Meanwhile the sun had gone about his business elsewhere, taking all his gold and glory with him.  Off in the east a big black shutter came pushing up and rising higher and higher; it spread over the whole sky, shut out all light, and left the world a very gloomy place indeed.  Then another mischief-maker, the wind, taking advantage of the sun’s absence, came on the scene and set about brewing trouble.  The weather turned colder and colder; it seemed worse than when the ground had been covered with snow.

“Isn’t this terribly cold?  How I wish we had our stove-pipe brush-pile,” said Rag.

“A good night for the pine-root hole,” replied Molly, “but we have not yet seen the pelt of that mink on the end of the barn, and it is not safe till we do.”

The hollow hickory was gone—­in fact at this very moment its trunk, lying in the wood-yard, was harboring the mink they feared.  So the Cottontails hopped to the south side of the pond and, choosing a brush-pile, they crept under and snuggled down for the night, facing the wind but with their noses in different directions so as to go out different ways in case of alarm.  The wind blew harder and colder as the hours went by, and about midnight a fine, icy snow came ticking down on the dead leaves and hissing through the brush heap.  It might seem a poor night for hunting, but that old fox from Springfield was out.  He came pointing up the wind in the shelter of the Swamp and chanced in the lee of the brush-pile, where he scented the sleeping Cottontails.  He halted for a moment, then came stealthily sneaking up toward the brush under which his nose told him the rabbits were crouching.  The noise of the wind and the sleet enabled him to come quite close before Molly heard the faint crunch of a dry leaf under his paw.  She touched Rag’s whiskers, and both were fully awake just as the fox sprang on them; but they always slept with their legs ready for a jump.  Molly darted out into the blinding storm.  The fox missed his spring, but followed like a racer, while Rag dashed off to one side.

There was only one road for Molly; that was straight up the wind, and bounding for her life she gained a little over the unfrozen mud that would not carry the fox, till she reached the margin of the pond.  No chance to turn now, on she must go.

Splash! splash! through the weeds she went, then plunge into the deep water.

And plunge went the fox close behind.  But it was too much for Reynard on such a night.  He turned back, and Molly, seeing only one course, struggled through the reeds into the deep water and struck out for the other shore.  But there was a strong headwind.  The little waves, icy cold, broke over her head as she swam, and the water was full of snow that blocked her way like soft ice, or floating mud.  The dark line of the other shore seemed far, far away, with perhaps the fox waiting for her there.

But she laid her ears flat to be out of the gale, and bravely put forth all her strength with wind and tide against her.  After a long, weary swim in the cold water, she had nearly reached the farther reeds when a great mass of floating snow barred her road; then the wind on the bank made strange, fox-like sounds that robbed her of all force, and she was drifted far backward before she could get free from the floating bar.