tiny voice said be careful i am death it was the dusty brown that lies for choice on the dusty earth and his bite is as dangerous as the s but he is so small that nobody thinks of him and so he does the more harm to people s eyes grew red again and he i the book danced up to with the peculiar rocking swaying motion that he had inherited from his family it looks very funny but it is so perfectly balanced a gait that you can fly off from it at any angle you please and in dealing with this is an advantage if had only known he was doing a much more dangerous thing than fighting for is so small and can turn so quickly that unless bit him close to the back of the head he would get the return stroke in his eye or lip but did not know his eyes were all red and he rocked back and forth looking for a good place to hold struck out jumped sideways and tried to run in but the wicked little dusty gray head lashed within a of his shoulder and he had to jump over the body and the head followed his heels close shouted to the house oh look here our is killing a snake and heard a scream from s mother his father ran out with a stick but by the time he came up had out once too far and had sprung jumped on the snake s back dropped his head far between his fore legs bitten as high up the back as he could � get hold and rolled away that bite and was just going to eat him up from the tail after the custom of his family at dinner when he remembered that a full meal makes a slow and if he wanted all his strength and quickness ready he must keep himself thin he went away for a dust bath under the oil bushes while s father beat the dead what is the use of that thought i have settled it all and then s mother picked him up from the dust and him crying that he had saved from death and s father said that he was a providence and looked on with big scared eyes was rather amused at all the fuss which of course he did not understand s mother might just as well have for playing in the dust was thoroughly enjoying himself that night at dinner walking to and fro among the wine glasses on the table he could have stuffed himself three times over with nice things but he remembered and and though it was very pleasant to be patted and by s mother and to sit on the book s shoulder his eyes would get red from time to time and he would go off into his long war cry of t carried him off to bed and insisted on sleeping under his chin f v in the dark he ran up against the was too well bred to bite or scratch but as soon as was asleep he went off for his nightly walk round the house and in the dark he ran up against the creeping round by the wall is a little beast he and all the night trying to make up his mind to run into the middle of the room but he never gets there don t kill me said almost weeping don t kill me do you think a snake said scornfully those who kill get killed by said more sorrowfully than ever and how am i to be sure that won t mistake me for you some dark night there s not the least danger said but is in the garden and i know you don t go there my cousin the rat told me � said and then he stopped told you what h sh is everywhere you should have talked to in the garden i did n t � so you must tell me quick or i bite you sat down and cried till the tears rolled off his whiskers i am a very poor man he sobbed i never had spirit enough to run out into the middle of the room h sh i must n t tell you anything can t you the book listened the house was as still as still but he thought he could just catch the faintest scratch scratch in the world � a noise as faint as that of a walking on a window pane � the dry scratch of a snake s scales on that s or he said to himself and he is crawling into the bath room you re right i should have talked to he stole off to s bath room but there was nothing there and then to s mother s bath room at the bottom of the smooth plaster wall there was a brick pulled out to make a for the bath water and as stole in by the where the bath is put he heard and whispering together outside in the moonlight when the house is emptied of people said to her husband he will have to go away and then the garden will be our own again go in quietly and remember that the big man who killed is the first one to bite then come out and tell me and we will hunt for together but are you sure that there is anything to be gained by killing the people said everything when there were no people in � the did we have any in the garden so long as the is empty we are king and queen of the garden and remember that as soon as our eggs in the bed as they may to morrow our children will need room and quiet i had not thought of that said i will go 