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Title: The Sins of Silvertip the Fox
Author: Breck, John
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Sins of Silvertip the Fox" ***
THE SINS OF SILVERTIP THE FOX
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Told at Twilight Stories
By JOHN BRECK
MOSTLY ABOUT NIBBLE THE BUNNY
NIBBLE RABBIT MAKES MORE FRIENDS
THE SINS OF SILVERTIP THE FOX
TAD COON’S TRICKS
THE WAVY TAILED WARRIOR
TAD COON’S GREAT ADVENTURE
THE BAD LITTLE OWLS
THE JAY BIRD WHO WENT TAME
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration: Silvertip wades across the pond.]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Told at Twilight Stories
The Sins of Silvertip the Fox
by
John Breck
Illustrated by
William T. Andrews
Garden City New York
Doubleday, Page & Company
1923
COPYRIGHT, 1923, BY
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF
TRANSLATION INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES,
INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN
COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY THE ASSOCIATED NEWSPAPERS
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES
AT
THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y
First Edition
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
I. How Nibble Rescued the Red Cow
II. Why Tommy ’Most Lost His Temper
III. The Red Cow’s Secret
IV. Why Louie Thomson Didn’t Enjoy His Visit
V. Nibble Tells One Secret and Hears Another
VI. A Game of Tag in Tommy’s Barn
VII. The White Cow Begins a Story
VIII. How the Man’s Wife Made the Compact with the Cows
IX. How a Bunny Undertook to Hunt a Fox
X. The Wicked Plot of the Bad Little Owls
XI. Why the Little Owls’ Plans Went Wrong
XII. How Long Ears Heard Bad News
XIII. How the Great Hunt Ended
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ILLUSTRATIONS
Silvertip wades across the pond
Tommy finds a trap
Nibble and Muskrat visit the Red Cow
The Red Cow walked around and around
Silvertip trotted past with the poor chicken
There was Nibble, perched on top of the partition
Nibble visits the chicken coop
Silvertip hid under the culvert
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE SINS OF SILVERTIP THE FOX
CHAPTER I
HOW NIBBLE RESCUED THE RED COW
Never before, in the early, early spring, had there been so much
excitement down at Doctor Muskrat’s Pond. Of course, spring’s the season
for visitors. They were always on the lookout for old friends winging up
from the south. The Beautiful Duck and his mate, who’d warned Nibble
Rabbit about the Terrible Storm, stopped in to wish everyone a happy
summer. Then they laughingly beaked their way northward through a flurry
of late snow. Bad weather couldn’t scare them now.
They kept a lookout for old enemies, too, as wise Woodsfolk always must.
But there was one visitor who puzzled them. Was he an enemy, or was he a
friend? Doctor Muskrat himself couldn’t say. Or rather, he wouldn’t. But
that wasn’t what started all the discussion.
The visitor was Tommy Peele. And his old dog Watch said he owned the
Woods and Fields. Now did that mean he owned the Woodsfolk who lived in
them? That’s what everyone wanted to know. For the Woodsfolk were wild.
Could a wild beast ever belong to any one? Doctor Muskrat had never
heard of such a thing.
“I certainly wouldn’t mind,” chirped Chewee the Chickadee. “I get a full
crop ’most every time I see him.”
“I guess you’d mind if he locked you up like he did Nibble,” remarked
Chaik Jay. “That’s what it means to belong to him.”
“No, it doesn’t,” contradicted Nibble. (He really knew more about the
little boy than any one else. He hadn’t liked being locked up, but he
did like Tommy.) “Watch says I belong to him just the same out of my
cage as I did in it. And he feeds me just the same, too.”
“Hmm!” sniffed Doctor Muskrat. He was wondering if it was that way with
traps. ’Cause you remember Tommy’d caught him in one, and then let him
go again. And Tommy’d fed him, too.
“You know,” said Nibble, “all the beasts up at the barn say——” And then
for the first time he heard the swishing in the bulrushes behind him.
“Ow!” he squealed. And he jumped. For the starey eyes of the cross Red
Cow came peering through them.
“Swish!” went Doctor Muskrat through his hole in the ice. “Flutter!”
went the scary wings of Chewee the Chickadee, and even Chaik the
Bluejay, who isn’t afraid of many things, went off with a startled
“squawk,” while Nibble Rabbit dashed through a tunnel he knew in the
Quail’s Thicket. But you know Nibble. First he’s scared—and then he’s
curious. As soon as he was safely hidden he stopped to listen. “Stupid
beast,” he said to himself. “Why couldn’t she have waited until we got
done talking?”
“M-m-moo!” lowed the Red Cow in a troubled voice.
Nibble came creeping back again. Pretty soon he sat up and stretched his
neck to get a good look at her. “What are you doing here?” he demanded.
“Is anything the matter?”
“M-m-m-yes,” moaned the Red Cow, swinging her head restlessly from side
to side and looking terribly troubled. “I don’t know just what it is,
but I’m all afraid! Isn’t there any place where wolves don’t come? Or
Men?”
“No Man comes here,” said Nibble, “’cepting only Tommy Peele—and he’s
just a little one.” Then, because the Red Cow looked so unhappy, he
burst out cheerfully, “Come on. I’ll show you where you can hide, even,
from him.”
But she looked at him very doubtfully with her near-sighted eyes.
“M-m-no-no,” she hesitated. “You haven’t forgotten that I tried to kill
you when you hung that flapping thing on my horn.” She meant the door of
his cage that she jerked off to get at the carrot Tommy Peele had given
Nibble for breakfast. But she insisted on thinking that he had fastened
the door to her. She was a very stupid thing.
“That’s all right,” he explained.
“You let me out of the cage, so we’re all fair and square.”
By this time she was so puzzled she couldn’t remember anything. But she
could tell that Nibble wasn’t angry, so she followed him. And he showed
her a fine dry spot on the top of a little hillock, all shut in by
clustering thorns. For Nibble wouldn’t trust anything but the Pickery
Things for even a cow to hide in.
There she stayed and there she slept very comfortably. Even the cold
wind that came up with the sunset couldn’t reach her. And Nibble dug
down a little way into the mud and ate the top off a mallow root and a
couple of plantains for his supper. And then he had to lick himself very
dry and clean before he popped into his own comfortable hole.
He slept late next morning because he’d stayed awake puzzling over that
Red Cow’s doings the night before. But as soon as he had washed his face
he set out to find her, for he’d thought of a lot more questions to ask.
And there she was, crouched down close in her hiding-place, with her
eyes bigger and starier than ever. “Hssh!” she snorted through her wide,
windy nostrils. “There was a Man! But he didn’t see me at all!”
CHAPTER II
WHY TOMMY ’MOST LOST HIS TEMPER
“Nonsense!” said Nibble Rabbit. “There wasn’t any Man. They don’t come
here. You must have had a bad dream.”
“No, I didn’t,” she insisted. “I was wide awake and I saw him as plain
as plain.”
Nibble sniffed the air, but the wind had blown all the scent away, so he
didn’t believe her. When he turned to her again she was trying to eat
the twigs that she could reach with her long tongue. “Hey! Don’t you
know better than that?” he demanded. “You’ll get pickers in your mouth,
and, what’s much worse, you’ll feel awfully queer and sick inside of
you. Doctor Muskrat says you should only eat that tree for medicine.”
Nibble felt very wise and grown-up beside this foolish cow. She wasn’t
really wild and she wasn’t really tame. Poor beast! No wonder she was
scary. She didn’t know enough to be either thing properly. “Come along!”
he ordered. “I’ll take you down for a drink and then you can eat the
willows. If you’re like the partridge you can nip the tips off a
cottonwood that your long neck will reach up to.”
So the Red Cow hove herself up to her feet, tail first, as is the custom
of cows, and followed him obediently. And he showed her the way to the
warm spring that was Doctor Muskrat’s front door.
It was a good thing he was polite and let her drink first. For as soon
as she began dragging her clumsy toes in the muck to spread them far
enough apart so she could get her nose into the water—“Clang!” went the
cold steely jaws of another trap.
She jumped back, snorting and waving her tassely tail, while she cocked
her eyes to try and see it. But Nibble wasn’t paying any attention to
her. He was thumping and bumping as hard as ever he could with his soft
furry feet and calling “Doctor Muskrat! Doctor Muskrat! Doctor Muskrat!”
“Eh?” said the old doctor as his nose came up out of the water (and the
cow snorted at him harder than ever), “what’s all this?” He sniffed at
her inquiringly.
“Oh, Doctor Muskrat,” Nibble almost cried. “Look! It’s more jaws!”
“Ah!” The old beast examined them wisely and shook his head. “What did I
tell you? You can’t trust even Tommy Peele! He was just pretending to
make friends with us so we’d forget to be afraid and he could catch us
again!”
“I guess you’re right,” murmured Nibble. But he felt very badly about
it—for he really liked Tommy.
Just then the Red Cow spoke up. She didn’t understand Doctor Muskrat,
but she caught Tommy’s name. And although she didn’t like Tommy herself,
even a stupid cow knows enough to be honest. “I told you I saw that
Man,” she said to Nibble. “Well, it surely wasn’t Tommy!”
“It wasn’t, eh?” snapped Doctor Muskrat. “We’ll just see about that.” He
dove again. He came up looking very puzzled. “Tommy’s jaws are still
biting the mud, just where he threw them.” he reported. “We’ll watch
what he does when he finds these.”
It was Saturday, so as soon as Tommy had finished his chores up at the
barn, he whistled to his old dog, Watch, and came tramping down the
fields with his tall rubber boots. He had a cap full of meal and an ear
of corn in his pocket. Yes! And he had a nice lump of fat for Chewee the
Chickadee and a string to tie it to a branch with.
But Nibble didn’t come running to meet him. He was crouching back in the
reeds with Doctor Muskrat. And the Red Cow had lumbered off to her own
hiding-place in the thicket that Nibble had showed her.
“Come, Bunny, Bunny,” called Tommy, in his nice voice that fairly made
Nibble’s feet itch to run to him. He crept up softly near the warm
spring so as not to scare his muskrat. Then he saw the footprints—the
big ones of the Red Cow, and the little ones of Nibble Rabbit, and the
paws of Doctor Muskrat with his toe gone, for now it was healed so he
could step on it. And there was the trap, sticking right straight up
where the cow’s clumsy foot had jerked it.
And wasn’t he angry! Just wasn’t he? He was the crossest little boy in
all the woods and fields, and the houses, too. Because someone was
trying to catch his very own wild things that he was trying to make
friends with!
The trap was chained to a bulrush stalk and he yanked it right off,
stalk and all, he was so angry. And then he did something that showed he
was really learning to think quite like a wild thing. It was just what
wise old Doctor Muskrat would have done if he hadn’t been so troubled,
deep down inside, that he forgot about everything but Tommy. He trailed
the footsteps of that other man and he found two other traps. Right in
his own woods!
“Clang! clang!” He had given each of those cold steel jaws a stick to
bite on. Then he rooted up their chains and tied them all together.
“Crash!” They went plump down into the mud beside his own. “Yah! Yah!
Hooray!” barked Watch. He thought that anything Tommy did was perfect.
And he wagged his big wavy tail so very hard that at last his tail
wagged him and he waltzed around and around.
And then Nibble came bouncing up with his ears in the air, and Doctor
Muskrat waddled after him. But Doctor Muskrat stopped at the edge of the
reeds because, you know, he and Watch hadn’t made friends. Still, he
looked very kindly at Tommy and he came out in a great hurry to get his
meal when Tommy moved away.
But Watch nearly scared him when he turned around to ask: “Nibble, do
you know where I’ll find that Red Cow?”
[Illustration: Tommy finds a trap.]
CHAPTER III
THE RED COW’S SECRET
Nibble Rabbit was so surprised at Watch’s question that he stopped
eating. And he was eating the delicious meal that Tommy had brought, so
it was a big surprise. For that was just the question he didn’t know how
to answer. He’d hidden the Red Cow himself. She was trusting him. How
could he show where she was when she was specially hiding from Tommy?
“I know,” said Nibble, at last, “but it isn’t fair to tell. Why do you
want her?”
“Why, I want her because we keep our cows in the barn, not in the wet
woods like you silly Wild Things,” Watch answered, smiling. “It doesn’t
matter, anyway. Do you think I can’t go sniffing around and find her for
myself if you won’t tell?” And he ran out a sly, pink tongue.
“Well, she’s all wild and scary, ’specially of Men,” pleaded Nibble.
“You remember how she chased Tommy before. You’d better take him to the
barn first and come back after her alone.” Nibble still had an idea that
Watch herded Tommy Peele the way he did the cows.
“That’s perfectly true, Bunny,” said Watch. And he went bounding off
ahead of his Boy, urging him to hurry as though he had something
particularly interesting to show him. And he had, but he didn’t know it.
As soon as they had finished the meal Tommy had brought them, Doctor
Muskrat went off to sleep on his sun-warmed stone, spread out flat with
his paws hanging over the edges, and Nibble went lipity, lipity up his
tunnel in the thicket to tell the Red Cow Watch was asking for her.
He heard the strangest noises as he came along—but they weren’t sad and
scary. She was talking to someone in a new voice, very soft and gentle,
very loving and happy.
“Who’s there?” Nibble called. “Red Cow, can I come?”
“Come quick, quick!” she lowed. “Isn’t it lovely? That’s why I was
afraid. I came here to hide so that no one could take it away from me.”
Then she added in her new voice that wasn’t meant for Nibble at all,
“Lie still, wee thing.”
Nibble poked his head through the Pickery Things and peeked at her. And
he saw what she was talking about. It was the cunningest little red calf
with a white spot in the middle of its forehead. It had bright black
eyes, wide open, and it perked a pair of wide, round ears at Nibble.
Then it tried to get up on its spindly legs, but they were pretty shaky.
“Does it seem all right?” asked the Red Cow. It was her first calf and
she wasn’t quite sure what to do with it.
“It seems very queer,” said Nibble honestly. Of course it did to him.
Because baby rabbits are blind and haven’t any fur. “Can’t I call Doctor
Muskrat?” He was wondering, too, whether he oughtn’t to call Watch and
Tommy.
“Yes, go call the doctor,” said the Red Cow.
You just ought to have seen Doctor Muskrat wake up when he heard Nibble
squeal for him so excitedly. “I’m coming! I’m coming!” he called in his
high, thin voice, and he flopped along through Nibble’s tunnel as fast
as ever he could, for his webby paws aren’t meant for running.
“What is it?” he asked. And then he saw the little calf. And it sniffed
its turned-up nose at him with a cunning pink tongue-tip showing. He
walked all around it, inspecting it very carefully. It seemed strange to
him, too, because baby muskrats are born as blind and helpless as baby
rabbits.
“Is there anything the matter with it?” asked the Red Cow, anxiously.
“I think not,” he said, sensibly, “excepting that it’s pretty cold and
shivery. You must lick it hard and get its blood to circulating.”
So she licked it and licked it. And her tongue was very strong and very
gentle, because that’s one of the things all cows’ tongues are made for.
And the baby calf grew livelier and livelier. And pretty soon it got up
on its spindly legs, waving its little tail that was still too new to
have a tassel on it. “Now what’ll I do?” asked the Red Cow.
“Feed it,” advised Doctor Muskrat.
So she did, though it took quite a little coaxing to show the silly baby
how to find what he wanted. But the milk was trickling from the corners
of his little mouth in about three minutes. And then wasn’t he happy?
“Let me say, madam,” began Doctor Muskrat, in his most professional
tone, “that is the most remarkable youngster I have ever attended.” You
see he was only used to bunnies and muskrats and fieldmice.
But the Red Cow heaved a great sigh of pride when she heard that. And
just wasn’t she the happiest cow in the world?
“Nevertheless,” went on the doctor, “this is no place for it. You should
have a nice quiet hole for it. There’s nothing in the woods big enough
for you. I believe the barn is where you ought to be.”
“But they’ll take it away from me?” moaned the Red Cow, getting all
scary again.
“Not if you trust Tommy,” put in Nibble Rabbit, eagerly.
“Madam, if you’ll take an old muskrat’s advice,” said the doctor, “you
will place your confidence in Tommy Peele.” He used those long words
because they sounded wise and important. And the Red Cow was really
impressed.
“All right,” she agreed. And on the word Nibble Rabbit darted out across
the Broad Field and down the Pasture, where he could see Watch and Tommy
Peele.
CHAPTER IV
WHY LOUIE THOMSON DIDN’T ENJOY HIS VISIT
“Watch, come back!” Nibble squealed breathlessly, when he caught up with
Tommy and the old dog in the end of the Pasture. “Come back and bring
Tommy, too. I can tell you the Red Cow’s secret. She has a little new
baby calf and she says she’ll trust it to Tommy Peele.”
“Er-r yah!” barked Watch, very pleased and proud because the other
animals were beginning to love his Tommy. And he turned right around to
follow Nibble.
But of course Tommy hadn’t heard a word they said. They talk too low,
for one thing, and they use all sorts of sign languages, too, for
another. He thought Watch was chasing Nibble. So he shouted and scolded
and called him a bad old dog. But Watch only wagged his tail and kept
right on.
[Illustration: Nibble and Muskrat visit the Red Cow.]
Meantime, something had been happening back at the pond. The strange Man
who set all those strange traps had come to look at them. And the Red
Cow heard him. But she wasn’t scary any more because she had her new
calf and she meant to take care of him. And she didn’t mean to let any
one else in the world but Tommy Peele lay a hand on him.
He had a nice meal of warm milk inside of him and he’d gone to sleep.
Besides, Doctor Muskrat was still there to look after him. So out of the
thicket she bounced and after the Man.
“M-m-moo!” she roared, just like the first cows did when they told
Mother Nature they’d punish the wicked wolves for themselves if she gave
them their teeth again. But you remember Mother Nature couldn’t do that,
so she gave them horns longer and sharper than the teeth of any wolf.
The Red Cow’s horns certainly were. So that strange Man climbed up the
nearest tree to get away from them.
“Get out!” she snorted. “Go away from here!” But of course he couldn’t
because she was walking around and around the trunk of that big tree,
roaring at him and sending the mud over her shoulders with her big,
horny toes. Only she never thought of that, because she was rather
stupid. Then Watch came bouncing up and he barked and snapped very
fiercely. But Tommy just laughed.
“Oh, Louie Thomson,” he jeered. “You will set your traps in my woods,
will you? See what you get now!” For this was the greedy boy who had
sold him the trap that wouldn’t work.
“You’ll see what you get if that crazy cow takes after you!” yelled
Louie.
Tommy was just a little bit afraid, for the cow was watching him with
that scary look in her eyes. But he wasn’t going to let Louie Thomson
know it. So he stood perfectly still and called her, “Come Bossy, Co’
Boss.”
“Go along, Red Cow!” barked Watch.
“I know,” squealed Nibble, “I can see Chaik Jay’s present sticking right
out of Tommy’s pocket. Ask him for that ear of corn.”
Now the Red Cow was really very hungry. She reached out her sniffing
nose. Tommy didn’t move. So she picked the corn right out of his pocket
with her long curling tongue. And then he laid such a gentle hand on her
that she knew she wouldn’t be afraid of him ever again.
So here was Tommy Peele stroking the Red Cow’s neck while she ate the
corn he had meant to give Chaik Jay. Here, too, was Nibble Rabbit
enjoying the haws off a wild rose bush the Red Cow had trampled down,
while old Doctor Muskrat watched the Red Cow’s sleepy new baby, and
pricked his ears to hear all that was going on.
Even Watch the Dog was happy. He was lying at the foot of the tree, with
his nose on his paws as though he expected to stay there all day, and
wagging his tail.
But Louie Thomson, perched on one of its branches in the cold wind, was
very unhappy. Whenever he moved Watch would raise the hair all along his
back and growl, and the Red Cow would roll her scary eyes at him. “Hey,
Tommy!” he called. “Drive off those brutes and let me come down!”
“No, I won’t,” said Tommy. “This is two times you’ve cheated me. You
cheated me with that old trap, and now you tried to come over here into
my very own woods and catch my very own Beasts. That’s stealing. I’m
going to let them watch you while I go up to the house and get my father
to come for you.”
Of course not one of the Woodsfolk knew what he meant. But they knew he
was very angry.
“Oh, please, please don’t do that!” begged Louie. “I’ll promise never to
set foot in your woods again. Honest, cross my heart and hope to die, I
will! Please let me go this time.”
Nibble sat straight up and listened hard. For Louie sounded just like
Chatter Squirrel the night of the Terrible Storm when he was so terribly
afraid. “My whiskers, but isn’t Tommy wonderful,” he breathed to Watch.
“You and the Red Cow can scare that Man when you can reach him, but
Tommy scares him without doing anything.” And he came close up to
Tommy’s tall rubber boots and cocked his head on one side, trying to see
how Tommy did it.
“I know you’ll promise,” Tommy was saying, “and you’ll keep it, too, or
else I’ll know about it.” He just meant he and Watch would find Louie’s
footprints.
But Louie saw that rabbit sitting by Tommy and looking exactly as though
he were talking to him.
“And if you want your traps,” Tommy went on, “you’ll have to get that
muskrat to find them.” He just meant he’d thrown them into the pond.
But Louie Thomson didn’t know what to think of that. He guessed perhaps
he’d better leave Tommy Peele and his wild things very much alone.
CHAPTER V
NIBBLE TELLS ONE SECRET AND HEARS ANOTHER
Now when Tommy Peele followed Watch back to the woods it was because he
thought the old dog was chasing Nibble Rabbit. Then he made up his mind
Nibble had warned Watch about that bad Louie Thomson. He never dreamed
Nibble had whispered a secret that belonged to the Red Cow. So as soon
as he’d made Louie promise to behave, he whistled to Watch and began to
lead the Red Cow away so Louie could climb down.
Well, right then the Red Cow remembered that secret she had to show him.
So she insisted on leading him.
She fairly galloped around the end of the thicket, with Tommy running
after her in his tall rubber boots and Watch bounding after him. But
Nibble took a short cut through his tunnel. And he met Doctor Muskrat
coming to meet him.
“Climp, clump, climp, clump!” went a sound outside.
“What’s that?” asked Doctor Muskrat.
Nibble peered along the ground. And he could see Louie Thomson’s boots
moving very fast. “It’s that Man,” he exclaimed. “He’s running like
Silvertip the Fox did when the Red Cow took after him.”
“Fine!” chuckled Doctor Muskrat. “He’ll never bring his wicked jaws back
here again. And we can thank Tommy Peele for that.”
Then there was another sound. “What’s that?” asked Nibble. And Doctor
Muskrat laughed. For it was Tommy Peele squealing with surprise because
he’d found the secret that belonged to the Red Cow. “A calf! Oh, the
cute little thing!”
[Illustration: The Red Cow walked around and around the trunk of that
big tree roaring at him.]
So Nibble and Doctor Muskrat both crept back down the tunnel to watch
what was going on. The calf raised his head and looked at Tommy; then he
got up on his shaky legs and sniffed at him. Because Tommy was a strange
Beast with a strange smell and even a baby knows enough to be careful
about strange things. But when he touched his little turned-up nose to
the hand Tommy held out to him he smelled his mother. You know Tommy had
been stroking her. So the foolish little rascal put out his little pink
tongue, trying to lick Tommy’s fingers. And wasn’t his mother pleased
because they were friends the very first thing!
Watch led the way, and Tommy walked beside the Red Cow and helped to
steer her wobbly-legged calf all the way up to the barn. And the baby
kept trying to kick up his silly little heels the way Nibble used to
when he felt playful. And he just would run splash into all the puddles,
and bunt and wriggle when they caught him. The Red Cow kept getting
prouder and prouder every step, but even she was glad when they got
safely home with him.
Nibble went with them as far as the Pasture. Doctor Muskrat was enjoying
a nice sweet flag-root (the first one he’d dug that spring) when Nibble
came loping back again. And he was the messiest rabbit you ever heard
of. And so cross and disgusted!
“That bad baby!” he complained, beginning to clean the mud spots off his
white shirt front. “He wouldn’t do anything I told him to. And then, the
very first time I wasn’t looking, he danced in a puddle and splashed it
all over me. From whiskers to—” he craned his neck about to look—“to
tail! He all but drowned me!”
“You don’t have to tell me that,” said Doctor Muskrat, and his fat sides
were shaking with laughter. “I’ve eyes to see with. You’re as wet as
ever you were when I fished you out of that pond there.” For you
remember how Nibble tumbled right into the water he was so frightened
the first time he ever saw the kind old muskrat.
“And then,” Nibble went on indignantly, “the impudent little scamp
sniffed his little turned-up nose at me because I was spluttering.”
“You can’t expect a calf to be born with manners, can you?” soothed
Doctor Muskrat, “’specially if it belongs to the Red Cow. But, as I told
her, that’s the most remarkable youngst——” He flattened his ears, ready
to dive, for a shadow came swooping down and he was expecting the Marsh
Hawk back any day.
But it was only Chaik the Jay. “Hello,” he piped. “Who was she and what
did you tell her?” And he pounced on an acorn that was half-buried in
the ground.
“The Red Cow,” answered Doctor Muskrat, “has a little new calf who’s the
most remarkable youngster I’ve ever seen.” And he was going to tell
Chaik all about it, only——
Didn’t Nibble Rabbit just interrupt and tell it all himself? Just didn’t
he? He was that puffed up because he was the first one to see it that he
couldn’t wait. He described, how bright its little eyes were, and how it
wriggled its tail like Chatter Squirrel does when he’s in a temper,
and—everything there was to tell about that Red Cow’s red baby with the
white star in his forehead and the turned-up nose.
And all the time Nibble was forgetting to clean his fur. And the mud
spots showed worse than ever as the wind dried them. But Nibble was too
busy talking about that very same bad little Beast who had splashed them
on him.
Chaik was preening and tucking in his feathers every once in a while. He
didn’t have his new spring coat yet, so he was very particular over his
old one. Presently he noticed Nibble. “By the Worm in the Acorn, Rabbit,
what’s happened to you?” he wanted to know.
Do you think Nibble would tell on that Red Cow’s bad baby? Not at all.
He just said, “Oh, I wasn’t looking—you don’t know what the walking is
this spring.” Then he got very busy with his mud spots and Chaik flew
away.
“Hm,” giggled the doctor. “What do you really think of the Red Cow’s
calf, what you told me about it or what you told Chaik?”
“I mean,” said Nibble shamefacedly, “that I’m going up to see it
to-morrow morning.” And off he hopped to his bed.
He woke up early, early, before the darkest night had begun to melt into
the gray of dawn. He yawned sleepily and rolled over. My, but that hole
of his was warm and comfortable! Suddenly he jumped up and began to
scrub his face with his paws.
In about three minutes he was down by the pond, thumping for Doctor
Muskrat. And weren’t the doctor’s eyes all sleepy when he poked his head
out of the water? “Ouf,” he shivered, “what do you want at this hour of
the night? Spear me with an icicle, but this pond is cold!” (If one of
the Woodsfolk is found frozen to death the saying is that he’s been
speared by an icicle.)
“Come along,” said Nibble. “I’m going up to the barn to see the Red Cow
and her bad baby.”
“What do you take me for?” snorted the old doctor. “Don’t you forget
that Silvertip the Fox is living there! Gimlet the Woodpecker said so. I
can’t run like you can and there isn’t any water for me to dive into.”
“I forgot,” apologized Nibble.
“Well, you just be careful,” warned the wise old beast, “and you come
straight back and tell me about him.”
So off went Nibble, creeping about among the puddles. He dove into the
Brushpile for a minute because he heard two birds talking. But they were
only little downy Mr. and Mrs. Screech Owl, smaller than Bobby Robin. “I
tell you it’s too early for nesting,” one was saying.
“Not if Silvertip keeps on leaving all that nice food for us in the
fence corner,” insisted the other. “He scarcely eats half of what he
catches, and chickens are the best eating in the world for our owlets.
We wouldn’t have to do any hunting.”
“So,” said Nibble to himself, “Gimlet was right. Silvertip’s catching
Tommy Peele’s chickens.”
He sniffed carefully about the haystack and, sure enough, there was a
nice nest that smelled of Silvertip—it’s almost the same smell as the
seeds of the “cranes-bill,” as the Woodsfolk call wild geranium. It was
empty, so Nibble cocked an ear at the chicken coop. Sure enough, there
was a tiny rustling in the straw. As he sat there listening he heard the
scared shout of a pullet, “Squa-awk! Squa-a—” and that was all.
Silvertip had throttled her. Bounce! Down he came from the perch and
slam! Out he slipped through the little back door his snoopy nose had
learned how to open. But Nibble didn’t dare call Watch for fear
Silvertip would hear him.
[Illustration: Silvertip trotted past with the poor chicken hanging from
his jaws.]
CHAPTER VI
A GAME OF TAG IN TOMMY’S BARN
You know about Nibble Rabbit. First he’s scared and then he’s curious.
He was scared when he heard Silvertip catch the pullet. And he was still
more scared when Silvertip trotted past in the mist, splashing softly in
the puddles, with the poor chicken hanging from his jaws. But when
Silvertip suddenly stopped and sniffed Nibble’s own footprints by the
haystack, he was the scaredest little rabbit in all the fields and woods
and the barnyard, too.
Just the same he could see Silvertip say to himself, “It’s too wet to
follow that trail. I’ll keep an eye out for bunnies around here as well
as birds.”
And Nibble said to his own self, “Bunny, that fox will have to do some
looking.” Then Silvertip picked up the chicken and trotted on.
Of course Nibble took a long breath when he had gone. That gave him time
to grow curious. “I wonder which fence-corner those greedy little
Screech Owls said he hid his food in?” he thought. “Watch would like to
know.” So he peeked around the end of the stack and listened. Silvertip
was away out of sight in the mist, but his feet went splashing off to
the very corner of the Broad Field, where he used to sleep under some
elderberry bushes. Yes, and sometimes he’d catch the birds who came
there for berries. Oh, that Silvertip was certainly clever.
“Now,” Nibble thought, “it’s safe for me to hunt for the Red Cow.” She
wasn’t in the milking barn, but he could hear her baby, not very far
away, calling his mother to get up and give him his breakfast. And the
more he listened to that naughty little calf the more he wanted to see
it again. So he crept down the line of scary, switchy tails, past the
very last one. Then he came to a narrow lane, all sprinkled with dried
clover-leaves. Pretty soon he had to squeeze under a door into another
part of the barn. It was much brighter than the milking barn, because
there was a hole in the wall at the far end. There were three box
stalls, and he could hear the little calf in the last one.
He hopped up on a bale of straw and ran along the top of the partition
until he could look in and see him. There that naughty little beast had
got tired of calling his mother and bunting her, so now he was trying to
kick her. And Nibble thought he was cunninger than ever.
Of course the Red Cow was pleased to see him, and full of talk. But
Nibble was getting curious again. After a while he said, “Red Cow, I can
see the trees moving outside, but there isn’t any wind in here. Why is
that?”
“Why, I never thought about it,” said the Red Cow. You remember she was
always a little bit stupid.
“I’m going to find out,” said Nibble. He hopped carefully along the
partition to the window. And if ever a rabbit looked foolish, it was
Nibble when he snubbed his twitchy nose against it. He was puzzled. None
of the Woodsfolk could imagine such a thing as window glass.
“What is it?” asked the Red Cow, wagging her big ears.
“Ice,” guessed Nibble. “No, it’s not, either.” He was trying to taste it
with his licky little tongue that he uses to wash his shirt front. “It
doesn’t taste like the drops that freeze into my fur and it isn’t wet.
But it’s cold——”
And right then he learned some more about it. For you know Silvertip had
seen the bunny’s footprints. “Chickens are all right,” thought the bad
fox to himself as he trotted along, “but I’d a great deal rather have a
nice tasty mouthful of rabbit.” So he hid the pullet and came galloping
back to find Nibble.
It wasn’t long before he saw the bunny’s trail going into the door of
the milking barn, and he could smell plainly on the dry wood floor
exactly where Nibble had gone. So Silvertip went sniffing quietly down
the long aisle behind the row of cows. But they smelled him. “Help!
Watch! Wolves! Wolves! Help!” they bawled. And they all tried to kick
him.
Now Silvertip was afraid to run out past their heels, so he had to
follow Nibble’s trail under the door into the barn, where the box stalls
were. And there he saw Nibble, perched on top of the partition, sniffing
at the window with his back turned.
Up jumped Silvertip on to the straw bale. Down jumped Nibble into the
stall beside the Red Cow. “Arh,” whimpered Silvertip excitedly, and
jumped after him.
You never heard such a commotion. For the Red Cow began to roar and aim
her horns at the fox. And Silvertip had to do some lively dodging. He’d
just managed to scramble back on the partition when Watch came squeezing
under the door. There wasn’t another place for the fox to turn so he ran
straight for the window.
“Wouw!” he whimpered as he hit it. But it was too late to stop. “Crash!”
he went right through it and landed plump on the floor of a wagon that
stood beneath it. Then he went galloping off to the woods as fast as he
could go, holding up first one foot and then the other, for he couldn’t
make up his mind where he was hurt the most. And his nose felt as if a
bee had lit on it, and his eyes were so bunged up he could hardly see
where he was going, and he had a new slit in the ear Mrs. Hooter had
nipped—he was pretty badly damaged. And he was grinding his teeth and
blaming poor Nibble Rabbit for every bit of it. For no one who thinks
himself as clever as Silvertip can get into trouble without finding some
way to think somebody else made him do it.
“Aourgh!” barked Watch excitedly. And then of course Nibble knew he was
perfectly safe, and he wanted to come out from under the Red Cow’s
manger, where he had hidden, to see what was happening. But the naughty
little calf was so excited he was dancing around and bunting at
everything in sight. His mother had to give him some more breakfast
before he’d stand still a single minute.
[Illustration: There was Nibble, perched on top of the partition.]
By that time Silvertip was away off down the Pasture and Watch had
squeezed under the door again. He was bound to catch that fox, but he
knew more than to go jumping through windows after him.
So Nibble just hopped up on the manger and from there onto the high
partition and stretched out his inquisitive nose where the glass had
been. There wasn’t much left for him to snub it against, I can tell you.
And the wind blew through it so hard that it laid his ears flat back.
“What is it?” demanded the Red Cow. She was learning to be curious, too,
and that’s the first step to being wise and sensible.
“It’s awfully hard,” Nibble answered. “I can bite ice, but I can’t bite
this.”
Just then who should open the door but Tommy Peele with the Red Cow’s
breakfast.
Right away he saw the glass was broken. But he wasn’t angry at all. He
just said, “Did you do that?” But he picked up every bit that had fallen
inside so folks wouldn’t cut their feet on it, and then he went around
to pick up what was outside, too. And he found some blood and a big tuft
of Silvertip’s hair on the wagon-box.
“Phew!” he whistled. “Bunny, this fur isn’t any of yours—nor that
footprint, either! You just wait until school is out and Watch and I’ll
just see about this!”
He hadn’t any time to do it then. For he had to stuff the Red Cow’s
manger full of hay and hurry fast to get to the schoolhouse before the
bell rang.
“Have some, Nibble,” she lowed politely. And the bunny didn’t need a
second invitation. His twitchy nose had been wiggling pretty fast from
the first minute he smelled that delicious clover.
CHAPTER VII
THE WHITE COW BEGINS A STORY
If the smell of that delicious hay in the Red Cow’s manger made Nibble’s
nose go fast, the taste of it made his hungry little jaws go still
faster. And the Red Cow was just about as busy as he was. Her big teeth
wouldn’t move quite so quickly, but she could take bigger bites to make
up for lost time.
They were still eating when he heard a loud snort just outside. So he
jumped up on the windowsill again to be sure who it was. “Hello,
Rabbit,” came the White Cow’s nice fluty voice as she saw his whiskers
in the window. “I told you you’d come back again.”
“Oh, the Red Cow’s got such a cunning calf in here I just have to come,”
he laughed.
“She has, has she?” mooed the White Cow. “I’d like to see it myself.”
She was a motherly old beast, so she really did love babies. “Is it all
right? That wolf who ran through the milking barns has been around
here—I can smell him. Calves are what they always come for.”
“That was only Silvertip the Fox,” he chuckled. “He’s gone!”
Still the White Cow kept shaking her head and snorting. “He’s no
business here. He’s a wolf, and it’s plain against the compact.”
“What compact, please, Madame Snowflake?” lowed the Red Cow.
“Why, the compact between Cows and Man,” she answered. “You know Man
used to hunt us. It must have been dreadful, for one man is worse than a
whole pack of wolves-”
“Exactly what Doctor Muskrat says!” exclaimed Nibble.
“Well, it’s true,” she asserted. “Cows are all right so long as they
keep all together. But you can’t have little new wobbly babies in a herd
because we’re so near-sighted someone would be sure to step on them. So
the mothers used to go off and hide them until they grew strong enough
not to let themselves get stepped on. And the wolves and the men would
watch out for them. No matter how careful the cows were someone would be
sure to find them. Long before they came, the mothers would get all
scary and unhappy just thinking about it.”
“I felt just that way!” gasped the Red Cow. “Didn’t I, Nibble?”
“Well, after a long time Man made a compact with the cows. He promised
that if they’d live with him and give him milk and plough his fields and
let him take the meat of certain ones, not the young heifers or the
mothers, he’d keep the wolves away from them.”
“How did that happen?” asked Nibble excitedly, for he guessed it was one
of those tales of the First-Off Beginning of Things.
And sure enough, the White Cow began, “Well, as I said, both Man and
wolves hunted the cows in the First-Off Beginning. That was bad enough.
But when Man made friends with the dogs, who were really wolves, it was
worse yet. They both knew all the tricks between them.
“There was a river wandering through the plain where the cows used to
feed, and it had a rocky island standing up in the middle of it. The
island was hollow as a cup and full of brush and grass, and there was
only one crack in the rocks where a cow could just squeeze through to
get into it. It was a secret among the cows, who only went there to
raise their calves, and they were careful to walk a long way in the
water to hide their trails before they crossed over to it. So the wolves
would never have found it. But a man did.
“He was hunting cows. So were a pack of wolves, and they saw he had only
one dog, so they decided to hunt him instead. They say a man is very
good eating. So he ran for the island. Because he knew if he could climb
high up on the tall rocks they couldn’t climb up after him. He had to
take his dog by the scruff of the neck to help him. And of course when
he got up high he could see everything—the two cows who were grazing in
the middle of the island and the narrow passage between the rocks, and
the wolves running around and around looking for a place where they
could get in.
“The cows couldn’t see the wolves, but they could hear them. So one of
them, who was an old cow and very wise, galloped over to the passage.
And when the wolves got there she was stopping the way with her sharp
horns.
“I don’t know how long she could have stayed there, for there were a
great many wolves and only one cow, but the man was wiser yet. He saw a
big tippy boulder that he could roll down to block the passage so nobody
could possibly get in. And he gave it a big shove. Smash, it went down
right in the middle of the wolves! It killed the leader and another
wolf, and the rest got scared and ran away.
“So did the cow, for the man’s dog started right after her. But the man
called him back. ‘Come here!’ he called. ‘Stop that, you foolish thing.
The wolves would have picked our bones if she hadn’t helped us. That’s
one cow you can never kill.’
“The dog came back with his tail between his legs, grumbling to himself.
‘This is very queer. It’s the first time in all my life I was told not
to kill anything.’ And of course the cow heard him. And it set her
thinking.”
CHAPTER VIII
HOW THE MAN’S WIFE MADE THE COMPACT WITH THE COWS
The White Cow stopped talking quite as though she had finished her
story. But Nibble Rabbit and the Red Cow, who were listening with all
their ears, both broke out: “Please, Mrs. Snowflake, you haven’t said a
word yet about the compact!”
“Pickery thistles!” she exclaimed. “So I haven’t. I was just thinking
about it instead. Well, the man was in the middle of that little hollow
island with the high rocks all around it, and so were the cows. The dog
was growling because he couldn’t kill the cow, and the cow was wondering
why the man wouldn’t let him. But most of all she was wondering how
quickly she and her calf would starve because that stone blocked up the
passage.
“The man was thinking that, too. For the cow had saved his life by
keeping out the wolves; that made him in debt to her. And if a man was
careless about his debts he was sure to be dreadfully unlucky. Either he
had to roll away that stone so the cow could go over to the plains to
graze—and he knew he couldn’t do that—or he had to bring the grass to
her.
“Bright and early next morning he went to bring the grass to feed that
cow. He found it was lots of trouble, especially since he didn’t have
his wife there to help him. So he decided to bring her.
“He told her how nice and safe it was in the middle of that rocky island
until she got quite delighted at the idea of living there. So she packed
their belongings on her back, slung their baby in front of her, and
started out. She waded the stream all right, but she stopped at the big
rock which blocked up the passage.
“‘I won’t stay here at all unless you take that out of there,’ she said.
‘It’s too inconvenient.’
“So of course he just had to. And when it comes right down to ‘having
to’ a man can do almost anything. But he had a terrible time. He heaved
and clawed and shoved and rolled until his fingers and arms were sore.
Then he picked up a stick, because it was easier to handle—and he
learned how to pry that stone out of the passage.
“In walked his wife and began to settle their new home. Out walked the
cows, and over they went to the plain to pick their own grass, but they
left their calves hidden on the island. So, after they had finished
feeding, back they came.
“Then the man took his stick and pried the rock into the passage again
for fear the wolves would come back. And his wife stared at the cows and
the cows stared at his wife, but still they didn’t make any compact.”
Nibble Rabbit and the Red Cow were both fairly stamping their feet with
impatience because the White Cow wouldn’t hurry right along with her
story. But she brought a big wad of cud all the way up her long neck and
stood there chewing it while she thought things over. Finally she
swallowed it and went on.
“I told you the man learned to use the great stone for a gate to the
narrow passageway where the cows squeezed through. But I didn’t tell you
how angry the wolves were about that.
“They were simply raging. Night after night they gnashed their jaws and
howled around those rocks, but their claws wouldn’t climb them. And the
man’s dog would sit up on top and shout insults at them. And the two
cows would snuggle together in the brush with their calves between them
and say, ‘Those wolves would have eaten us long ago if the man hadn’t
been here.’
“They got very used to the man and his family. They didn’t walk ’way
round his fire any more, or make eyes at his wife, and the calves got
very friendly with his baby. But his wife used to look hard at them.
‘It’s all very well to take care of the cow who saved your life,’ she’d
say to the man, ‘but how about that other one?’
“‘Well, what about her?’ he’d answer. ‘She isn’t any trouble.’
“‘She ought to pay for being taken care of,’ insisted his wife. ‘It’s
all very well for this year, but next year these calves will be grown up
and there will be new ones and we’ll be all cluttered up with cattle.’
“She thought and thought. At last she caught up her biggest clamshell
and walked down into the thicket where the cows stood. And the dog went
with her. ‘Old Cow,’ she said, ‘you can live with us for ever and ever
because you stopped the passageway with your horns when the wolves were
trying to get in to kill my husband. Young Cow, you will have to pay
something if you’re going to live with us.’ And with that she tried to
milk the young cow into her clamshell.
“The young cow didn’t like it a little bit. But she was afraid of the
dog, and besides the old cow argued, ‘You have milk to spare, and you’ll
never have any place as safe as this. Let me talk to her.’
“So the young cow gave in and let herself be milked. But the old one
said to the woman: ‘We’ll stay with you and give you milk so long as you
see we get food and water and protect us from the wolves. But the minute
you don’t we’ll go off and be wild again, and you’ll be no better off
than you were before.’
“‘Agreed,’ said the woman. ‘The dog will be our witness.’
“So that was the beginning of the compact. The cows settled down to live
with the man and his family. But after the woman was gone the wise old
cow said comfortably, ‘It’s spring now. She doesn’t think how much
trouble it will be to feed us through the winter.’”
“Wasn’t that old cow clever!” exclaimed Nibble admiringly.
The White Cow snorted. “She was wise. But that woman was wiser. She knew
that if she waited long enough there would be cattle on that island who
hadn’t any milk, so she and the man could bargain some more with them.
They had to carry loads and pull ploughs; they even had to let the man
kill certain ones. They didn’t like that a little bit, but the wise old
cow argued, ‘It’s better than being hunted by both wolves and men.’ So
they finally gave in. It was really a good bargain for us,” finished the
White Cow thoughtfully, “but it was a better one for the man. After he
learned to build barns as safe as that island he gave up hunting.”
CHAPTER IX
HOW A BUNNY UNDERTOOK TO HUNT A FOX
Madame snowflake swished her tail thoughtfully for a moment; then she
went back to chewing her cud as a sign that her story was all done.
“My horns!” exclaimed the Red Cow. “That’s awfully interesting.”
“Yes,” drawled the story-teller. “But can’t you see how worrisome it is?
If Tommy Peele lets wolves go galloping through this barn we’ll have to
go wild again. It’s in the compact. That’s what I’ve been trying to
explain.”
“Noo-oo-oo,” the Red Cow moaned. “I don’t want to go wild. I won’t go
wild again. I’ve been wild once, and I like being Tommy Peele’s tame cow
ever so much better.”
“Nonsense!” interrupted Nibble Rabbit, sitting up very straight. “It
hasn’t anything at all to do with you cows. Silvertip’s no more of a
wolf than Watch is. Besides, I’m the only one he was chasing. He won’t
come back again unless I do, and I won’t come until there isn’t any
Silvertip to chase me.”
“Hoo-oo,” teased the White Cow. “What can you do to Silvertip?”
“Wait and see,” said Nibble. And off he set. But as he ran he said to
himself, “Silvertip’s very big and clever—whatever can I do to him?”
For a while he was just about the most thoughtful bunny that ever
flopped an ear. He’d made the White Cow a great big promise, one no
grownup rabbit would ever have thought of.
And he had to have help about it. He was pretty glad, I can tell you,
when he saw Watch scouting about the pasture with his nose to the
ground.
“Have you found where Silvertip went to?” Nibble asked when the big dog
stopped to speak with him.
“No,” said Watch in a discouraged tone. “There was a mist this morning
and it’s washed away all the scent. But what do you want of Silvertip?”
“I’ve got to help you catch him,” murmured Nibble.
“You!” exclaimed Watch. “You must be as crazy as a chickadee! Has any
thing bitten you?” You know dogs are terribly afraid of being bitten by
a crazy beast—it makes them go mad, too.
“No. But—but I promised the White Cow that I wouldn’t come back to the
barn while Silvertip was alive to chase into it after me—and I won’t
stay away from the Red Cow’s baby for ever and ever. Something’s got to
happen to Silvertip.”
“I wouldn’t want him chasing me if I were you,” Watch agreed. This
sounded more sensible. “But I don’t see what the White Cow has to do
with it.”
“She says Silvertip is really a wolf,” Nibble explained, “and if Tommy
Peele lets wolves come right into his barn, whether it’s calves or
rabbits they’re hunting, the cows will have to go wild again. That’s in
the compact between cows and man in the First-Off Beginning.”
“Wurr-r-r!” Watch growled thoughtfully. “So it is. But that’s my
trouble, and the cow’s and Tommy’s. It hasn’t anything to do with you.”
Suddenly Nibble remembered something and quoted:
“By dusk and by dawn you shall travel alone.
And all troubles are yours excepting your own.
That’s my fortune. The stars told it to Doctor Muskrat the day I left
home.”
“I understand,” Watch nodded wisely. “Well, the trouble about all this
is that I can’t explain it to Tommy. And we need him. What can you do to
Silvertip—except give him a stomachache from eating too much rabbit,
eh?”
“I can see where he is and what he does. I know how he gets into the
chicken coop and where he hid the pullet he stole this morning and the
feathers from all the rest he’s been stealing.”
“How—when—where!” barked Watch excitedly. “We don’t have to tell that to
Tommy—we can show it to him. Quick, Nibble! How did Silvertip get into
the chicken coop? Tommy’ll be home from school any minute.”
So Nibble took him around to the little back door. “That fox is
certainly clever,” sniffed Watch. “He’s gnawed the hook right off. I’ve
smelt him around here dozens of times, but I never thought of looking
inside of the coop for him.” Then he lifted it with his nose, just as
Silvertip had done, but he was too big to crawl in.
It was Nibble who squeezed through and took a hop on to the soft straw
of the chicken coop floor. Then he sat up to sniff around. The hens were
scratching busily, but the rooster was dozing off a full crop on his
perch. Nibble poked his nose into a box of feed and the bird next to him
went, “Cut, cut!” That woke the rooster. He opened his eye and caught
sight of Nibble’s whiskers.
“Er—er—err, I’m Chanticleer!” he crowed. “And you’re the rascal who
stole my beautiful young wife, Specklefeather, this morning! You’re the
one who took Stripedwing, the best setting hen ever a rooster owned, and
dear little red-wattled Minorca—and all the rest who’ve been snatched
from my perches. Your time has come! I’ll show you——” and he flapped
down and began to peck poor Nibble and kick him with those long spurs
roosters wear on their legs.
[Illustration: Nibble visits the chicken coop.]
“Wait a minute, wait a minute!” Nibble cried. But the rooster wouldn’t
listen. Then a voice behind Nibble called, “Here, here,” and he darted
under the perches and squeezed into a dark nest beside a hen.
“There,” she clucked. “That old bully never comes here. It isn’t proper
for a rooster to come into the nesting corner. Poor Stripedwing. She
used to set in here most of the time because he was so cruel to her. And
he killed our son because Minorca was in love with him. I wish the fox
had taken him.”
Nibble peeked out again and saw the rooster strutting around as though
he’d really done something grand, calling on the hens to admire him. And
now he could hear Watch shouting, “Come along, Tommy—come quick!” In a
minute more he was barking outside the front door, and Tommy opened it.
“What’s the matter?” asked Tommy. Out hopped Nibble Rabbit. “However did
you get in here?” gasped the little boy. And with that Nibble slipped
through the little back door as neat as you please. Maybe Tommy didn’t
whistle! And maybe he wasn’t still more surprised when he saw the hook
all gnawed! But maybe he wasn’t maddest of all when Nibble and Watch
took him across the field to Silvertip’s fence corner, all full of
feathers, with poor dead Specklefeather lying in the middle of it!
“The fox!” Tommy exclaimed. “Old chicken thief; he ought to be hunted
with a gun!”
“That’s all right,” Watch wagged his tail. “Now Tommy’ll find the gun
and a man to shoot it, but we’ll have to find Silvertip so they can
shoot him. I’ll sleep in the haystack and watch the barn, and you see if
he’s hidden in the woods.”
So Nibble cocked his own little puffy tail and laid back his ears and
scuttled through the cornfield. Because the first one he meant to ask
was Doctor Muskrat. And it didn’t take much thumping to wake the doctor.
“My whiskers, but I’m glad to see you,” said the nice old beast as soon
as he got his nose out of the water. “I was afraid that fox had really
caught you. He came down here for a drink early this morning. He was
feeling pretty sick, but he said he wasn’t going to do another thing
until he’d pulled your long ears out by the roots and made a meal of
you.”
“Well, he doesn’t want to find me any more than I want to find him,”
said Nibble. And he told how Silvertip had followed him into the barn
and jumped smash through the window, and what trouble that made for the
cows, and the way he’d killed Tommy’s chickens, and how angry Tommy was
about it.
“Shoot him? I wish they would.” Doctor Muskrat agreed. “He’s the worst
beast in all the woods and fields, and we’ve plenty more to look out
for—Slyfoot the Mink and the Marsh Hawk are back, and Grandpop Snapping
Turtle is out again—but you’ll have to be mighty careful. You dig
yourself a root and stay hidden while I see what the birds know about
him.”
So Doctor Muskrat asked every bird who came down to drink if he’d keep
an eye out for Silvertip. That was a great many, too, for whole clouds
of them were coming north on every south wind. But they were all so busy
about courting and nesting it was three days before Doctor Muskrat had
any news. Late in the evening a whippoorwill came dipping down like a
great feathery moth and called softly: “Doctor Muskrat!” Then he perched
on the doctor’s house and whispered: “Silvertip’s living in the hollow
log that shadows my last year’s nest. He’s still too sick to hunt
anything but frogs and tadpoles and the eggs of us poor ground birds,
but the minute he can gallop he’s going to get that rabbit. He lies
there growling and swearing about him.”
Nibble couldn’t hear what the whippoorwill said. And that was lucky,
because he was lying very still in the Quail’s Thicket with those
screech owls perched right above him.
CHAPTER X
THE WICKED PLOT OF THE BAD LITTLE OWLS
As soon as the whippoorwill had finished whispering the news, about
where Silvertip was hiding, he flew off so quietly that even the doctor
couldn’t hear him. Then the wise old beast raised his queer, thin call,
almost like a whistle, to tell Nibble Rabbit he was wanted, and swam
quite as quietly to the place in the bulrushes by the pond where they
always met.
But no Nibble came. Nibble Rabbit was still hiding in the Quail’s
Thicket, listening to Mr. and Mrs. Screech Owl, who were perched right
above him.
“That bird’s telling him about Silvertip,” said one. “If it had been any
other bird in the woods he’d have spoken so we could overhear him.”
“I wish he had,” said the other. “We’ve picked that last hen so clean
we’ll have to hunt for ourselves if we can’t find him. I wonder what
that muskrat wants of him. He’s been asking every bird who came down to
drink for the last three days. I heard Chaik the Jay talking to Chewee
the Chickadee about it just when I was going to sleep this morning.”
“What did they say?” demanded Mrs. Screech Owl. The lady owl is always
the more thoughtful. They both live in trees. Silvertip never bothers
them.
“I didn’t understand,” said her mate. “Chaik was insisting that they
must all hunt hard for Silvertip. He said that it concerned every good
friend of Tommy Peele’s.”
“You pinfeathered idiot!” she exclaimed. “Why didn’t you tell me that
before? That explains why Tommy Peele and his dog were sniffing about
Silvertip’s fence corner. And that rabbit was with them. He’s at the
bottom of all this. Something’s wrong there. I never knew a wild rabbit
to be friends with a dog in all my life. If he’ll do that he’ll do
anything. Silvertip must be warned. We can’t let anything happen to him.
Besides, think how much he could do for us if he felt grateful.”
“Grateful? Not much. A fox is never grateful. But he’d know we were
useful and that amounts to the same thing. I wonder why that rabbit
doesn’t answer Doctor Muskrat?” and Mr. Screech Owl flew cautiously over
the doctor’s house in the middle of the pond. Back he came to where his
wife was still thinking. “He must have meant that call for the
whippoorwill,” he said to his mate. “He’s gone to bed.”
“We must get some friend who lives on the ground to keep watch for us,
too,” said the Lady Owl thoughtfully. “Only Silvertip has no friends.
He’ll eat anybody.”
“Excepting old Foul Fang the Rattlesnake,” said Mr. Screech Owl. “We
could buy Foul Fang’s service for a mouse a day. I’ll just do that, and
you go up to the house, not the barn, mind, and see if you can get a
word with that grandson of Ouphe the Rat who lives there. Silvertip’s
never hunted him. By the kitchen door—now flutter!” And away they went.
But Nibble waited until he was perfectly sure they had gone before he
crept down to talk with Doctor Muskrat in the bulrushes.
And he was a pretty trembly little rabbit. He hopped very carefully,
gliding from shadow to shadow like a fieldmouse. And the doctor never
moved when Nibble Rabbit slipped in beside him; he was listening to the
stars as they danced in the pool just exactly the way he had done the
night they told him Nibble’s fortune. He was muttering:
“Let him who is both young and wise
Beware the killer with lidless eyes.
“Yes, that’s all I can make out of it,” said the old doctor slowly. “Now
what does that mean, I wonder?”
“I know,” gasped Nibble, “I know—it’s Foul Fang the Rattlesnake. The
little owls don’t want us to catch that fox, Silvertip, because he
catches chickens and leaves their bones for the owls to pick. They heard
Chaik and Jay and Chewee the Chickadee talking about it. So the he-owl
has gone out to hire Foul Fang to help them. They’re going to pay him a
mouse a day to do it. And his wife has gone up to the house to bargain
with the grandson of Ouphe the Rat who lives in the walls. He’s to keep
watch on Tommy and warn them what he means to do about Silvertip. But
they don’t know where Silvertip is.”
“That’s one good thing,” the doctor nodded. “And another is that
Silvertip has no friends—nor the owls, either. They only work for him
because of what he gives them, and they have to hire their own helpers.
Now all the woods know how you help any one who’s in trouble, and Tommy
Peele has quite a few friends. I can’t see whether this warning is for
you or for Tommy.”
“Tommy, of course. Watch the Dog says he’s the cleverest boy in all the
world, and Watch is his dog, so he ought to know about him,” said Nibble
promptly.
“Hm,” laughed Doctor Muskrat into his whiskers. “Well, for a rabbit, you
know a thing or two. What cheers me up is this. The stars never warn
about something that’s surely going to happen. They warn so you can be
careful and escape your enemies. Now I’ll set every bird who drinks here
at the pool to keep watching for Foul Fang. And I’m going over to the
stump right now to send out word to all the fieldmice.”
“And I’ll go back to the Brushpile,” said Nibble, “and listen to the Bad
Little Owls when they come to their hole in the morning.”
Off set the rabbit, lipity-lipity, scudding under the brush and over the
shadows and through the grasses, until he snuggled down in a nice little
pocket where only a mouse could have found him. And about dawn he heard
the screech owls.
“It’s all fixed,” said the he-owl. “I found Foul Fang, and he knew where
Silvertip was because he’d already smelled him (snakes say they smell
any one instead of seeing him), and when I squawk the signal he’ll
rattle and Silvertip will hear it and run. I didn’t find Silvertip
because he stayed out hunting too long.”
“Fine,” said his wife. “And Tommy’s gun is all ready to start in the
morning.”
CHAPTER XI
WHY THE LITTLE OWLS’ PLANS WENT WRONG
Tommy Peele got up early, very early, on Saturday morning and took care
of his cows, for this was the day he was to hunt Silvertip the Fox with
a gun. His big cousin Sandy had come with his hound, Trailer. Sandy was
to do the shooting. And Watch took Trailer into a quiet corner and
remarked: “I don’t want to be unpleasant, but it’s a fox, not a rabbit
we’re going to kill, and if you so much as yelp at another thing I’ll
tear the hide right off you.” And Trailer opened his big brown eyes and
promised to be very careful.
All the woods and fields were ready, too, for the fox killed a great
many things besides Tommy’s chickens. Every one hoped Tommy would kill
him; every one but little Mr. and Mrs. Screech Owl and Foul Fang the
Rattlesnake, who was hiding that very minute in the leaves in front of
the fox’s log.
Nibble wanted to warn Watch, but when he saw Trailer sniffing along
beside him he didn’t dare. So off he set toward the woods. And Watch and
Trailer followed him. Pretty soon Trailer said: “I thought you weren’t
chasing rabbits.”
“I’m not,” growled Watch. “He’s showing us where the fox is hidden.” And
maybe that didn’t set Trailer wondering.
Just then those Bad Little Owls stumbled past, bumping against the
twigs, for they fly badly in the daytime. But they never reached Foul
Fang, for Chaik the Jay, who was another of Tommy’s friends, was lying
in wait for them. He had his whole family to help him, and what they did
to those Bad Little Owls!
Meantime, Nibble was going slowly and carefully on the lookout for Foul
Fang. “Stop!” shrieked Chewee the Chickadee from a branch above him.
“Foul Fang’s right in front of you. I saw him move a minute ago, but I
can’t see him until he moves again.”
Nibble froze in his tracks. Foul Fang was ahead, that strange dog was
behind him. But he knew he mustn’t let any one pass him. He waited until
the dogs were very close, then he darted past them, right to Tommy’s
feet, calling: “Foul Fang! Foul Fang!”
“Wait!” barked Watch to Trailer. “Something’s wrong.” And he ran and
caught Tommy by the coat to stop him. And of course Trailer and Tommy’s
cousin Sandy stopped, too. “What’s up?” demanded Sandy.
“I don’t know,” said Tommy, “but there’s my chickadee, and here’s my
rabbit. Something’s frightening them.”
“There, there! Look!” squeaked Chewee, dancing about on his twig like a
crazy bird. Foul Fang raised his ugly head to sniff at them. Then he
wound into his striking coil.
“Bz-z-z!” began Foul Fang’s rattle. “Bang-bang!” went Sandy’s gun. “A
snake! No wonder they were frightened!” exclaimed Sandy. “Lucky that
rabbit saw him!”
“Wow-wow-wow!” bayed Trailer, for Silvertip bolted out of his log and
began to run.
“Bang—bang!” went the gun. And that did scare Nibble. It sent him flying
through the woods, straight for Doctor Muskrat’s Pool.
The old doctor was out on his flat stone; but he wasn’t asleep. He was
sitting straight up with his round ears pricked and his whiskers
stiffened, listening. Ka-flick, ka-flick, came the long bounces of
Nibble Rabbit. “Chick-adee-dee-dee-dee-ee!” rang out the joyful shout of
Chewee, just a little way behind him. “We-e-e-ak!” came the far-away
squeak of a fieldmouse. “We-e-e-aw!” echoed one nearer at paw.
“R-r-r-r!” drummed a partridge, and a meadowlark who was drinking
remarked: “That’s a death beat, but he isn’t muffling it. Sounds as
though he were mighty glad about it.”
Ka-flick-thump! Nibble Rabbit landed beside the doctor. “I warned
Tommy!” was all he had breath to gasp. But here came Chewee, his wings
whirring like a humming bird’s, his eyes popping like a crawfish’s, as
though they had stalks to stand on. “Whee!” he screeched. “You ought to
see—ee—ee!”
“See what?” called Chaik, who was hurrying by to find out what all the
noise meant, and he circled back to listen.
“Foul Fang!” squeaked Chewee, turning somersaults on a bulrush. “He’s in
three pieces, and his tail is cut off and his wicked scales are
squirming in the sun.”
“Yeah!” squawked Chaik, dancing on his wings. “And those Bad Little Owls
are hiding in the Brushpile. I’m all mussed up from climbing in after
them, but my relatives and I have picked them ’most as clean as the mice
picked Nibble’s woodchuck. I’m going back to shout the news at them.
Yeah!” And off he flew.
“What did it?” gasped Nibble.
“You silly rabbit,” chuckled Doctor Muskrat. “That ‘bang!’ was a gun.”
“Oh,” and Nibble sat up to think. “The partridge did say Man could make
more noise than a summer storm. He certainly can!”
“Why, Nibble!” teased Doctor Muskrat, his shiny little eyes twinkling,
“didn’t you ever hear a gun? Every other creature in all the Woods and
Fields has been waiting for that noise to celebrate the death of
Silvertip the Fox. That was what Tommy Peele brought out here to kill
him.”
“Did it?” demanded Nibble Rabbit. He knew that it pretty nearly stunned
one small and scary rabbit he could tell about.
“Not if it bit Foul Fang in three pieces,” answered the wise old doctor.
“That takes two bites, one for each noise. Silvertip isn’t bitten yet.”
“Shot” was what he meant, but the Woodsfolk don’t use that word.
“How do you know he isn’t bitten?” squealed Chewee the Chickadee. He was
twirling and tumbling about the bulrushes because he was too happy and
excited to keep still. “He jumped right out under the nose of Trailer,
that hound Tommy Peele brought to help his own dog Watch. And the last I
saw he was just about two steps ahead of Trailer’s jaws.”
“Ssh!” warned Doctor Muskrat, and he cocked his ears. Far, far away they
could hear Trailer calling, “Where, where?” And Watch answered: “Isn’t
this fox?” and Tommy Peele’s cousin was shouting: “Hie out, Trailer!
Find him!”
“You see,” said the doctor, “Silvertip’s saved his skin this time. But
we’ll find him again.”
He was right. Late in the afternoon Tommy came trudging along with his
head down, too unhappy to listen to the “Thank you” the meadowlarks were
singing, and the one Chewee brought from the partridge. For every
creature that lived or nested on the ground was more than grateful to be
rid of Foul Fang. Tommy’s big cousin Sandy was carrying his gun, and his
dog Trailer was so tired he could scarcely crawl. Watch was tired and
sheepish besides. He came down for a drink and whispered: “See where
Silvertip sleeps. We’ll be out again to-morrow.”
“I wonder how he got away,” said Nibble, stamping impatiently. He’d come
from eating a dandelion head in the Quail’s Thicket to see what Watch
had to say.
“I can tell you,” came the soft whisper of the whippoorwill who had
skimmed a drink as he flew across the pond, leaving a wake of tiny,
quiet ripples. “There’s still deep water in the ditches. Silvertip
splashed along in it to hide his trail and then sneaked into the culvert
where it runs under the woods road. The frogs say he almost drowned. But
he shivered in there with only his nose out until Trailer circled past.
Then he ran back in the ditch on the other side and jumped over to a
tree that was broken off by the terrible storm. He climbed up the limbs
to the broken stump—it’s ten good wingbeats above the ground—and curled
up in a woodduck’s nest. And he ate every egg she’d laid, too. Now he’s
coming this way.”
[Illustration: Silvertip hid under the culvert until Trailer circled
past.]
“My stars, Nibble!” exclaimed the doctor, “you can’t sleep here. Warn
Watch and hide somewhere up near the barn!” So off Nibble ran.
CHAPTER XII
HOW LONG EARS HEARD BAD NEWS
The minute the whippoorwill said that Silvertip the Fox was coming right
back into the very woods Tommy Peele and his cousin Sandy and the dogs
had just driven him out of, they knew he did it for just one reason: he
was bound to catch Nibble. So that was no place for a sensible bunny. It
was really pretty scary.
But you know Nibble. He can’t stay frightened, because he’s so terribly
curious. Before ever he hunted himself a safe place to sleep he had to
sneak into the Brushpile and listen to the Bad Little Owls. They were
just creeping out from beneath it, where they had hidden away from Chaik
Jay and his family.
“Are you all right?” asked Mr. Owl. “I feel better since I slept, but
those jays gave us a terrible mauling.”
“My poor wings!” mourned his wife. “I am ashamed to be seen in them.”
“What’s a lot worse, we’ll have hardly a thing to fly with, until our
fall feathers come in,” he complained. “My wings aren’t very bad, but
I’ll never be able to steer until my tail grows.”
“I’m going to watch Chaik’s nest,” scolded the Lady Owl, “and let Mrs.
Hooter drag his wife out by the claws as soon as ever she gets back
here. Her owlets are out already, so it won’t be long. And I’ll smash
every one of Chaik’s eggs with my very own beak—see if I don’t!” Mrs.
Owl was still nearly crying over her ruffled feathers.
“No, you won’t!” snapped her husband. The husband, you know, is always
the timid one of an owl family. “We’d have Tommy Peele shooting us next!
What do you think made Chaik take after us, eh? He was helping Tommy.
That boy wouldn’t have a chance of finding that clever fox if half the
Woodsfolk weren’t helping him. It’s a bad thing to have any man so
friendly with them.” Of course it was, for a bad bird like the owl or a
bad beast like Silvertip.
“It certainly is,” she agreed. “Tommy would be hunting them all just as
hard as we do if it weren’t for that rabbit. It’s all his fault. We’ve
got to get rid of him. Let’s tell Silvertip about the flat stone where
he thumps for Doctor Muskrat.”
“Let’s find his hole,” said her husband. “Every mouse in the Woods and
Fields knows about it; they went there this spring for woodchuck fur to
make a charm against us owls. I’ll show them if it can keep me from
catching one. Then we’ll offer to let him go if he tells us.”
“Yes,” she agreed, “and then we can eat him afterward, so he won’t run
and warn that rabbit.”
“Thank you so much for all this information,” said Nibble to himself.
“If Silvertip stays in the woods tonight I can sleep very comfortably in
the haystack.”
Nibble slept in the haystack that night, but he didn’t sleep any too
well, because the news of Foul Fang’s death had travelled ’way up to the
barn and the mice were celebrating. Besides, he had to sleep with one
ear up, listening for Watch.
He heard the old dog padding past early in the morning, before even the
birds were awake, and thumped to call him. In another minute Watch and
Trailer the hound, who was with him, were sniffing at the door of Ouphe
the Rat’s old tunnel under the hay. “What’s on your mind?” the big dog
whined softly. “Trailer won’t chase you.”
“I know he won’t,” Nibble chuckled. “I’m not going to run for him. I’m
going to stay snuggled up in here until I hear him busy after
Silvertip.”
“There,” said Watch proudly, “Trailer, I told you Nibble would find
him.”
“But I don’t see how we lost him,” Trailer insisted. “He simply
disappeared in the middle of a hot trail. I never lifted my nose from
it.”
“The whippoorwill said he took to water and then climbed up into the
woodduck’s nest in the top of that fallen tree,” said Nibble. “But why
didn’t the gun catch him? That’s what I want to know.”
“The gun’s a stupid thing,” Trailer explained. “It bangs twice and then
it has to be fed again before it will do anything more.” (He knew it was
no use to tell Nibble about putting fresh shells into a double-barrelled
shotgun, because even Watch, who was a very wise dog, didn’t
understand.) “My man Sandy was so excited over shooting the snake that
he forgot to feed it. He didn’t hear me bark until Silvertip and I were
out of sight in the brush. And Silvertip was gone before he found me
again. That gun has to use his eyes to see with and his legs to run
with, and no man’s fast enough to chase a fox. That’s why Watch and I
think we can get him just as easily if we go out alone.”
“Yes, and I don’t like taking Tommy Peele to meet strange snakes in
strange woods,” said Watch. “It worries me so I can’t keep my mind on
what I’m doing.”
“Of course,” Nibble agreed. “Well, last night I overheard the little
screech owls in the Brushpile—my paddy-paws are good for more than to
scrub my ears with, I can tell you. They’re so quiet even the owls
didn’t hear them, and they said they were going to tell Silvertip to
watch the flat stone where I thump for Doctor Muskrat, or my hole. He’ll
be one place or the other. And please tell Doctor Muskrat I’ll go around
to the far side of the pool to meet him.”
“All right,” promised Watch. And off went the dogs with their tails
wagging. “I tell you what,” growled Trailer, “that rabbit is a great
help to hunt with.”
CHAPTER XIII
HOW THE GREAT HUNT ENDED
Nibble Rabbit cuddled down comfortably in the bottom of the haystack.
Pretty soon he heard Trailer bark. “Aough! Here, Watch! Quick! Catch
him!”
“They didn’t get him that time, either,” thought Nibble as Trailer’s
voice settled down to the hunting call. “But I guess Silvertip’s too
busy to hurt me, and I must tell Doctor Muskrat to keep away from that
flat stone.” So off he went to the woods as fast as ever his paddy-feet
would carry him.
But he didn’t go straight to Doctor Muskrat’s Pool. He ran around the
lower end of the Prickly Ash Thicket, where his hole was, and jumped
across the brook. Then he came up on the far side of the pool and hid in
a clump of willows. Deep in the woods he could hear Trailer, still
baying. Everything else was very still. He thumped softly.
“M—m! Eh? Is that you, Nibble?” came the startled voice of the old
doctor. “Watch sent me over here and I fell asleep. We sat up all night
watching Silvertip, Whippoorwill and I. He slept curled up on that
rotten log just behind your hole.”
“Then the little owls did find a fieldmouse,” said Nibble. “They said
they’d make one show it to them and then eat him so he couldn’t tell
me.”
“Well, that’s just what they tried to do,” and the doctor’s eyes
twinkled, “but he managed to wriggle away when he got there and pop
right into it. And he dug along the big root that runs up into the mouse
tunnels and was down here for me to put a moss-seed poultice on his claw
wounds while they were still watching your doorway. A doctor knows
pretty much everything that goes on, I can tell you.”
“And Silvertip?” asked Nibble.
“Oh, that hound all but caught him!” the doctor exclaimed. “He came
sneaking out when Watch called me, and he was so busy trying to hear
what one dog had to say that he forgot all about the other. He squeaked
like a frightened mouse.”
“How exciting!” Nibble flicked his tufty little tail at the thought of
it. “I had Watch tell you not to go back to that flat stone because the
little owls know about it. Those bad little birds will do anything to
help Silvertip. They bargained with Foul Fang the Rattlesnake, and they
bargained with the grandson of Ouphe the Rat. They might bargain with
Slyfoot the Mink to watch it.”
“There’s someone watching it this very minute that the little owls
didn’t bargain with,” answered Doctor Muskrat. “It’s Grandpop Snapping
Turtle. He moves just a little closer every day, and then he settles
down in the mud so exactly like a stone himself, that even I can hardly
tell the difference. He’s very polite—but we’ll keep a safe distance
away from him. What’s that?”
For a shadow was floating over the old doctor’s pool.
Nibble and Doctor Muskrat crouched very low among the willow stems as it
sailed silently above them. It was just daybreak, when mice scuttle down
to drink and crayfish are stiff with the night’s chill—the best hunting
time of the day for the marsh hawk. The woods were very still; they
couldn’t hear even the distant barking of the dogs.
Pretty soon Nibble put up his head. “It’s the whippoorwill,” he
whispered, flashing a signal to the bird. “He’s got news of Silvertip!
Do you suppose they’ve caught him?” He was so excited that he squirmed
inside his furry skin.
“We’ll know in a minute,” said Doctor Muskrat, as the whippoorwill
dropped quietly to the ground.
But he fluttered in surprise when he saw the doctor. “Great beetles!” he
exclaimed. “I just saw your nose poking out of the water by the flat
stone.”
“Not his,” said Nibble. “We can’t go there, because the Bad Little Owls
who help Silvertip are watching it.”
“Yes,” put in the doctor, “and so is Grandpop Snapping Turtle, who helps
himself.”
“O—ho!” said the whippoorwill. “I thought it was you, hiding from the
little owls. They’re in the Quail’s Thicket.”
“And Silvertip?” asked Nibble.
“Silvertip’s too clever for those dogs. He’s got away,” said the
whippoorwill, sadly. “I know just how you feel. It’s awful to know he’s
always after you. But you did me a good turn when you found that
rattlesnake and showed it to Tommy Peele. And Tommy did me a good turn
when he shot it. I’ll help you all I can. Only when a fox is smart
enough to run along the top of a fence to hide his trail, what dog will
ever catch him?”
“There’s just one thing sure,” said Doctor Muskrat, “he’ll catch himself
with his own cleverness one of these days.”
“Listen!” breathed the whippoorwill. “He’s come back to the brook on his
own trail. Now he’s walking in the water to hide his footsteps while he
crosses to the Quail’s Thicket to see if the little owls have found
Nibble. Isn’t that smart?”
Ka-splash, ka-splash, ka-splash, ka-splash, went the cautious feet of
the fox. He was wading up the other side of the pond, nearer and nearer
to the flat stone. Ka-splash—he was right beside it. Ka-splash. “Yah!”
he screamed. “A trap! Urr—waur-r-r! Leggo, leggo!” he snarled, biting
the thing that gripped his leg.
Then slowly, surely, they saw him dragged deeper and deeper into the
pool.
“Oh!” gasped Nibble. “How awful! That was—Grandpop Snapping Turtle!”
“Lip, lip, lip,” sang the ripples against the shore. They broke in rings
about the poor fox’s nose as it disappeared. They travelled clear across
to the farthest shore where Nibble Rabbit and Doctor Muskrat were
crouching in the willows, and they whispered “Silvertip’s gone.”
“Poor Silvertip,” gasped Nibble. “I wouldn’t have minded a bit if the
dogs had caught him—but to be drowned—Ugh!” And he shivered.
“That’s all in the way you look at it,” answered the doctor. “You’re
used to the idea of having something run you down and kill you. But we
muskrats are quite used to the idea of being eaten by snapping turtles.
If I’m not clever enough to get away it doesn’t matter to me which gets
me in the end.”
“But he’s terribly dangerous,” Nibble insisted. “I should think you’d be
afraid to dive into the same pond with him. We must catch him. We can
get Tommy to help us.”
“There’s no need of that,” argued the wise old beast calmly. “I’ve grown
up in this pond. And Grandpop Snapping Turtle has been paddling around
in it every summer since I was born. He’s never troubled me because so
far I’m smarter than he is. When I get old and stupid perhaps he will.”
“But why should there be anything to catch us?” persisted Nibble. “Why
can’t we make a compact with them, like the cows made with the dogs, or
why can’t we make a compact with Man to help us kill them? Then it would
be like Mother Nature meant to have it in the First-Off Beginning.”
“You forget that they both were Mother Nature’s own children to start
with. Even she can’t make a compact with the
Things-that-came-from-under-the-earth like Grandpop. And those are the
worst enemies we have. Besides, I think even Mother Nature has changed
her mind about that first plan. Now she’s growing something she never
thought of.”
“What’s that?” asked Nibble, trying hard to guess.
“Brains! we’re learning to think. You’re safe enough if you know all
your enemy knows and then think for yourself besides. It’s only when
he’s cleverer than you are that he can catch you. If we had no enemies
we’d still be as stupid as plants—no, stupider—because they had to learn
to take care of themselves, too.”
“I see,” said Nibble, slowly. “Silvertip was safe on land because he was
smarter than any one else. He got caught when he took to the water
because Grandpop Snapping Turtle knew more about that than he did.”
“Exactly,” agreed Doctor Muskrat. “It was perfectly fair. Look at Man.
He had the most enemies and the least help from Mother Nature. Now no
one can hurt him but himself—he still has that much to learn. But he’s
wiser and safer than any one else in all the world. And his enemies
taught him.”
THE END
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Sins of Silvertip the Fox" ***
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