Those were sad and terrible times around the Smiling Pool and along the Laughing Brook for the people in fur, but there didn’t seem to be anything they could do about it except to everlastingly watch out.
One morning Tommy awoke to find the Smiling Pool covered with ice. He liked it. A sense of great peace fell on the Smiling Pool. There was no more danger from traps except around certain spring holes, and there was no need of going there. Much of the time Tommy slept in that fine house of rushes and mud. Its walls had frozen solid and it was as comfortable as could be imagined. A couple of friends who had no house stayed with him.
When they were hungry all they had to do was to drop down into the tunnel leading to deep water and so out into the Smiling Pool under the ice, dig up a lily-root and swim back and eat it in comfort inside the house. If they got short of air while swimming under the ice they were almost sure to find little air spaces under the edge of the banks. No matter how bitter the cold or how wild the storm above the ice,—below it was always calm and the temperature never changed.
Sometimes Tommy went over to his house in the bank. Once, while he was there, a bloodthirsty mink followed him. Tommy heard him coming and escaped down one of the other passages. Then he was thankful indeed that he had made more than one. But this was his only adventure all the long winter. At last spring came, the ice disappeared and the water rose in the Laughing Brook until it was above the banks, and in the Smiling Pool until Tommy’s house was nearly under water. Then he moved over to his house in the bank and was comfortable again.
One day he swam over to his house of rushes and climbed up on the top. He had no thought of danger there and he was heedless. Snap! A trap set right on top of the house held him fast by one leg. A mist swam before his eyes as he looked across the Green Meadows and heard the joyous carol of Welcome Robin. Why, oh why, should there be such misery in the midst of so much joy? He was trying to make up his mind to lose his foot when, far up on the edge of the meadows, he saw an old gray rock. Somehow the sight of it brought a vague sense of comfort to him. He strained his eyes to see it better and—Tommy was just himself, rubbing his eyes as he sat on the old wishing-stone.
“—I was just going to cut my foot off. Ugh!” he shuddered. “Two or three times I’ve found a foot in my traps, but I never realized before what it really meant. Why, those little chaps had more nerve than I’ll ever have!”
He gazed thoughtfully down toward the Smiling Pool. Then suddenly he sprang to his feet and began to run toward it. “It’s too late to take all of ’em up to-night,” he muttered, “but I’ll take what I can, and to-morrow morning I’ll take up the rest. I hope nothing will get caught in ’em. I never knew before how dreadful it must be to be caught in a trap. I’ll never set another trap as long as I live, so there!
“Why, Jerry Muskrat is almost as wonderful as Paddy the Beaver, and he doesn’t do anything a bit of harm. I didn’t know he was so interesting. He hasn’t as many troubles as some, but he has enough, I guess, without me adding to them. Say, that’s a great life he leads! If it wasn’t for traps, it wouldn’t be half bad to be a muskrat. Of course it’s better to be a boy, but I can tell you right now I’m going to be a better boy—less thoughtless and cruel. Jerry Muskrat, you haven’t anything more to fear from me, not a thing! I take off my hat to you for a busy little worker, and for having more nerve than any boy I know.”
And never again did Tommy set a trap for little wild folk.