CHAPTER XV
A BIG WHITE BIRD
Mrs. Martin looked up, smiling at the three children. She was thinkingof setting out the lunch which had been brought along, and perhaps hermind was so much on this, wondering whether there would be enough forfive hungry children, that, at first, she did not know just what Tomand Ted were saying.
“Come on, Mother!” cried Ted to her. “You come and see what it is!”
“Where shall I come?” she asked, getting up, as Ted tugged at her handto help her to her feet.
“Come to the growlery hole,” begged Tom.
“And me want my wed ball!” cried Trouble.
“Is this some game you are playing?” asked Mrs. Martin, looking firstat one and then the other. “Have you taken Trouble’s ball and hiddenit, Teddy?”
“Oh, no’m!” answered the little Curlytop boy. “Trouble threw his balldown a hole. Tom and I tried to get it out for him, but every time wepoke our hands or a stick in a growl comes out of the hole.”
“What comes out?” asked Mrs. Martin in surprise.
“A growl!” answered Tom. “It’s a growl, like a dog, and that’s why wecall it the growlery hole.”
“Maybe it’s Skyrocket, Mother!” suggested Ted. “Please come and see.”
“Oh, it couldn’t be Skyrocket,” said Mrs. Martin. “If your dog were ina hole he’d come out as soon as you called him. Besides, how wouldSkyrocket get here?”
“He might get away from the Gypsies,” answered Ted. “Anyhow, Mother,come and see what’s in the growlery hole, please!”
“Very well, I’ll come,” said his mother. “But it’s probably only alittle squirrel or chipmunk that thinks you’re trying to hurt it.”
“Does a squirrel or a chipmunk growl?” asked Tom.
“Well, I don’t know that they exactly growl,” answered Mrs. Martin,“but they make funny noises. However, we’ll go see what it is.”
As she was starting back with the three boys to the place that Ted andTom called the growlery hole, Jan and Lola came over the top of alittle hill.
“Where are you going, Mother?” asked Jan. “Is it time to eat?”
“Not quite,” answered the Curlytops’ mother. “But it will be soon. Iam going with the boys to look at a growlery hole. Do you want tocome, Jan and Lola?”
“Is a growlery hole nice?” asked Janet.
“I don’t know—I never saw one,” Mrs. Martin answered with a smile.“Tell them about it, Ted.”
Which Ted and Tom did, in quite excited voices, you may be sure.
“Is it very loud growls that come out?” asked Ted’s sister.
“If they’re as loud as thunder I don’t want to see them!” declaredLola.
“You can’t _see_ growls, you _hear_ ’em!” exclaimed Tom.
“Well, we’ll go, anyway, and see _and_ hear,” said Janet.
So Lola and Janet went with Mrs. Martin, Trouble, Ted, and Tom to the“growlery hole.”
“There it is!” cried Tom, after a little walk. “There’s the growleryhole!”
“Yes, there it is!” added Ted.
They pointed to a small hole under the overhanging ledge of a rock.
“My wed ball down there!” said Trouble. “Me want wed ball!”
“All right. Mother will see if she can get it for you,” promised Mrs.Martin with a smile. “But first I want to hear the growl.”
“Just poke a stick down, or your hand, and you’ll hear it,” said Tom.
“I think I’d better put a stick down first,” answered Mrs. Martin. “Ifthere is some animal there—and there seems to be from what you boyssay—he might bite me. A stick will be safer.”
And when she thrust down the same stick that Tom and Ted had used,surely enough there sounded first a growl and then a queer littlebarking noise.
“Oh, is it Skyrocket?” cried Janet.
“No, I think not,” answered her mother. “It doesn’t sound at all likeour little dog. But there’s some animal there, that’s sure, and Idon’t believe that it is quite as harmless as a squirrel or a rabbit.I’ll tell you what we’ll do.”
“What?” cried the four larger children in a chorus.
“We’ll wait until Uncle Ben comes,” was the answer. “He knows a lotabout the woods and about animals.”
“Uncle Ben get my wed ball?” asked Trouble.
“Yes, we’ll have Uncle Ben get your red ball if he can,” his mothertold him. “And now we might as well go back and have our lunch.”
“But maybe the bear in the growlery hole will take Trouble’s red ballwhile we’re gone,” said Teddy.
“It isn’t a bear in there—that’s sure,” answered Mrs. Martin. “Thereare no bears around here.”
They all went back to the little grassy hill under the shade of thetrees, and near the spring of clear, cold, bubbling water. There Mrs.Martin set out the lunch on a big flat stump for a table, and thechildren sat down on the ground to eat it.
“Oh! Ah! Um!” murmured Teddy and Janet when they saw their mother setout some jam tarts on a little wooden plate.
“You may pass them, Janet,” said her mother, and Janet, very politely,passed the jam tarts first to Lola, she being company, and next toTom, he being company also.
“Me want jam tart!” cried Trouble, reaching across the stump-table.
“Yes, you shall have one, dear,” said Janet, and she passed the plateto him next, at the same time smiling at Tom and Ted. They understoodwhat this meant—that Ted would have to wait until his little brotherhad been served. Then came Ted’s turn, and next Janet offered theplate to her mother.
“Help yourself, dear,” said Mrs. Martin. “I am not very hungry.”
But the Curlytops were, and so were Trouble and Tom and Lola. And Iwish you could have seen them all eat! No, on second thought, I don’twish that. It would have made you so hungry that you would go rightout to the kitchen, I’m sure, and ask whoever was there to make somejam tarts. And there might just happen to be no jam, you know.
So we’ll pass over that part and I’ll tell you what happened next.Lola was eating a second jam tart, and had just taken one bite fromit, when Janet asked her to pass the sugar. Lola put her tart down ona plate at her side to reach for the sugar bowl, and when she turnedagain to take up her piece of pastry it was gone.
“Tom Taylor!” she exclaimed, looking sharply at her brother, who satnext to her, “did you take my jam tart?”
“Why no, I didn’t take it,” he answered.
“You’re eating one!” exclaimed Lola.
“This is my own!” Tom declared. “Ted passed it to me; didn’t you,Ted?”
“Yes, I gave it to you,” was the answer.
“Well, somebody took mine!” cried Lola. “I put it down to hand Jan thesugar, and now it’s gone!”
“I think I can show you who took it, Lola, my dear,” said Mrs. Martin,in a low voice.
“Who?” asked the little girl.
“Look over there, on that little stump,” was the whispered answer.“There is the little chap who took it.”
Lola and the others looked, and saw a pretty striped chipmunk, alittle animal something like a squirrel. The chipmunk was sitting upon the flat stump, and, held in its paws, was the missing jam tart.Mr. Chipmunk was eating away as fast as he could at Lola’s tart, andhe seemed to like it. He didn’t mind in the least that she had taken abite out of it. Though of course I suppose he would rather have had awhole one.
“There is the burglar who took your tart, Lola!” said Mrs. Martin.
“Oh, did he come up here when I wasn’t looking and take it?” asked thelittle girl who was visiting the Curlytops.
“That’s just what he did. The chipmunks in these woods are very tame,”said Mrs. Martin. “I have heard campers say they would sometimes jumpup on the table and take pieces of bread. The little animals are sopretty and harmless that no one hurts them, so they grow bolder andbolder. Next time put your jam tart down in front of you, and then you
can shoo the chipmunk away if he comes after it.”
“Maybe I won’t have any more jam tarts,” said Lola.
“Oh, yes, I have some more in another box,” answered Mrs. Martin, witha laugh. “But watch out for chipmunks!”
And they did, after that. They watched the one that had taken Lola’start as it sat on the stump eating it until Trouble laughed so hard atthe queer motions of the striped animal that Mr. Chipmunk seemed notto like it, and away he scampered, carrying what was left of the tartwith him.
There was no other accident to the rest of the picnic lunch, exceptthat a lot of ants crawled on a piece of bread and sugar that Troublelaid down for a moment, and some bees buzzed around when Mrs. Martinbrought out a can of peaches. But the bees stung no one, and Troublesaid the ants could have his bread.
The dishes were put away—there was no lunch itself left, you may besure—and when the crumbs had been brushed into a little pile for thebirds, and the scattered papers piled under a rock so they would notblow about and make the woods untidy, Ted looked down toward SilverLake and cried:
“Here comes Uncle Ben!”
“Yes, that’s our boat,” said Mrs. Martin, shading her eyes from thesun and peering toward the boat at which Ted pointed.
“Now we’ll find out what’s in the growlery hole!” exclaimed Tom.
Uncle Ben was almost knocked down by the rush of four eager childrenat him when he reached the shore, all crying:
“Uncle Ben! Uncle Ben!”
“What’s the matter?” he asked, when he had made the motor boat fast toshore. “Did you think I wasn’t coming?”
“Oh, no. But we want you to see what’s in the growlery hole!” criedTed.
Then they told Uncle Ben what they meant, and when Mrs. Martin hadnodded, to show that there was really something in the story sobreathlessly gasped out, Uncle Ben said:
“Well, we’ll go and see about this. Show me the growlery hole.”
Eagerly Tom and Ted led the way, hurrying on ahead of the sailor. Mrs.Martin, with Trouble, Janet, and Lola followed.
“There it is!” cried Ted, pointing.
“Me want my wed ball!” cried Trouble.
Uncle Ben looked at the hole. Then he took the stick which had beenleft beside it and poked it down. Suddenly, just as had happened whenthe boys and Mrs. Martin did this, there was a growl, followed by atiny bark.
“Oh, ho! I know what that is!” said Uncle Ben.
From his pocket he took a heavy leather glove that he used when heworked around the motor in the gasolene boat. Drawing this glove onhis hand, the old sailor stretched out on the ground, and thrust hishand and arm into the hole as far as it would go. Then he seemed to befeeling around, down inside, and a moment later he pulled somethingout of the hole.
“Is it my wed ball?” asked Trouble.
“It’s a baby dog!” cried Janet, as she caught sight of something aliveand wiggling in Uncle Ben’s gloved hand.
“No, it’s a little baby fox,” said Uncle Ben. “That’s what thegrowlery hole is, children—the den of a fox. But the big foxes are outnow, hunting chickens, perhaps. Only the little ones are at home. Thisis one of them.”
He held out a little animal with a sharp nose, a rather large tail,and very bright eyes for the children to see. The baby fox tried toget away, but Uncle Ben held it firmly though gently.
“Could we take it home with us?” asked Ted eagerly.
“I’m afraid it’s too small to be taken away from the mother fox,”answered Uncle Ben. “Later on, perhaps, we can come back and get oneof the little foxes when they are bigger. I once knew a boy who had atame fox for a pet. But after a while it began to steal chickens fromthe neighbors’ coops, so the boy had to let his fox go.”
“Did de fox eat my wed ball?” Trouble wanted to know.
“I guess not,” answered Uncle Ben. “I’ll feel around down there andsee if I can get it. I’ll hurry though. There are three or four littlefoxes in there, and the father and mother fox may come back at anymoment, and as they can bite pretty hard when they try, I don’t wantmy hand in the hole then, even with a glove on. I put it on because Ithought there were foxes in the hole, and I guessed right.”
Uncle Ben gave Mrs. Martin the baby fox to hold in her lap while heput his hand down in the hole again. The tiny animal did not seemafraid now, and it did not try to bite. The five children stroked itssoft pretty fur gently.
“Here’s your rubber ball, Trouble,” said Uncle Ben at last, as hepulled his arm out of the fox hole for the second time.
“Are the little foxes there yet?” asked Tom.
“No, they seem to have gone farther back in the den,” answered thesailor. “And I guess we’d better put this one back with his brothersand sisters, so he’ll be there when his father and mother come back.”
After the children had given a last look at the little wild animal,Uncle Ben put it down at the mouth of the hole, and in the tiny chapscampered, probably very glad to be at home again. Then with Troubleholding tightly to his red ball, the picnic party went down to theboat, talking on the way of the fine time they had had.
“It was a regular adventure!” exclaimed Tom.
“It surely was,” agreed Ted. “I’m coming back next week and get afox.”
“So’m I,” cried all the other children.
Across Silver Lake puffed the motor boat, and soon they were all atSunnyside once more. Daddy Martin was there to greet them, havingspent the day at his office in Cresco, coming down on the eveningtrain.
Of course he had to be told all about the picnic and the loss ofTrouble’s ball, the finding of it in the growlery hole, and the waythe chipmunk took Lola’s jam tart.
“How does it look at our house, Daddy?” asked Ted of his father.
“Oh, just about the same,” was the answer. “It’s lonesome, though,with you Curlytops away. I wouldn’t want to stay in Cresco withoutyou.”
“Did you see Miss Ransom?” asked Janet. “And did she get back herqueer box that the burglars took?”
“Yes, I saw her. But she hasn’t her box yet, and they haven’t caughtthe burglars,” answered her father.
“You didn’t see Skyrocket, did you?” asked Ted.
“No,” was the answer, “I didn’t.”
The next morning after breakfast Uncle Ben came up from the littleoffice on the end of the pier that Mr. Martin owned.
“Some of our rowboats drifted off in the night,” said the sailor toMr. Martin. “A man told me they were about a mile down the lake shore.I’ll take the motor launch and go after them. Do any of the childrenwant to come?”
“Oh, yes!” cried Ted and Janet, Lola and Tom.
“Me tum too!” cried Trouble.
“I can take them all if you’ll let me,” said the sailor to Mrs.Martin.
“Well, take them,” she said. “Now be good children with Uncle Ben!”she told them, as they started off.
“Yes’m, we will!” was the answer.
It was a nice little trip down the lake after the missing boats. Theywere seen on shore, just where the man had told Uncle Ben they wouldbe, and soon the sailor was tying them to the stem of the motor boatto tow them back.
While he was doing this, the children wandered along to a little shadycove, and Tom and Ted, who always carried fishlines in their pockets,started to try their luck.
Uncle Ben had made fast the last boat, and he was going in search ofthe children, whom he could hear talking, but not see, when Lola camerunning up to him.
“Oh, Uncle Ben! Uncle Ben!” she cried. “A big white bird has got holdof Trouble, and it’s trying to fly away with him! Come and get Troubleaway from the big, white bird!”