“A . . . beaver!” Clover exclaimed. Just to say the word brought understanding: Beavers had come and dammed the Brook.
As Clover and Valerian stared, the beaver saw them. Lifting his water-soaked head, he offered an immense, toothy smile.
“Bless my teeth and smooth my tail!” the beaver called out in a loud, raucous voice. “I do believe it’s my new neighbors! Hey, pal! Evening, sweetheart! Tickled pink to meet up with you. The name is Caster P. Canad. But everybody calls me Cas. Hey,” he added with another toothy grin, “you know what the old philosopher says, ‘A stranger is just a friend you haven’t met.’
“As for me, I’m head of the construction co that’s doing the work here. Canad and Co. ‘Progress Without Pain,’ that’s our motto.”
“But . . . but . . . you’ve . . . destroyed our brook,” Clover managed to say.
“Easy does it, sweetheart, easy does it,” Mr. Canad boomed with insistent good nature. “Don’t need to make a mountain out of a molehill, do we? Or for that matter,” he added with a laugh that set his belly to shaking, “an ocean out of a puddle.”
Without saying another word, Valerian and Clover turned and fled back up the path.
“Have a nice day!” the beaver shouted after them, though it was the middle of the night. “I mean that, sincerely!”
As the two mice dashed toward their nest, all Clover could think was, “Oh, Ragweed. Please, please come home. We need you! Where are you?”
CHAPTER 2
Poppy and Ereth
IT WAS COOL in Dimwood Forest. Through the high canopy of trees, flecks of sunlight sprinkled the earth with spots of gold. But on the floor of the forest, inside a long, hollow, and decaying log, it was all stink and muck.
“Oh, skunk whizzle,” mocked the old porcupine who lived in the log. “Who cares foot fungus about Ragweed’s family? I bet they’re nothing but nasty nose bumps.”
Though his full name was Erethizon Dorsatum, the porcupine insisted on being called Ereth. Not the sweetest smelling of creatures, he had a flat face with a blunt, black nose and fierce, grizzled whiskers. Sharp quills covered him from head to tail.
He was talking to a deer mouse by the name of Poppy.
Though most of her fur was soft orange-brown, Poppy had pure white fur on her round, gracefully plump belly. Her whiskers, which stuck straight out from her delicate pink nose, were quite full. Her toes were small and her tail was long. As for her ears, they were relatively large and dark, and from the right one hung an earring, nothing more than a purple plastic bead dangling from a tiny chain.
“Ereth,” Poppy explained, “if something happened to a child of yours, wouldn’t you want to hear about it?”
“Look here, slug-brain,” the porcupine said with something close to anger, “I thought you liked living in my neighborhood. Thought you were my friend. But if you want to trundle off, forget me, make new friends, start a new life, go ahead. I’ve got plenty of things to do.”
“Like what?” Poppy asked.
“Eating,” the porcupine growled. “And sleeping.” With a rattle of quills Ereth moved off toward the far end of his log.
“Ereth,” Poppy pleaded as she followed after him, “let me try to explain one more time. Ragweed was a golden mouse. He was like no one I’d ever met before. And when he came here, I fell in love with him.”
“Love!” sneered Ereth. “You can put love in a wasp’s nest and chew on it.”
“But I did love him,” Poppy insisted. “And we . . . we were going to get married.”
“Marriage!” Ereth hooted. “Head for the toilet bowl and bring two plungers!”
“But then,” Poppy continued patiently, “that owl, Mr. Ocax, killed him and—”
“Poppy, stop! I’ve heard this slop a hundred times!”
“But all I want to do,” an exasperated Poppy continued, “is tell Ragweed’s parents what happened to him. Don’t you think they should know? Besides, I want to give them this.” She touched the earring. “So they’ll have something to remember him by.”
“Listen, swamp-mouth,” Ereth said, “take my word. They don’t care what happened to him. No more than I do. Wise up. You’d have to be mushroom mucus not to know that!”
“The thing is, Ereth,” Poppy persisted, “the trip would be so much nicer if you came along. It’ll be an adventure. We’ll see the world.”
“Oh, frozen frog pips!” Ereth cried. “I don’t want to see the world. I hate going places. I hate doing things. And I like being alone. Most of all, I’m sick and tired of hearing about Ragweed! So beat it!” The porcupine continued on toward the far end of his log.
A frustrated Poppy let out a sigh, tenderly fingered Ragweed’s earring, then went to the open end of the log and gazed out at Dimwood Forest.
This forest of towering trees was her home. One moment it was dark, the next moment it was light. Usually serene, the forest often exploded with noisy life. Though Poppy loved the forest dearly, and would miss it, she felt a great need to make the journey.
Poppy had to acknowledge that there was no particular reason for Ereth to go. He had never met Ragweed. Besides, Poppy hardly knew where his home was. Ragweed had never offered much detail about it. “The Woodlands,” he called his home area. He said it was a few miles west of Dimwood Forest.
His family nest, he had once told her, was on the banks of a brook. He referred to it as little more than “The Brook.” “It’s a decent spot, girl,” Ragweed had told her. “But, know what I’m saying, like, dullsville. Totally. Nothing ever happens there.”
“Tell me about your parents,” Poppy had said to him.
“They’re named Clover and Valerian,” he said. “Pretty cool . . . for parents. But, hey, like, I needed to see the world. And I did, too.”
“Did they give you permission to go?” Poppy asked, impressed with Ragweed’s story. At the time not only hadn’t she gone far from where her own family lived, she was certain her
