In stunned silence they stood around the hole. There was a chance—it was what they all hoped for—that the mole was hiding somewhere safe. But perhaps he was lying hurt from the fall and in need of help. Or, most awful thought of all, maybe he had already been discovered by the Creepscreech and was past help. Slowly, one after another, the Undergardeners turned their heads and looked up at Mouse. With mixed emotions it dawned on him that he was the one they were turning to for help. He’d never been looked up to as a leader before. His friends at school always expected him to follow them. A warm glow ran though him. He liked this new role.
“What do you think, Mouse?” asked Alkus.
Mouse didn’t know anything about this Creepscreech except that the Undergardeners were terrified of it. What did it look like? Was it big, small, fat, thin? What did it do to people it caught? Imprison them? Beat them? Eat them? What? “For a start,” he said, “tell me a bit about the Creepscreech.”
“Well, it’s very…” began Qwolsh. He shook his head, pulled off his cap and began to chew the ends of his long mustache.
“It’s rather more than that, d’you see,” said Podge. “It’s…It’s…” Then he too faltered and turned to Alkus for help. She shook her head in consternation.
Chuck screwed up his face in a vain attempt to produce a solution. Snick and Snock made no pretence of thought at all; they just lifted a shoulder apiece in a blended shrug.
“Okay,” Mouse asked next, “why does it hate you so much?”
“The truth is,” Alkus admitted, “we don’t really know much about it.”
“But if that’s the case,” Mouse wanted to know, “how do you know it’s an enemy? Perhaps it’s friendly if you give it a chance.”
“Ha!” snorted Qwolsh, his mustache bristling. “There are stories from the old days of those who ventured into its lair and were never seen again.”
“You heard it yourself just now,” said Alkus. “The way it came charging at us screaming and snorting—that didn’t sound friendly, did it?”
“Broke into its lair once m’self by accident,” said Podge. “I was digging a larder, d’you see? It must have been waitin’, because next thing, it charged on the other side of the wall. Couldn’t get to me, d’you see, hole was too small, but its foul breath came whistlin’ through that hole like a hurricane. Twisted m’quills somethin’ shockin’.”
“Well, the first thing we should do is try to find out what happened to Digger,” said Mouse. “What’s it like down there, Chuck?”
“The tunnel slopes down at an angle of one-in-three,” said Chuck professionally, “then suddenly goes straight down into blackness.”
“Then we’ll need a light, for a start,” said Mouse.
Alkus scratched her head. “Bit of a problem, that. Our lighting system doesn’t stretch to the Creepscreech’s lair.” She looked about her, a frown wrinkling her brow.
“Wait a minute,” Mouse exclaimed. “There’s lots of the Rhymer’s papers here.”
“Papers?” inquired Podge. “ ’Pon my… At a time like this you want us to read poems?”
“No,” said Mouse. “But if we set fire to them, how would that be?”
“I certainly don’t want to read a poem that’s on fire.” Podge sounded annoyed. Then he understood. “Oh, yes, I see now. You mean…”
“Torches!” cried Alkus. “Good idea, Mouse.” She picked up several sheets of discarded paper and twisted them tightly together. Everyone followed her example and, working in hectic silence, they produced a good armful of torches in a short time. Alkus lit one and handed the blazing beacon to the groundhog. “You first, Chuck,” she said. The groundhog nodded stoically and, holding the flaming torch before him, wriggled on his stomach headfirst into the mole-sized hole in the ground. “Now you, Qwolsh. Be ready to grab his ankle so he doesn’t fall through. I’ll be ready to grab yours.”
As Qwolsh disappeared on hands and knees on the heels of the groundhog, Alkus said to Mouse, “Obviously you won’t get much more than your arms in, but if you reach down as far as you can and hold my ankles, you can be the anchor. Podge, you get busy twisting more papers together.” So saying, she stuffed a bundle of unlit torches into her belt and crawled into the hole after Qwolsh.
Mouse lay full length on the ground and reached an arm into the hole until he seized Alkus’s ankle. He felt something at his own ankles: Snick and Snock had grabbed a pajama leg each and were holding on for all they were worth. Initially smoke from Chuck’s torch drifted backward, irritating Mouse’s nostrils, but it stopped as the torch entered the Creepscreech’s tunnel below.
In the distance they heard the faraway voice of the groundhog. “It’s a tunnel all right, and it’s huge,” he called. “Huge-huge-huge,” his voice came reverberating back.
“Can you see anything?” shouted Alkus.
“I think there’s water on the ground far below,” called the groundhog. “Below-below-below,” replied the echo. “I can’t see any walls from here; it’s very black. And it’s cold.”
“Cold-cold-cold,” agreed the tunnel.
“I think I can hear…Agh! Pull me up, pull me up. Quick! Quick! Hurry up! Quick! Quickquickquick!” All of this came out in such a rush that it ran together with its echoes as, from far off, the rapidly rising roar of the Creepscreech reached Mouse’s ears.
He scrambled backward as fast as he could, pulling Alkus and knocking the deer mice flying in the process. As soon as Alkus’s feet came into view, Mouse reached past her, grabbed hold of Qwolsh and pulled. But before Qwolsh’s legs were even out of the hole, a gibbering, chattering Chuck appeared. Somehow he had managed to turn around and scamper up across Qwolsh’s back. A pained bellow from Qwolsh was drowned out by the Creepscreech’s roar. Scrambling rapidly away from the edge of the hole, they ended up in a jumbled pile, a tangle of arms and tails and legs and paws. They lay like that, hushed and holding on to each other, long after the roar of the Creepscreech had subsided.
Finally Chuck broke the silence. “It was horrible,” he sobbed. “An icy blast hit me and when I looked I could see its evil yellow eyes rushing at me. It almost… oh!” He was nearly overcome at this point but managed to go on. “It almost grabbed me. Ugh! It was big, and shiny with slime. Horrible!”
Qwolsh cleared his throat. “No…er…sign of Digger?” he asked hesitantly. Chuck squinted at Qwolsh with sorrow-filled eyes. He blinked once and looked downward, shaking his head slowly from side to side. The blinking became more rapid, as though he had something in his eye. Which indeed he had. Mouse saw a big teardrop well up from within, tremble in the corner of the groundhog’s eye for a moment, then break free and roll down his snout to plop onto the ground below, making a small crater in the dust.
All the Undergardeners, in fact, were close to tears. The deer mice were so heartsick that when Snick, or maybe it was Snock, said, “Poor Digger,” Snock (or Snick) didn’t join in, just gave a deep sigh.
Mouse himself was greatly upset, but he was determined not to let down his newfound friends. Some attempt, no matter how futile, had to be made to save the mole. “We can’t just give up,” he said. “We have to get down into that tunnel.”
“Down?” Shock was evident in the groundhog’s voice. “You want to go down into the Creepscreech’s lair?”
“You don’t want to leave Digger down there alone, do you?” asked Mouse. “Especially if there’s still a chance to save him.”
“No! No, we don’t, Mouse,” said Alkus firmly. “You’re right.” She collected the mole’s scattered spectacles and turned to the others. “We have to do something. We can’t just leave him. Not as long as we have breath in our bodies.”
“Breath in our bodies,” echoed Qwolsh forcefully, and the others took it up as a rallying cry. “Breath in our bodies!” they shouted determinedly, and the tunnel about them rang with their voices.
“Well, it will be difficult. The Creep-screech’s lair is very high,” said Chuck. “We’ll need lots of rope, and we’ll be very exposed on the climb down. Extremely dangerous!”
“Besides,” interjected Podge, “Mouse here would never get through that tunnel Digger just made.” He sounded reluctant to go without Mouse.
“Wait a minute,” said Mouse to Podge. “What about that larder you told us about? The one you were digging when you broke through. Could we get through that way?”
“Plugged it, didn’t I?” said Podge.
“Could we unplug it?” Qwolsh wanted to know.
“Well, yes, I suppose so.” Podge nodded doubtfully.
“Show us where it is,” said Mouse decisively. “Follow me, then.” Podge spun around and set off down the main tunnel; the others—an uneasy mix of determination and trepidation—followed his twitching quills. The farther they went, the lower the tunnel became, and Mouse had to walk bent over, but at last they got to a section of wall that was stoutly boarded over with crude planks.
“Here we are,” said Podge, slapping the barrier.
Alkus stood back to assess the job. “You did a good job here, Podge.” She paused and Podge smiled with pride. “I’m sorry to say,” she finished and Podge’s smile faded. “It’ll take a while to shift this. Right, let’s get to it.” They all set to with a will. Using hammers and bars and axes from their tool bags, they began to pound and pry and lever at the planks.