Chapter 1

Chapter 1

It was either very late or very early by the time Volbert the mole had finished his work, shuffling and sneaking around in the dimly lit streets of the small village.  All he knew was it was dark, and it was cold, and he had found only a few things he could take to add to his collection.  The thick black clouds overhead had just started to drop little white flecks of snow all over the village, and with that, he decided, it was time to go home. 

Wrapping his oversized hands softly around the handles of the black bicycle with the wonky wheels and putting the rest of the scrap in his sack, he left the sleeping village, crossed the fields that now glowed with white powdery snow, and eventually he came to the secret door.  In all honesty, the door was not much of a secret; it was a big round thing made of oak, and it was built into the side of the hill.  In fact, the only thing that made it a secret was that there was no reason for anyone to walk over this way.  Of course, whilst finding the door would be relatively easy, getting into his house was not, because Volbert was no ordinary mole (you may have already noticed this, since he has a front door to his house, walks around villages at night and steals bicycles). Volbert was a magical mole, and with just a twitch of his pointy nose and a shake of his sausage fingers, Volbert could make amazing magical spells.  Every night (or morning, whichever the case may be) before Volbert goes to sleep, he shakes his fingers, twitches his nose, and the door to his house becomes just a door leading to nowhere; anyone who finds it and opens it would just see the other side of the hill, like it was just resting in the dirt. 

He pulled the large door open, and carelessly rolled the bicycle through the gaping hole.  The snow was coming down very heavily now, and he shook it off his patchwork cloak.  Stifling a yawn with the back of one big hand, he thought of how much fun the children of Daisyfield will have playing in the snow.  He smiled to himself, but it was a sad smile.  Volbert had never played in the snow before . . . Volbert had never really played with anyone before; he was always too big to play with other little moles (not that Volbert had ever been little) and the children would be scared of him . . . probably the  grown-ups would be too.

He picked up the black bicycle with the wonky wheels once more, and shuffled along the completely black corridor (which, with his mole eyes, he could see perfectly in) towards the orange glow coming from the end, where the main room was.  Once entering the living room, he took off his patchwork cape and hung it on a tree-root peg.  The air that came into his house with him had woken up the embers of the fire, but Volbert flicked another log onto it with his foot (it was a very cold night).  He made his way to the pyramid of junk that filled the middle of the room; half-broken cups here, a bent spoon there, broken oil lamps, a rocking horse that didn’t rock and a light bulb with no light and no bulb were just a few of the oddities he had collected on his visits to Daisyfield.  He always found it incredible how much perfectly good stuff people threw away as rubbish.

He rested the black bicycle with wonky wheels against the mountain, and removed from his shoulder sack a copper kettle and a battered brass birdcage.  He looked fondly at his collection of ‘junk’ the humans had basically given to him; one day he would get around to repairing everything and returning it all as good as it was new – he would! He promised himself . . . but right now, the fire was warm, and he was cold, and his chair was comfy, and his feet were sore, and he was so very tired.  Shuffling clumsily over to his tattered armchair, he slumped into it, and folded one leg over the other.  Did I lock the door? he thought drowsily to himself.  Oddly, his last awake thoughts were of the children playing in the snow.  He thought to himself how much fun it would be to throw a snowball . . . but then thought about how unfunny it would be to be hit with a snowball.  His tired eyes looked around the room.  

With the glow of the fire, he could make out the shape of Morris, the old grey badger, curled up asleep inside a giant black cooking pot tipped on its side.  Over there, a big red bushy tail fountaining out of a chipped blue and white striped mug gave away Flake the squirrel’s sleeping place.  On a pile of worn out rugs close to the fire rested Millie the fox.  How could Volbert feel lonely, when he had all of his friends living with him?  With a silly smile, one more yawn, and asking himself once more whether he had remembered to lock the door (and then convinced himself that he had), Volbert pulled the knitted blanket over his big body, and fell asleep by the fire.