well, killer waited, and waited, and waited. but nobody came at all. nobody unless you count the bats. killer didn’t because only a bird can catch them when they’re awake, and it’s a mighty lucky bird if it does.
he got hungrier, and hungrier, and hungrier. still nobody came. and the hungrier he got the madder he was because the little screecher owls had brought him there. he thought they were playing a trick on him. so he began to slip from one tree to another, hunting for the one they perch in.
the ground under an owl’s perch always has little gray wads of fur and feathers and bones beneath it—the leftovers of the last food the owls have been eating.
if there are very many weasels and cats to bother them, the owls neatly carry these to some other tree than the one they sleep in. but these bad little owls were too lazy to attend to their housekeeping. killer put his nose into a whole pile of this rubbish the very first thing.
“robin!” he sniffed. “let me think. that owl said she didn’t hunt robins. then she stole them; she stole them from under the robins’ roost. i’ll teach that owl to let my birds alone, just exactly wherever i choose to leave them. she stole those robins! i’ll——” but he pricked up his ears because he heard the little owls begin to talk on their perch just over his head.
“i wonder if killer and the woodsfolk have made friends by now,” said one. “i’ve been listening ever since i woke up, and i haven’t heard a thing.”
“few beasts can move so quietly that an owl doesn’t hear them even if he’s listening,” thought killer proudly.
“of course they’ve made friends,” said the lady owl. “if they made friends with stripes skunk, of course they would with him. he’s ever so much smarter, and i think he’s much handsomer.” she did, too. owls think it’s fine to be fierce looking.
“but what if they don’t?” insisted her mate.
“why, then i’ll show him where they have their holes and help him hunt them, that’s all,” she answered.
“a-ha!” said killer to himself. “that won’t be a bad plan. i won’t quarrel with her yet. i’ll let her help me all she can before i get even with her. all the same, i want to know what that man is doing out here, and why she didn’t warn me.”
he meant louie thomson.
if those little owls had known there wasn’t another thing for him to eat in all the woods and fields except the flittery bats, which he couldn’t catch, and chatter squirrel, safely hidden in his secret nest, they’d have had the appetites scared right out of them—and that’s the most you can possibly scare an owl. but they didn’t. so there they perched, feasting on the robins they had stored in their hole, which they used for a pantry.
“speaking of holes,” said the little he-owl, “i’ve been wondering if we oughtn’t to look up some more. this one we have will never hold all we’ll have to hide when that weasel begins killing the woodsfolk.”
“it’s no use,” answered his wicked little wife. “those woodsfolk are all too big for us to carry. we’ll have to eat them where he leaves them, like we did when silvertip was doing our hunting.”
“silvertip!” bristled the weasel. “o-ho! i remember that fox. he couldn’t catch me. i’m too smart for him. but i’d better keep an eye out. i wonder where he is now?”
“i wish killer would catch some more robins,” said the little he-owl, wiping his beak clean of the feathers that were sticking to it. “they’re very convenient, and we’ve eaten all but the very last one. shall i get it?”
“um-hm!” the weasel nodded to himself. “now i understand. you birds invited me here to do your hunting, did you? well, i’ll see to it you don’t get anything you don’t earn.” but of course he didn’t say it—not yet. he wanted to hear what else they’d talk about.
“only one robin left!” exclaimed the lady owl. “my claws! who’d have thought we’d eat those birds all up in such a short time? you must have been at them while i was sleeping, you greedy thing! i’ve had hardly any of them.” she clattered her beak at the other owl so angrily that he moved away from her down the limb.
“you’ve had as many as i have,” he whimpered. “can’t we show killer the stump where the mice live? they’d be easy to carry, and he’d kill any amount of them.”
“fine!” she agreed. “we’ll need them. there’s going to be a storm.”
“well, we might just as well eat this robin then,” argued her piggy little mate, “and then we can clean out the hole and leave it all ready to store the mice in.”
killer listened while the owl tugged and grunted, getting the bird out of his narrow pantry door. suddenly he called: “i’ll trouble you for that robin. it’s mine, and i want it myself!”
plunk! down fell the bird, ’most on top of the wide burdock leaf where killer was hiding from them. but that wasn’t on purpose. the little he-owl never meant to let it fall—he just jumped so hard from fright that he dropped it.
my, but his wife wanted to peck him! she didn’t dare, for fear killer would see how angry she was about losing it. she gave her husband a horrid glare with her scary, starey eyes, and then she said in her politest voice: “certainly, mr. weasel, you’re welcome to anything we have.”
“but i don’t see how you come to have it,” said killer rudely.
“owl custom, owl custom, my dear sir,” said she, preening herself so her feathers wouldn’t ruffle and show how scared she was. “we pick up the odds and ends you clever hunters don’t care about, and store them up here in our hole. you can see it from where you are, and i’m sure i hope you’ll help yourself whenever you feel like it.” all this time she was saying to herself: “that’s the last thing we’ll hide in this hole, now he knows where it is.” wasn’t she deceitful?
“you’re very kind, i’m sure,” he answered more politely. “but i’ve hurt my paw so i can’t climb.” he said that because he hoped the owls would go on roosting there so he could come and catch them in the daytime if he wanted to.
“isn’t that too bad,” she sympathized. really she was glad; her feathers unruffled again, now that she felt sure he couldn’t sneak up on her while she wasn’t looking.
by this time he was picking the robin’s bones. pretty soon he licked his whiskers with a raspy tongue; it made cold shivers run through those bad little birds. even the lady owl was sorry she’d brought him to tommy peele’s woods and fields. that’s what she got for losing her temper. she wondered how long he’d been listening and what he’d heard.
the wicked weasel knew just what she was thinking about. he said in a voice as raspy as his tongue: “i heard you say something about a mouse’s stump. that sounds like a quick place to get a full meal before this storm that’s coming. i’ll ask you to take me there so i won’t have to waste any time hunting for it. but first i want to ask you some questions. come down here so i don’t have to shout. come along!”
his wife stared at the bad little owl and the bad little owl stared back at her. their eyes grew wider and shinier, and their clothes felt pin-featherier than ever they had since the day those birds were hatched. my, but they were scared! slowly they both turned to stare down at killer the weasel, who sat beneath their tree. and let me tell you he wasn’t the handsome, slicked-up beast with the pricky ears and the arched neck and the fluffed tail who had tried to make friends with the woodsfolk—he looked too sharp-toothed and snaky for anything.
“hustle!” called killer in his raspy voice. “i’m not going to shout at you way up there for every one to hear, and i’m not going to hunt, until i know several things that you forgot to tell me when you invited me here. but we’ve no time to waste. if this turns out to be a three-days’ storm we’ll be hungry enough by the end of it, even if we get a good meal before it begins. come along!” he fixed his eye on the lady owl, and she saw a red spark gleaming in it.
she didn’t mean to come—not she. but somehow she couldn’t seem to help herself. before he knew quite what she was doing, down she came. she grabbed at the springy, pickery stem of a wild raspberry—no bird in its sane senses would ever think of perching on one—and there she hung. but she knew he could jump right up and catch her.
“now!” he hissed in that dreadful whisper things from under-the-earth use, whether they wear fur or scales, “where’s silvertip the fox, my deadly enemy?”
“silvertip? oh, he’s duck hunting in the big marsh, way off the other side of the deep woods,” lied the owl. she didn’t dare tell him silvertip was dead.
“ah,” growled the weasel. “well, then, why didn’t you warn me about that man?” (he meant louie thomson.) “did you think i wouldn’t know these woods are full of his jaws, just gaping for me to put my foot in one?” (he meant traps, of course.)
“who-o-o!” exclaimed the owl. “that man hasn’t any more jaws or claws than a hoptoad. men don’t get them till they’re grown, and he’s just a little harmless wild one. he never hunts; he lives on corn. once in a while he comes over here for a root from doctor muskrat, who owns the pond—just like the other wild things do if they’re sick or hurt. then he goes back again.”
“hey? what’s that? a wild man? there isn’t any such thing!” snarled killer.
“well, he’s wild. you could see for yourself even the rabbits weren’t afraid of him,” the owl kept on arguing.
the weasel thought for a minute. that certainly was true; so were the corncobs, left from louie’s feast, he saw piled beside the little blanket tent. “all right,” said he. “then show me the mouse’s stump. flap along, bird, flap along!”
