“Mole,” said the Badger, in his dry, quiet way, “I perceive you have more sense in your little finger than some other animals have in the whole of their fat bodies. You have managed excellently, and I begin to have great hopes of you. Good Mole! Clever Mole!”
The Toad was simply wild with jealousy, more especially as he couldn’t make out for the life of him what the Mole had done that was so particularly clever; but, fortunately for him, before he could show temper or expose himself to the Badger’s sarcasm, the bell rang for luncheon.
It was a simple but sustaining meal—bacon and broad beans, and a macaroni pudding; and when they had quite done, the Badger settled himself into an arm-chair, and said, “Well, we’ve got our work cut out for us to-night, and it will probably be pretty late before we’re quite through with it; so I’m just going to take forty winks, while I can.” And he drew a handkerchief over his face and was soon snoring.
The anxious and laborious Rat at once resumed his preparations, and started running between his four little heaps, muttering, “Here’s-a-belt-for-the-Rat, here’s-a-belt-for-the-Mole, here’s-a-belt-for-the-Toad, here’s-a-belt-for-the-Badger!” and so on, with every fresh accoutrement he produced, to which there seemed really no end; so the Mole drew his arm through Toad’s, led him out into the open air, shoved him into a wicker chair, and made him tell him all his adventures from beginning to end, which Toad was only too willing to do. The Mole was a good listener, and Toad, with no one to check his statements or to criticise in an unfriendly spirit, rather let himself go. Indeed, much that he related belonged more properly to the category of what-might-have-happened-had-I-only-thought-of-it-in-time-instead-of ten-minutes-afterwards. Those are always the best and the raciest adventures; and why should they not be truly ours, as much as the somewhat inadequate things that really come off?
XII.
THE RETURN OF ULYSSES
When it began to grow dark, the Rat, with an air of excitement and mystery, summoned them back into the parlour, stood each of them up alongside of his little heap, and proceeded to dress them up for the coming expedition. He was very earnest and thoroughgoing about it, and the affair took quite a long time. First, there was a belt to go round each animal, and then a sword to be stuck into each belt, and then a cutlass on the other side to balance it. Then a pair of pistols, a policeman’s truncheon, several sets of handcuffs, some bandages and sticking-plaster, and a flask and a sandwich-case. The Badger laughed good-humouredly and said, “All right, Ratty! It amuses you and it doesn’t hurt me. I’m going to do all I’ve got to do with this here stick.” But the Rat only said, “please, Badger. You know I shouldn’t like you to blame me afterwards and say I had forgotten anything!”
When all was quite ready, the Badger took a dark lantern in one paw, grasped his great stick with the other, and said, “Now then, follow me! Mole first, “cos I’m very pleased with him; Rat next; Toad last. And look here, Toady! Don’t you chatter so much as usual, or you’ll be sent back, as sure as fate!”
The Toad was so anxious not to be left out that he took up the inferior position assigned to him without a murmur, and the animals set off. The Badger led them along by the river for a little way, and then suddenly swung himself over the edge into a hole in the river-bank, a little above the water. The Mole and the Rat followed silently, swinging themselves successfully into the hole as they had seen the Badger do; but when it came to Toad’s turn, of course he managed to slip and fall into the water with a loud splash and a squeal of alarm. He was hauled out by his friends, rubbed down and wrung out hastily, comforted, and set on his legs; but the Badger was seriously angry, and told him that the very next time he made a fool of himself he would most certainly be left behind.
So at last they were in the secret passage, and the cutting-out expedition had really begun!
It was cold, and dark, and damp, and low, and narrow, and poor Toad began to shiver, partly from dread of what might be before him, partly because he was wet through. The lantern was far ahead, and he could not help lagging behind a little in the darkness. Then he heard the Rat call out warningly, “Come on, Toad!” and a terror seized him of being left behind, alone in the darkness, and he “came on” with such a rush that he upset the Rat into the Mole and the Mole into the Badger, and for a moment all was confusion. The Badger thought they were being attacked from behind, and, as there was no room to use a stick or a cutlass, drew a pistol, and was on the point of putting a bullet into Toad. When he found out what had really happened he was very angry indeed, and said, “Now this time that tiresome Toad shall be left behind!”