"You don"t mean to say they have run away, do you?" asked Uncle Wiggily, in surprise.
"No, not exactly run away. But they have not come home from school, though the lady mouse, who teaches in the hollow stump, must have let the animal children out long ago."
"She did," Uncle Wiggily said. "I came past the hollow stump school on my way here, and every one was gone."
"Then where can Jackie and Peetie be keeping themselves?" asked Mrs.
Bow Wow. "Oh, I"m so worried about them!"
"Don"t be worried or frightened," said Uncle Wiggily, kindly. "I"ll go look for them for you."
"Oh, if you will I"ll be so glad!" cried Mrs. Bow Wow. "And if you find them please tell them to come home at once."
"I will," promised the bunny uncle.
Giving the dog lady her thimble, Uncle Wiggily set off through the woods to look for Jackie and Peetie Bow Wow. On every side of the woodland path he peered, under trees and bushes and around the corners of moss-covered rocks and big stumps.
But no little puppy dog chaps could he find.
All at once, as Mr. Longears was going past an old log he heard a rustling in the bushes, and a voice said:
"Well, we nearly caught them, didn"t we?"
"We surely did," said another voice. "And I think if we race after them once more we"ll certainly have them. Let"s rest here a bit, and then chase those puppy dogs some more. That Jackie is a good runner."
"I think Peetie is better," said the other voice. "Anyhow, they both got away from us."
"Ha! This must be Peetie and Jackie Bow Wow they are talking about,"
said Uncle Wiggily to himself. "This sounds like trouble. So the puppy dogs were chased, were they? I must see by whom."
He peeked through the bushes, and there he saw two big, bad foxes, whose tongues were hanging out over their white teeth, for the foxes had run far and they were tired.
"I see how it is," Uncle Wiggily thought. "The foxes chased the little puppy dogs as they were coming from school and Jackie and Peetie have run somewhere and hidden. I must find them."
Just then one of the foxes cried:
"Come on. Now we"ll chase after those puppies, and get them. Come on!"
"Ha! I must go, too!" thought Uncle Wiggily. "Maybe I can scare away the foxes, and save Jackie and Peetie."
So the foxes ran and Uncle Wiggily also ran, and pretty soon the rabbit gentleman came to a place in the woods where grew a tree with big white blossoms on it, and in the center the blossoms were colored a dark red.
"Ha! There are the puppy boys under that tree!" cried one fox, and, surely enough, there, right under the tree, Jackie and Peetie were crouched, trembling and much frightened.
"We"ll get them!" cried the other fox. "Come on!"
And then, all of a sudden, as the foxes leaped toward the poor little puppy dog boys, that tree began to hark and growl and it cried out loud:
"Get away from here, you bad foxes! Leave Jackie and Peetie alone!
Wow! Bow-wow! Gurr-r-r-r!" and the tree barked and roared so like a lion that the foxes were frightened and were glad enough to run away, taking their tails with them. Then Jackie and Peetie came safely out, and thanked the tree for taking care of them.
[Ill.u.s.tration: The tree barked and roared so like a lion that the foxes were frightened and were glad enough to run away.]
"Oh, you are welcome," said the tree. "I am the dogwood tree, you know, so why should I not bark and growl to scare foxes, and take care of you little puppy chaps? Come to me again whenever any bad foxes chase you." And Peetie and Jackie said they would.
So Uncle Wiggily, after also thanking the tree, took the doggie boys home, and they told him how the foxes had chased them soon after they came from school, so they had to run.
But everything came out all right, you see, and if the black cat doesn"t dip his tail in the ink, and make chalk marks all over the piano, I"ll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the hazel nuts.
STORY XVIII
UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE HAZEL NUTS
"Going out again, Uncle Wiggily?" asked Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, one morning, as she saw the rabbit gentleman taking his red, white and blue-striped rheumatism crutch down off the clock shelf.
"Well, yes, Janie, I did think of going out for a little stroll in the forest," answered the bunny uncle, talking like a phonograph. What he meant was that he was going for a walk in the woods, but he thought he"d be polite about it, and stylish, just for once.
"Don"t forget your umbrella," went on Nurse Jane. "It looks to me very much as though there would be a storm."
"I think you"re right," Uncle Wiggily said. "Our April showers are not yet over. I shall take my umbrella."
So, with his umbrella, and the rheumatism crutch which Nurse Jane had gnawed for him out of a cornstalk, off started the bunny uncle, hopping along over the fields and through the woods.
Pretty soon Uncle Wiggily met Johnnie Bushytail, the squirrel boy.
"Where are you going, Johnnie?" asked the rabbit gentleman. "Are you here in the woods, looking for an adventure? That"s what I"m doing."
"No, Uncle Wiggily," answered the squirrel boy. "I"m not looking for an adventure. I"m looking for hazel nuts."
"Hazel nuts?" cried the bunny uncle in surprise.
"Yes," went on Johnnie. "You know they"re something like chestnuts, only without the p.r.i.c.kly burrs, and they"re very good to eat. They grow on bushes, instead of trees. I"m looking for some to eat. They are nice, brown, shiny nuts."
"Good!" cried the rabbit gentleman. "We"ll go together looking for hazel nuts, and perhaps we may also find an adventure. I"ll take the adventure and you can take the hazel nuts."
"All right!" laughed Johnnie, and off they started.
On and over the fields and through the woods went the bunny uncle and Johnnie, until, just as they were close to the place where some extra early new kind of Spring hazel nuts grew on bushes, there was a noise behind a big black stump--and suddenly out pounced a bear!
"Oh, h.e.l.lo, Neddie Stubtail!" called Johnnie. And he was just going up and shake paws when Uncle Wiggily cried:
"Look out, Johnnie! Wait a minute! That isn"t your friend Neddie!"
"Isn"t it?" asked Johnnie, surprised-like, and he drew back.
"No, it"s a bad old bear--not our nice Neddie, at all! And I think he is going to chase us! Get ready to run!"