The little creature shook his head and shut his eyes, as if to signify he did not understand the question.
Nod at that shut his eyes too, and laid his cheek on his lean little hand, as if to say, "Sleep."
Thereupon eight thickish Minimuls came—four on either side—and hoisted up by its handles the grass mat on which he lay, while others went before, strewing dried leaves and a kind of forest-flower that smells like mint when crushed, and carrying lanterns of candle-worms, while others waddled with them, beating on little tambours of Skeeto-skin—all this because Nod breathed magic, part his own, part his Wonderstone's.
They laid him down in a sandy chamber strewn with flowers. And, bowing many times, their heads betwixt their rather bandy legs, they left him. When they were gone, Nod wriggled softly up and looked about him. The chamber was round and caved, and on the walls were still visible the marks of the Minimuls' hands and scoops which had hollowed it out. Through the roof a rugged root pierced, crossed over, and dipped into the earth again. The candle-worms cast a gentle sheen on the golden sanded walls. Hung from the roof were strings of dried flowers, shedding so heavy and languid a smell in the narrow chamber that Nod's drowsy eyelids soon began to droop. His bright eyes glanced like fireflies, darting to and fro with his thoughts. But the odour of the flowers soon soothed them all to rest. Nod fell asleep.
The next day (that is, the next Minimul day, which is Munza night) crept slowly by. Nod was never left alone. Every hour the little soft-shuffling Mouse-faces tended and fed and watched him, and burnt little magic sticks around him. Three dead Skeetoes, with fast-shut eyes, lay on the floor, shot by their poisoned darts in the dusk of the evening, when he was carried into the big fire-chamber, or kitchen, again. They were soon skinned and trussed by the hungry Minimuls, and stretched along the spit. The smell of their roasting rose up in smoke. At last came sleeping-time again. And then, when all was silent, Nod rose softly from his grass-mat, and stealing down the low, narrow earth-run, looked out into the kitchen where he had lain all day. The fire was dying in faintly glowing embers. All was utterly still. But which way should he go now, he wondered, to seek his brothers? And which of these dark arches led to the open forest, the snow, and the Assasimmon?
NOD WAS NEVER LEFT ALONE.
His quick eyes caught sight of the thin smoke winding silently up from the logs. Somewhere that must escape into the air. But on high it was so dim he could scarcely see the roof, only the steep walls, ragged with snake-skins, and the huge pods of the silky poison-seed. He crept stealthily under one of the arches hung at the entrance with the dried carcass of a little fierce-faced, snow-white Gunga cub, and presently came to where, all in their sandy beds, with their tails curled up, side by side in double rows, the mousey Earth-mulgars slept. He returned to the kitchen, and called softly in the hollow cavern, "Thumb, Thumb!"
Only his own voice echoed back to him. Yet a sound feeble as this awoke the light-sleeping Minimuls. For their mounds echo more than mere hollowness would seem to make them. The lightest stir or footfall of beast walking above in Munza may be heard. Nod had only just time enough to scamper up his own narrow corridor and throw himself on his mat before a score of shuffling footfalls followed, and he felt many glassy eyes peering closely into his face.