His ears heard a new sound: a nearby flopping and hissing noise. The left corner of his eye caught a surprising image on the pond bank: a blacksnake twisting this way and that with a catfish in its mouth. He was shocked. Benjamin heard the fish groaning and thought it was quite strange. He’d never heard a fish groan but he figured that’s what they did. The image was still frightening. The snake looked up at Benjamin and quickly slithered off into the water, taking the fish with it.

Did I just really see that? Benjamin made sure no other snakes were along the pond bank.

A small, solitary maple tree, which grew on a hill separating the end of the pond from the road, always had a bullfrog croaking loudly beside it. Usually the croaking sounded normal (well, bullfrog normal). But today Benjamin thought he heard it croak “Beware! Beware!”

No, he can’t be saying that!

He approached the faded blue newspaper box, which the delivery man always carelessly missed when he drove by. A hedge apple lay close to the paper. Benjamin kicked it halfway across the road. Deciding to finish it off, he ran and gave it a great big boot. It soared through the air and landed on the other side of the road on a large pile of sticks and dead branches in front of an endless row of tall hedge trees. The abandoned fox den had been across from the mailbox for as long as Benjamin could remember.

All at once…SNAP!

He jerked his head. What was that? He took a step forward and a small stick on the fox den stood up on its end. Did I hit an animal? Benjamin took another step and two more sticks pointed straight up. What was happening? It seemed that his steps were making the sticks move. Scared but curious, he forced his right foot forward and many more sticks responded, making a partial opening at the top of the den. Do foxes still live in there? He heard what sounded like a faint laugh coming from the half-opened hole. What in the world?!

The distant sound of talking and laughing came from the hole. Benjamin’s eyes widened. He thought he was going crazy. He leaned forward to see all the sticks on top of the fox den sticking out and the hole completely exposed. He couldn’t tell how deep it was, but he knew he stood at the mouth of a dark tunnel. The voices grew louder.