The allure of moss and a rustle of danger.....

Harold, (for such was the name of the Old Lady's son) was walking through the forest. Not walking as you or I, or the gnomes might walk with full attention on our senses - listening and looking with wonder and delight - but walking with a purpose. Harold was making a list of all the trees that might be valuable - that is valuable to him in terms of how much money he could make by selling them as timber - once he had finally persuaded his Mother to give him the forest so that he could cut the trees down. Of course all the trees could sense his intent and soon a rustle of leaves spread the news far and wide. The deeper into the forest Harold walked, the more strange everything seemed to be. For a moment he had been sure that he had heard a trumpet call in the distance, but then giving himself a firm talking to, he dismissed the thought as the sound of the wind in the branches.

The thing was he was finding making his way through the forest very difficult. No matter which way he turned, and no matter how determined he became, the more obstructed he found himself. After hitting his head several times and even falling over, twisting his ankle and grazing his knee, he finally decided to sit down and have a short rest. It had been years since he had been in the forest and it wasn't at all how he remembered.

As fate would have it, he had settled down on a mossy bank that made up the outer ring of the Sacred Clearing. Hortensia's trumpet call had alerted the forest of imminent danger and from far and wide gnomes were rushing to that very spot! Luckily Harold was taking his shoe and sock off (he had been wearing very silly shoes to go for a walk in a forest in - black shiny leather ones with a smooth sole) just as Aunt Mildred and Humperdinck burst into the clearing. They quickly hid behind a tree trunk and Aunt Mildred started her impression of a lark singing on a joyous morning. Singing like a lark was one of Aunt Mildred's special talents, it had taken her many years to perfect her talent and she was more than a little proud of her skill. Of course, though humans would think that it was a real bird singing, all gnomes knew that Aunt Mildred was warning them that an intruder was present, and were very careful to stay hidden as they approached the Clearing.

As for Harold, well, he found himself overcome with the desire for a little nap. Slowly, no matter how hard he tried to stay awake, all he could do was think about how soft the green moss looked and how much he felt like lying down. Soon he had given in and was sound asleep. The gnomes hearing such a reassuring noise, gently crept up to look at their very strange visitor.