Undergardeners by Desmond Ellis Read Free Book Online Page B

exclaimed as his gaze focused on Mouse. “Who under the earth…?” he stammered. “Wha…Wha… What a monster!”
    â€œI’m not a monster,” Mouse explained patiently. The novelty of his relative hugeness was beginning to wear off. In fact, he didn’t think he’d mind too much the next time someone Uptop made fun of his size. “I’m an ordinary boy,” he said. “Who just saved you from your burning cave,” he added. He thought it was rude of the Rhymer not to have even said thanks.
    The Rhymer’s eyes and mouth opened wide and round. “Oh,” he said. He had been so intent on his verse he hadn’t thought about the fire. “My pens and papers. My desks and dictionaries and dabbled-in diaries. Everything ruined and burned and gone.”
    â€œI wouldn’t worry too much about it,” said Qwolsh, emerging from the cave combing his slightly sooty mustache with his fingers.
    â€œMostly smoke damage,” said Alkus, following him. “We got to it in time, thanks to Mouse here. But let that be a lesson to you,” she continued sternly, wiping her hands on a cloth. “You shouldn’t be using candles. You have light.”
    She hummed and lights came on in the cave behind them. Then, looking up “Fans—extractor type” in her notes book, she hummed the given note and the smoke swirling around in the tunnel was rapidly whisked away. For a brief moment—a very brief moment—Mouse was tempted to join in.
    The tortoise poked his head out from his shell and swung it from side to side, looking about him; craning his neck he peered around at his back, where Snick and Snock were perched as though he were a park bench. The Rhymer screwed up his eyes against the light and pulled his eyebrows down. From behind those woolly blinds he said, “Oh, no, no, no! Such mechanical light I have long eschewed. Bright light destroys the poet’s mood.”
    â€œYou nearly had more than your mood destroyed,” said Qwolsh gruffly. “If it hadn’t been for Mouse…”
    â€œAnd,” butted in Podge, “you haven’t thanked him yet for saving your life.”
    Parting his eyebrows, the Rhymer peered upward. “You call this gigantic mound a mouse? Good gracious me! He’s big as a house.” Then he smiled. “But I thank you greatly for being so brave, and charging into the smoke-filled cave. And for saving me and my friend, he that Snick and Snock did upend.” He gave the deer mice a fierce look and wagged a finger at them. The mice skittered away from the wagging finger and hid behind Mouse’s legs as the Ancient Rhymer went back into his cave, followed by the others.
    â€œNot at all,” said Mouse. “I’m very glad I was here.” With the benefit of the lighting, Mouse could see that the burned area didn’t stretch very far; a small ring of charred paper marked the extent of it. But it’s a good job we acted quickly, he thought. If it had all caught fire we’d never have been able to put it out, no matter how fast Digger had been able to dig.
    Digger! Mouse looked around but he couldn’t see the mole anywhere. “Where’s Digger?” he asked.
    â€œWhoops! Nobody told the silly fellow to stop,” said Podge. They gathered around the hole in the ground. Of the mole himself there was no sign.
    â€œMy goodness me, he’s gone,” said Chuck. The mole’s many pairs of spectacles were the only evidence that he’d ever been there.
    â€œDigger…Stop,” called Alkus through cupped hands as she stood at the mole-made rim. They could hear no sound from below. “Digger,” she called again. No reply!
    â€œHe has…
    â€¦probably fallen…
    â€¦asleep,” said Snick and Snock.
    Qwolsh laughed and said, “Thought it was a new bedroom he was digging.”
    â€œDigger,” Alkus called