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And what about Mr. Tumnus? said Lucy. Where is he?

Shh, said the beaver. Not here. I must bring you where we can have a real talk, and also dinner."

No one except Edmund felt any difficulty about trusting the beaver now, and everyone,

including Edmund, was very glad to hear the word dinner.

They therefore all hurried along behind their new friend, who led them at a surprisingly quick

pace, and always

in the thickest parts of the forest for over an hour. Everyone was feeling quite tired and very

hungry when suddenly the trees began to get thinner in front of them and the ground to fall steeply

downhill. A minute later they came out under the open sky. The sun was still shining and found themselves looking down on a fine sight.

They were standing on the edge of a steep, narrow valley at the bottom of which ran,

at least it would have been running if it hadn't been frozen, a fairly large river.

Just below them, a dam had been built across the river.

And when they saw it, everyone

suddenly remembered that, of course, beavers are always making dams, and felt quite sure that

Mr. Beaver had made this one.

They also noticed that he now had a sort of modest expression on his face, the sort of look

people have when you're visiting a garden they've made or reading a story they've written. It was only common politeness when Susan said, What a lovely dam! And Mr. Beaver didn't say hush this time, but merely a trifle, merely a trifle, and it isn't really finished. Above the dam, there was what ought to have been a deep pool, but was now, of course, a level floor of dark green ice. And below the dam, much

lower down, was more ice. But instead of being smooth, this was all frozen into the foamy and

wavy shapes, in which the water had been rushing along at the very moment when the frost came.

And out in the middle, partly on top of the dam, was a funny little house shaped like a rather

...