“The idea of such a thing!” said the mole. “As for doors, they are things I don’t understand. Galleries and tunnels are what I use, and I think them much grander.”
“But”—Tommy Smith was beginning.
“Let me get on,” said the mole. “I have two galleries inside my fortress, an upper one and a lower one. The lower one is the largest. It runs all round the ceiling of my bedroom. From it there are five little passages which run up into the upper one. That goes round in a circle too, but it is high up inside the dome of my fortress, and a long way above the ceiling of my bedroom. So what do you think I have done? I have made three little tunnels, which go from my upper gallery right into the top of my bedroom. I just run down one of them, and tumble into it through the ceiling.”
“But can’t you get into your bedroom from the lower gallery too?” asked Tommy Smith.
“Oh no,” said the mole; “that would never do. It would be so easy; and a mole likes to do things that are difficult. I go into my lower gallery first, and then I go from that into my upper gallery. I can go by five different passages, and choose which I like.”
“Five different passages! That is a lot,” cried Tommy Smith.
“Yes; and there are three more from the upper gallery into the bedroom!” said the mole. “How many doors are there into your rooms?”
“Oh, one,” said Tommy Smith.
“Only one!” said the mole. “That is very sad. Why, if I had only one tunnel into my room I should be almost ashamed to go through it. But then you have only a house to live in, and not a palace, as I have.”