ten

it was quite a large hole, the sort of thing an animal about the size of a fox might have made.

james knelt down in front of it, and poked his head and shoulders inside.

he crawled in.

he kept on crawling.

this isn’t a hole, he thought excitedly. it’s a tunnel!

the tunnel was damp and murky, and all around him there was the curious bittersweet smell of freshpeach. the floor was soggy under his knees, the walls were wet and sticky, and peach juice wasdripping from the ceiling. james opened his mouth and caught some of it on his tongue. it tasteddelicious.

he was crawling uphill now, as though the tunnel were leading straight towards the very centre ofthe gigantic fruit. every few seconds he paused and took a bite out of the wall. the peach flesh wassweet and juicy, and marvellously refreshing.

he crawled on for several more yards, and then suddenly – bang – the top of his head bumped intosomething extremely hard blocking his way. he glanced up. in front of him there was a solid wall thatseemed at first as though it were made of wood. he touched it with his fingers. it certainly felt likewood, except that it was very jagged and full of deep grooves.

‘good heavens!’ he said. ‘i know what this is! i‘ve come to the stone in the middle of the peach!’

then he noticed that there was a small door cut into the face of the peach stone. he gave a push. itswung open. he crawled through it, and before he had time to glance up and see where he was, heheard a voice saying, ‘look who’s here!’ and another one said, ‘we‘ve been waiting for you!’

james stopped and stared at the speakers, his face white with horror.

he started to stand up, but his knees were shaking so much he had to sit down again on the floor. heglanced behind him, thinking he could bolt back into the tunnel the way he had come, but the doorwayhad disappeared. there was now only a solid brown wall behind him.

十

洞口很大，仿佛是狐狸大小的那类兽儿才能打的洞。

詹姆斯在洞口蹲下来，把脑袋和肩膀探进洞里。

接着便爬了进去。

他不停地爬呀爬。

“这不是个洞，”他激动地自言自语起来，“是条通道呀！”

通道里阴暗潮湿，周围散发着鲜桃子那种甜中带苦的气味。詹姆斯头顶上流着桃汁，膝盖底下湿漉漉的，四周潮湿发黏，他张开嘴巴，用舌头接住了几滴汁水，桃汁尝起来非常鲜美。

这会儿，他还在往上爬，好像通道一直通向大桃子的中心。每隔几秒钟，他就从壁上咬一口桃肉吃，桃肉甘甜多汁，爽心提神，十分奇妙。

他又爬了几码，突然听得“砰”的一声，头撞到了什么特别坚硬的东西上，那东西挡住了他的去路。他抬头瞧了瞧，只见眼前有一堵牢固的墙壁。乍看上去，仿佛是用木头做的。他用手摸了摸，感到确实像木头一般，只是锯齿似的，满是沟沟儿。

“老天哪！”詹姆斯说，“我晓得是什么东西！我来到了桃子中央的桃核啦！”

接着，他又看见，桃核表面开了一扇小门。他推了推，门就打开了，于是，他便爬了进去。还没有来得及抬头看自己到了什么地方，就听得一个声音说：“瞧！谁来了？”另外一个声音说：“我们一直在等你哪！”

詹姆斯停下来，盯着说话的人，吓得脸色发白。

他想站起来，可是膝盖抖得厉害，只好又坐在地板上。他朝身后瞧了瞧，想赶快回到自己来的通道里去，然而身后只有一堵棕色墙壁，却不见了门的踪影。