ii2 FLUFF-BUTTON THE RABBIT 
not move. Fear clogged her limbs, and she watched 
him, fascinated. She was, of course, entirely unaware 
that it was she herself who thus checked him. She 
believed herself almost invisible, and feared to 
move lest she should betray her presence, thus 
obeying the arbitrary law of her race : Lie still and 
he may pass you by. So they gazed eye to eye 
while one might pant half a score of times, and then 
a heron, sweeping by with a shriek which ripped 
the silence of the night, broke the spell. With a 
snarl the fox leaped sideways into the bushes ; and 
the rabbit, ears flattened, paws twitching, crouched 
where she was until the rush of his footsteps died 
away. After this adventure the White Rabbit 
gradually grew bolder. She lived in some ready- 
made burrows in the corner of the wood, and fed 
in the field below Garry's Hill. But if a prowling 
cat or fox came by, and the rest of the community 
dived underground, the White One merely sat at 
the hole's mouth and waited ; and in two cases out 
of three the hunter, after a stealthy glance, passed 
on. The third case was generally a cat who, 
more accustomed to the mysterious ways of men, 
their dependents and belongings, was not afraid to 
stalk the White Doe of Garry's Hill. 
By this time it was August, and the birds went 
to moult in the deepest thickets of Knockdane. 
