful reveries. It was perfect. It was entirely his own.

The light was growing stronger; a warm, sunset sort of light, sparkling with ripples from the water. Toad could now see more clearly the semicircular arch high above him in the ceiling. It was… was it? Had men built this place?

A curious heat crept up his back. The light was dazzling his eyes and making him blink, leaving bright circles dancing before him. They hung in the air, seeming to grow larger. They looked like golden moons, like symbols on a standard held high, a standard huge and topped with a fighting eagle. For a moment, Toad thought he heard the blowing of horns, faint and far away, the clashes of sword against sword, the marching of hobnailed sandals on roads like the one beneath his feet.

It was so vivid, and so like the dream he had conjured for himself in the rose-garden, that Toad had to shake his head several times to rid himself of it.

"It can't be," he said to himself. "It's the effect of coming out of the darkness, that's all." But his legs continued to tremble, all the same. This was an awesome place, an ancient place, and for the first time, Toad began to feel that perhaps the tunnel was not all his own after all. Others had been here before him. Maybe they were here still. There was a growing feeling coming over him, a feeling he now realised he had had all along, that he was not alone. He turned round.

There on the tunnel wall, in a space clear of roots and mildew, a painted figure stood in majestic repose, one hoof upon a painted rock, one elbow upon a glossy brown knee. The knowing brown eyes were turned on Toad, and in spite of the ancient nature of the paintwork, they still seemed to sparkle with a kindly reprimand and just a hint of amusement. It was enough to cause Toad's knees to give way, and for him to fall in reverence before the very image of the woodland Friend whose part it is to protect and guide all troubled animals.

"It is He," Toad stammered, his wide eyes taking in the curved sweep of the horns, the deftness of the fingers upon the pan-pipes, the benign smile on the wine-kissed lips. "It is truly He." And a thousand thoughts rushed through his head all at once without his really knowing what they were, save for a growing feeling that he was standing in a spot of tremendous significance, on which the fate of Toad Hall, perhaps of the riverbank itself, might one day depend. A great awe came over him. But such awe cannot last. That is not the demi-god's way. The next moment, the candle in the lantern went out and changed the colour of the light from gold to earthy green again. By the time Toad had fumbled in his pocket for a match and another candle, and got it lit properly, he had completely forgotten what he had been thinking. All he could remember was that his son had smashed up another bicycle in the kitchen-garden, and was now rampaging around the house, knocking down suits of armour and dirtying carpets, without a proper authority figure to take him in hand.

"And that will never do," said Toad, hauling himself off his knees (he couldn't think for the life of him why he was in that position) and striding towards Toad Hall as quickly as the broken pavement would allow. He allowed himself one half-regretful backward glance at the riverbank. It would keep. "What do I think I'm up to, skulking around in tunnels with all that going on upstairs? Lad needs a steadying hand. Can't rely on housekeepers." He kept staring at the walls of the tunnel as he walked, with a peculiar feeling that he ought to be seeing something else, but wasn't.

"This place might come in handy, though," he said. "I'll have to give it some thought."

#

The Badger had been doing very little in particular when the front door-bell rang. Indeed, he had spent most of the day in the deepest recesses of his underground home, thinking once again on those enormous vaultings and pillars, so majestic and yet so futile. Someone must have built them once, Badger considered, some long-lost race of men, once heroic and determined, but whoever-it-was had no use for them now. They were reclaimed, as all things would be one day, by the softening hand of Nature herself. Everything returned to its rightful purpose in the end, Badger thought. Waiting was the thing. There was strength in that which remained behind. The bell tolled once more, a deep chime resonating along the many passageways. Badger grunted and rubbed his eyebrows.

"Who is it this time?" he muttered, shuffling his way up through the central tunnel towards the front door and opening it. "Anyone would think – Toady, old chap! What brings you out here at this hour?"

Perhaps the look in the Toad's eyes said it all. Over the last few days, he had been doing some serious thinking, not to mention some serious cleaning and renovating (all at his own expense and without the least recourse to complaints about the dust or the inconvenience). It showed. Although possibly what showed more was the continual questioning of what exactly he thought he was doing, fussing so much over an underground passage, or why there always seemed to be an idea on the edge of his mind that he could never quite grasp. It may simply have been nerves about the Garden Party affecting his judgement; there again it may not. At any rate, there was an uncertainty to him that didn't seem like the familiar Toad at all.

"What is it, Toad?" asked Badger, in a much more kindly voice.

Toad shuffled his feet and stared straight ahead into Badger's hallway. For a moment, his gaze seemed to sharpen, and he looked as if he was going to ask a question. But the next moment he seemed to think better of it. Or perhaps he simply forgot. He straightened his cravat and cleared his throat.

"Would you care to join me in a stroll, Badger?" he said. "There's something I'd like you to see."

End.

Hope you enjoyed this story. I originally wrote it for a competition, but I didn't win! "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn" is so my favourite chapter in the Willows, so I wanted to try and get some of that magic in, as well as that of the strange (Roman?) ruins Badger shows to Mole. Please read and review!