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!”
