But his wife caught hold of his coat-tails and begged him to stay with her.
"No! no!" she cried. "You must not stir out of the house. I"d be terribly worried if you left me alone here with these six small children. And you might get hurt, besides."
Meanwhile the racket on the roof continued, with only a short pause between each outburst. The six Wren children began to cry--for they were hungry as well as frightened. And all the time Mrs. Rusty clung to her husband"s coat-tails and besought him not to leave her.
To tell the truth, he had no such intention. Though he was very brave for his size, he was thoroughly alarmed. And for the time being he was quite content to stay inside his snug house and hope that the trouble would soon come to an end.
On the whole, the Wren family spent a very unpleasant quarter of an hour. The _bang, clatter, bang_ on their roof still continued until the din became almost unbearable. And Rusty Wren grew so desperate that he had almost made up his mind to break away from his wife, even if he had to leave his coat-tails behind him, and dash out of doors to see what was the matter.
Then all at once a different sound fell upon their ears. And as soon as they heard it they knew at once that the sky was not falling, anyhow.
"_Jay! jay!_" Jasper Jay"s harsh voice was unmistakable. He had been playing one of his sly tricks on the Wren family; and they had never guessed that it was he!
XII
THE UNWELCOME VISITOR
"It"s Jasper Jay!" Rusty Wren cried, as soon as he and his wife heard the hoa.r.s.e cry outside their house. "He"s playing one of his tricks on us. And I"m going out and tell him exactly what I think of him."
"Don"t forget to tell him what I think of him, too!" Mrs. Rusty said, as she let go of her husband"s coat-tails.
Then Rusty hurried through the little doorway. And there was Jasper, sitting on a limb above the house, with a cherry in his bill, which he let fall with a sly smile.
The cherry struck the roof of Rusty"s house with a loud _bang_! And then came the same _clatter_, to which the Wren family had been listening.
"Here! Stop that!" Rusty cried.
Jasper Jay shrieked with laughter.
"Go away!" said Rusty.
"Go away yourself!" retorted Jasper.
"This is my home," Rusty Wren told him hotly. "And you"ve no right to come here and frighten my wife and children like this."
"How shall I frighten them, then?" Jasper Jay asked him. "Perhaps you like this way better!" he shouted. And with that he flew straight at Rusty Wren. He was so big and he looked so cruel that Rusty turned tail and dashed back into his house again. And he was glad that his doorway was not much bigger than a twenty-five-cent piece, because he knew that Jasper Jay could never squeeze through so small an opening.
Jasper alighted on top of the house and jumped up and down on the roof, striking it with his bill and screaming angrily.
"Don"t be afraid!" Rusty said to his wife. "He can"t do any harm.
And after a while he"ll grow tired of staying here and he"ll go away."
Well, Rusty was half right, at least. For Jasper Jay went away at last; but he didn"t wait until he had grown weary of his rowdyish sport.
Now, Johnnie Green happened to hear Jasper"s harsh cries. And, looking out of the window, he saw Jasper"s strange performance.
"That blue jay is teasing my little wrens!" Johnnie Green cried indignantly. And, catching up a potato from the kitchen table, he hurried to the door and hurled it as hard as he could at the blue-coated trouble-maker.
The potato missed Jasper Jay by less than an inch, bringing up _kerplunk!_ against the trunk of the old cherry tree, and breaking into several pieces.
And then it was Jasper Jay"s turn to be alarmed. He jumped off the roof of Rusty Wren"s house as if he had been shot and dashed off as fast as his handsome wings could carry him. He knew of no way to tease Johnnie Green; so there was really no sense in his staying in Farmer Green"s yard any longer.
Johnnie jeered at Jasper as the frightened bully hurried away.
"You"d better not come skulking around here again!" he shouted.
Although the cherries hung red and juicy upon the old tree for at least a week longer, just begging to be picked--as one might say--Jasper Jay did not come back to enjoy them. He told Jolly Robin that he was entirely too busy to waste his time in an old cherry tree.
XIII
BOY WANTED!
It seemed to take Rusty Wren"s wife a long time to recover from the fright that Jasper Jay had given her. He had amused himself by dropping cherries upon the roof of her house. But the trick had not amused the Wren family in the least.
Even after Johnnie Green had driven the blue-coated rascal away from the dooryard Mrs. Rusty Wren was all aflutter. She jumped at the slightest noise. And she was so nervous that Rusty soon saw that it was a great effort for her to go abroad for food for their hungry family.
"You must stay right here at home and rest," he urged her. "I"ll find enough for the children to eat--and for you too," he said manfully.
And really there was nothing else that his wife could do; for her nerves were in a frightful state.
So Rusty Wren took up his task cheerfully. He found it no easy one, either. Feeding six growing youngsters had kept both their parents working every minute all day long, because the children were always clamoring for more food. And now they seemed half starved, for they had had nothing to eat all the time that Jasper Jay had kept Rusty and his wife hiding in their house.
Rusty Wren, however, was not one to complain, no matter what happened. And every day from dawn till dark he hurried out of the house to find some toothsome insect, and bring it home to drop it into somebody"s yawning mouth.
Indeed, he was so busy feeding his family that he scarcely had a chance to eat anything himself. So he grew quite thin. And though he still sang as merrily as ever, his wife noticed the change that had come over him.
Naturally, that made her worry. And since worrying was bad for her nerves, she began to grow worse instead of better.
"I don"t know what"s going to become of us," she said at last. "As the children grow bigger they need more to eat. And I can see plainly that you"re never going to be able to provide enough for them."
"Oh! they"ll soon be old enough to leave home and catch their own insects," Rusty told her hopefully. "And until that time comes I"ll manage somehow, even if I have to work after dark."
But that plan did not suit his wife at all.
"I shouldn"t care to stay alone in the house at night with six small children," she said. "That will never do."
"I have it!" Rusty cried suddenly. "I"ll get somebody to help me!"
Well, his wife didn"t think much of that plan, either.