The Old Meadow by George Selden

thoughts on shells, scales, feathers—a cricket’s wing—but it whispered no answers.
    â€œTchoor!” Walter Water Snake suddenly had an idea. “I’ll get them out. The thing I’ve hated all my life is how much the human beings hated me! And all us snakes. But now it pays off!” Walt raised up and glowered down onto his friends. “You’re lookin’ at a deadly serpent! Har! har! I’ll scare the guards, and Dubber and Mr. Budd will go free. Simple—?”
    â€œOh, simple!” said Chester. “But how are you going to get to those jails?”
    â€œI’ll creep, I’ll crawl, I’ll slither—if necessary, I’ll even writhe! But I hate that word. And I’ll get directions first. John Robin—where is the pound? I’ll rescue Dubber before Mr. Budd. They take less time to dispose of dogs than men. John—where?”
    â€œNo problem,” said John. “You go six blocks on Mountain Road, take a left at Fisk, and then two blocks, hook a right at Hedley Avenue, but only one block, left at Santell, three blocks, then half a block on Salter Street—and there you are!”
    â€œYou see?” Walter splashed some water at Chester. “Not a thing in the world could be more simple!”
    â€œOh, nothing,” the cricket agreed heartily. “But Walt—let me ask you this—have you ever been out of this meadow before?”
    â€œI crossed Mountain Road once. The grass in front of the Andersons’ house looked so nice for basking.”
    â€œOh, that’s a real long journey, all right!”
    â€œAnd I’m good at north and south—stuff like that,” Walter Water Snake insisted. “I’ve made up my mind! Here I go—”
    A silence held everyone still. It was full of both wonder and fear: Walter Water Snake was venturing out—way outside the meadow. The round wind had spun itself out into nothing by now. All the animals watched as Walt flicked his tail to wave goodbye—not a care in the world—and slithered off.
    â€œThat’s the wrong way, Walt!” John Robin chirped. “Mountain Road is over there.”
    â€œOh.” Walter lifted his head and swung it around like a broken compass. “Don’t worry, you guys—I have an infallible sense of direction.”
    â€œTchoor—we all can see,” muttered Chester despondently, as Walter began once more the most important writhe of his life. “John—follow him! And fly above him. Try to chirp him the right way.”
    â€œOkay.”
    *   *   *
    The afternoon wore on. Then twilight wore on. Then evening wore on. And everyone tried not to show by a word or a cough or a quick look off toward Mountain Road that this day was becoming difficult. But when dark night took hold of the world, everybody gave up pretending and settled down to be downright scared—and in public at that. The night was very cloudy too, and the moon, almost full, was just a pale eye in the sky.
    â€œWhere are they?” The cricket, at last, couldn’t stand it. “It’s been hours and hours!”
    â€œThe pound is a long way off,” Simon Turtle tried to remind him.
    â€œI’ve done my darndest! I’ve done my best!” Without anyone noticing him—a robin can be so subtle, and especially in the dark—John had settled on Chester’s log. “And I lost him.”
    â€œJohn—”
    â€œI got him to Fisk—but then it got dark—and Walter blends in with the dark—and also, the humans were going home—horns honking—the horrible sounds humans make when day’s over—their radios blaring! He couldn’t hear my chirp any more!”
    â€œJohn—stop now,” said Chester. “Nobody blames you.”
    â€œI do,” said John Robin, and choked. “I’ve been looking and looking—under every