Great smoked hams and strings of fat brown onions hung from the rafters overhead. Badger gave them a good supper and they sat talking by the fire, about Toad and his craze for motor-cars. Something would have to be done about that, said Badger, when the winter was over.
In the morning they had porridge for breakfast, with two young hedgehogs who had got lost on their way to school. Badger showed them all the back door out of his lair, through a maze of tunnels that led to the edge of the wood.
Looking back, Mole and Rat saw the Wild Wood, black, threatening and grim, against the snow, and made their way quickly home, safe once more on the friendly River Bank.