In the heart of the North Woods, where the pine needles carpet the ground like a rusty velvet blanket, lived a beaver named Gumbo. Now, if you were to look at Gumbo, you might not see a "Brave" hero right away. He was a bit smaller than his brothers, and his flat, leathery tail—the pride of any beaver—was a good three inches shorter than average.
While the other beavers spent their days slapping the water with thunderous CRACKS to warn of danger, Gumbo’s slaps sounded more like a polite "plop." "It's not the slap of the tail that counts," his mother would say, grooming the woodchips from his fur. "
But Whispering Creek was in trouble. For three moons, the rain had forgotten the forest. The great pond, once deep enough to hide a moose, had shrunk into a series of muddy puddles. The fish were gasping, and the beavers' lodge—usually a fortress surrounded by deep water—was now sitting high and dry on a mudflat. This made them sitting ducks for the wolves
