it was funny that tommy never could pass that gray stone without sitting down on it for a few minutes. it seemed as if he just couldn’t, that was all. it had been a favorite seat ever since he was big enough to drive the cows to pasture and go after them at night. it was just far enough from home for him to think that he needed a rest when he reached it. you know a growing boy needs to rest often, except when he is playing. he used to take all his troubles there to think them over. the queer part of it is he left a great many of them there, though he didn’t seem to know it. if tommy ever could have seen in one pile all the troubles he had left at that old gray stone, i am afraid that he would have called it the trouble-stone instead of the wishing-stone.
it was only lately that he had begun to call it the wishing-stone. several times when he had been sitting on it, he had wished foolish wishes and they had come true. at least, it seemed as if they had come true. they had come as true as he ever wanted them to. he was thinking something of this kind now as he stood idly kicking at the old stone.
presently he stopped kicking at it, and, from force of habit, sat down on it. it was a bright, sunshiny day, one of those warm days that sometimes happen right in the middle of winter, as if the weather-man had somehow got mixed and slipped a spring day into the wrong place in the calendar.
from where he sat, tommy could look over to the green forest, which was green now only where the pine-trees and the hemlock-trees and the spruce-trees grew. all the rest was bare and brown, save that the ground was white with snow. he could look across the white meadow-land to the old pasture, where in places the brush was so thick that, in summer, he sometimes had to hunt to find the cows. now, even from this distance, he could trace the windings of the cow-paths, each a ribbon of spotless white. it puzzled him at first. he scowled at them.
“when the whole thing is covered with snow, it ought to be harder to see those paths, but instead of that it is easier,” he muttered. “it isn’t reasonable!” he scowled harder than ever, but the scowl wasn’t an unpleasant one. you know there is a difference in scowls. some are black and heavy, like ugly thunder-heads, and from them flashes of anger are likely to dart any minute, just as the lightning darts out from the thunder-heads. others are like the big fleecy clouds that hide the sun for a minute or two, and make it seem all the brighter by their passing.
there are scowls of anger and scowls of perplexity. it was a scowl of the latter kind that wrinkled tommy’s forehead now. he was trying to understand something that seemed to him quite beyond common sense.
“it isn’t reasonable!” he repeated. “i ought not to be able to see ’em at all. but i do. they stick out like——”
no one will ever know just what they stuck out like, for tommy never finished that sentence. the scowl cleared and his freckled face fairly beamed. he had made a discovery all by himself, and he felt all the joy of a discoverer. perhaps you will think it wasn’t much, but it was really important, so far as it concerned tommy, because it proved that tommy was learning to use his eyes and to understand what he saw. he had reasoned the thing out, and when anybody does that, it is always important.
“why, how simple!” exclaimed tommy. “of course i can see those old paths! it would be funny if i couldn’t. the bushes break through the snow on all sides, but where the paths are, there is nothing to break through, and so they are perfectly smooth and stand right out. queer i never noticed that before. hello! what’s that?”
his sharp eyes had caught sight of a little spot of red up in the old pasture. it was moving, and, as he watched it, it gradually took shape. it was reddy fox, trotting along one of those little white paths. apparently, reddy was going to keep an engagement somewhere, for he trotted along quite as if he were bound for some particular place and had no time to waste.
“he’s headed this way, and, if i keep still, perhaps he’ll come close,” thought tommy.
so he sat as still as if he were part of the old wishing-stone itself. reddy fox came straight on. at the edge of the old pasture he stopped for a minute and looked across to the green forest, as if to make sure that it was perfectly safe to cross the green meadows. evidently he thought it was, for he resumed his steady trot. if he kept on the way he was headed he would pass very near to the wishing-stone and to tommy.
just as he was half-way across the meadows, chanticleer, tommy’s prize plymouth rock rooster, crowed over in the farmyard. instantly reddy stopped with one black paw uplifted and turned his head in the direction of the sound. tommy could imagine the[8] hungry look in that sharp, crafty face. but reddy was far too wise to think of going up to the farmyard in broad daylight, and in a moment resumed his journey.
nearer and nearer he came, until he was passing not thirty feet away. how handsome he was! his beautiful red coat looked as if the coldest wind never could get through it. his great plume of a tail, black toward the end and just tipped with white, was held high to keep it out of the snow. his black stockings, white vest, and black-tipped ears gave him a wonderfully fine appearance. quite a dandy is reddy fox, and he looked it.
he was almost past when tommy squeaked like a mouse. like a flash reddy turned, his sharp ears cocked forward, his yellow eyes agleam with hunger. there he stood, as motionless as tommy himself, eagerness written in every line of his face. it was very clear that, no matter how important his business in the green forest was, he didn’t intend knowingly to pass anything so delicious as a meadow-mouse. again tommy squeaked. instantly reddy took several steps toward him, looking and listening intently. a look of doubt crept into his eager face. that old gray stone didn’t look just as he remembered it. for a long minute he stared straight at tommy. then a puff of wind fluttered the bottom of tommy’s coat, and perhaps at the same time it carried to reddy that dreaded man smell.
reddy almost turned a back-somersault in his hurry to get away. then he ran. how he did run! in almost no time at all he had reached the green forest and vanished from tommy’s sight. quite without knowing it tommy sighed. “my, how handsome he is!” you know tommy is freckle-faced and rather homely. “and gee, how he can run!” he added admiringly. “it must be fun to be able to run like that. it might be fun to be a fox anyhow. i wonder what it feels like. i wish i were a fox.”
if he had remembered where he was, perhaps tommy would have thought twice before wishing. but he had forgotten. forgetting was one of tommy’s besetting sins. hardly had the words left his mouth when tommy found that he was a fox, red-coated, black-stockinged—the very image of reddy himself.
and with that change in himself everything else had changed. it was summer. the green meadows and the green forest were very beautiful. even the old pasture was beautiful. but tommy had no eyes for beauty. all that beauty meant nothing to him save that now there was plenty to eat and no great trouble to get it. everywhere the birds were singing, but if tommy heeded at all, it was only to wish that some of the sweet songsters would come down on the ground where he could catch them.
those songs made him hungry. he knew of nothing he liked better, next to fat meadow-mice, than birds. that reminded him that some of them nest on[12] the ground, mrs. grouse for instance. he had little hope that he could catch her, for it seemed as if she had eyes in the back of her head; but she should have a family by this time, and if he could find those youngsters—the very thought made his mouth water, and he started for the green forest.
once there, he visited one place after another where he thought he might find mrs. grouse. he was almost ready to give up and go back to the green meadows to hunt for meadow-mice when a sudden rustling in the dead leaves made him stop short and strain his ears. there was a faint “kwitt,” and then all was still. tommy took three or four steps and then—could he believe his eyes?—there was mrs. grouse fluttering on the ground just in front of him! one wing dragged as if broken.
tommy made a quick spring and then another. somehow mrs. grouse just managed to get out of his way. but she couldn’t fly. she couldn’t run as she usually did. it was only luck that she had managed to evade him. very stealthily he approached her as she lay fluttering among the leaves. then, gathering himself for a long jump, he sprang.
once more he missed her, by a mere matter of inches it seemed. the same thing happened again and still again. it was maddening to have such a good dinner so near and yet not be able to get it. then something happened that made tommy feel so foolish that he wanted to sneak away. with a roar[14] of wings mrs. grouse sailed up over the tree-tops and out of sight!
“huh! haven’t you learned that trick yet?” said a voice.
tommy turned. there was reddy fox grinning at him. “what trick?” he demanded.
“why, that old grouse was just fooling you!” replied reddy. “there was nothing the matter with her. she was just pretending. she had a whole family of young ones hidden close by the place where you first saw her. my, but you are easy!”
“let’s go right back there!” cried tommy.
“no use. not the least bit,” declared reddy. “it’s too late. let’s go over on the meadows and hunt for mice.”
together they trotted over to the[15] green meadows. all through the grass were private little paths made by the mice. the grass hung over them so that they were more like tunnels than paths. reddy crouched down by one which smelled very strong of mouse. tommy crouched down by another.
presently there was the faint sound of tiny feet running. the grass moved ever so little over the small path reddy was watching. suddenly he sprang, and his two black paws came down together on something that gave a pitiful squeak. reddy had caught a mouse without even seeing it. he had known just where to jump by the movement of the grass. presently tommy caught one the same way. then, because they knew that the mice right around there were frightened,[16] they moved on to another part of the meadows.
“i know where there are some young woodchucks,” said tommy, who had unsuccessfully tried for one of them that very morning.
“where?” demanded reddy.
“over by that old tree on the edge of the meadow,” replied tommy. “it isn’t the least bit of use to try for them. they don’t go far enough away from their hole, and their mother keeps watch all the time. there she is now.”
sure enough, there sat old mrs. chuck, looking, at that distance, for all the world like a stake driven in the ground.
“come on,” said reddy. “we’ll have one of those chucks.”
but instead of going toward the woodchuck[17] home, reddy turned in quite the opposite direction. tommy didn’t know what to make of it, but he said nothing, and trotted along behind. when they were where reddy knew that mrs. chuck could no longer see them, he stopped.
“there’s no hurry,” said he. “there seems to be plenty of grasshoppers here, and we may as well catch a few. when mrs. chuck has forgotten all about us, we’ll go over there.”
tommy grinned to himself. “if he thinks we are going to get over there without being seen, he’s got something to learn,” thought tommy. but he said nothing, and, for lack of anything better to do, he caught grasshoppers. after a while, reddy said he guessed it was about time to go chuck-hunting.
“you go straight over there,” said he. “when you get near, mrs. chuck will send all the youngsters down into their hole and then she will follow, only she’ll stay where she can peep out and watch you. go right up to the hole so that she will go down out of sight, and then wait there until i come. i’ll hide right back of that tree, and then you go off as if you had given up trying to catch any of them. go hunt meadow-mice far enough away so that she won’t be afraid. i’ll do the rest.”
tommy didn’t quite see through the plan, but he did as he was told. as he drew near mrs. chuck, she did just as reddy said she would—sent her youngsters down underground. then, as he drew nearer, she followed them.
tommy kept on right up to her doorstep. the smell of those chucks was maddening. he was tempted to try to dig them out, only somehow he just felt that it would be of no use. he was still half minded to try, however, when reddy came trotting up and flattened himself in the long grass behind the trunk of the tree.
tommy knew then that it was time for him to do the rest of his part. he turned his back on the woodchuck home, and trotted off across the meadow. he hadn’t gone far when, looking back, he saw mrs. chuck sitting up very straight and still on her doorstep, watching him. not once did she take her eyes from him. tommy kept on, and presently began to hunt for meadow-mice. but he kept one eye on mrs. chuck, and presently he saw her look this way and that, as if[20] to make sure that all was well. then she must have told her children that they could come out to play once more, for out they came. by this time tommy was so excited that he almost forgot that he was supposed to be hunting mice.
presently he saw a red flash from behind the old tree. there was a frightened scurry of little chucks and old mrs. chuck dove into her hole. reddy barked joyfully. tommy hurried to join him. reddy had been quite as successful as he had boasted he would be, and was grinning.
“didn’t i tell you we’d have chuck for dinner?” said reddy. “what one can’t do, two can.”
after that, tommy and reddy often hunted together, and reddy taught tommy many things. so the summer passed with plenty to eat and nothing to worry about. not once had he known that terrible fear—the fear of being hunted—which is so large a part of the lives of danny meadow mouse and peter rabbit, and even chatterer the red squirrel.
instead of being afraid, he was feared. he was the hunter instead of the hunted. day and night, for he was abroad at night quite as much as by day, he went where he pleased and did as he pleased, and was happy, for there was nothing to worry him. having plenty to eat, he kept away from the homes of men. he had been warned that there was danger there.
at last the weather grew cold. there were no more grasshoppers. there were no more foolish young rabbits or[22] woodchucks or grouse, for those who had escaped had grown up and were wise and smart. every day it grew harder to get enough to eat. the cold weather made him hungrier than ever, and now he had little time for sun-naps or idle play. he had to spend most of the time that he was awake hunting. he never knew where the next meal was coming from, as did thrifty striped chipmunk, and happy jack squirrel, and danny meadow mouse.
it was hunt, hunt, hunt, and a meal only when his wits were sharper than the wits of those he hunted. he knew now what real hunger was. he knew what it was most of the time. so when, late one afternoon, he surprised a fat hen who had strayed away from the flock behind the barn of a lonely farm, he thought that never had he tasted anything more delicious. thereafter he visited chicken-houses and stole many fat pullets. to him they were no more than the wild birds he hunted, only more foolish and so easily caught.
and then one morning after a successful raid on a poultry-house, he heard for the first time the voices of dogs on his trail. he, the hunter, was being hunted. at first it didn’t bother him at all. he would run away and leave them far behind. so he ran, and when their voices were faint and far away, he lay down to rest.
but presently he grew uneasy. those voices were drawing nearer. those dogs were following his every twist and turn with their noses in his tracks, just as he had so often followed[24] a rabbit. for hours he ran, and still those dogs followed. he was almost ready to drop when he chanced to run along in a tiny brook, and, after he left that, he heard no more of the dogs that day. so he learned that running water broke his trail.
the next day the dogs found his trail again, and, as he ran from them through a swamp, there was a sudden flash and a dreadful noise. something stung him sharply on the shoulder. as he looked back, he caught a glimpse of a man with something in his hands that looked like a stick with smoke coming from the end of it. that night, as he lay licking his wounds, he knew that now he, who had known no fear, would never again be free from it—the fear of man.
little by little he learned how to fool and outwit the dogs. he learned that water destroyed his scent. he learned that dry sand did not hold it. he learned to run along stone walls and then jump far out into the field and so break his trail. he learned that, if he dashed through a flock of sheep, the foolish animals would rush around in aimless fright, and their feet would stamp out his trail. these and many other sharp tricks he learned, so that after a while he had no fear of the dogs. but his fear of man grew greater rather than less, and was with him at all times.
so all through the fall he hunted and was hunted. then came the snow, the beautiful white snow. all day it fell, and when at night the moon came out, the earth was covered with a wonderful white carpet. through the green forest and over the meadows tommy hunted. one lone shivering little wood-mouse he dug out of a moldering old stump, but this was only a bite. he visited one hen-house after another, only to find each without so much as a loose board by means of which he might get in. it was dreadful to be so hungry.
as if this were not enough, the breaking of the day brought the sound of dogs on his trail. “i’ll fool them in short order,” thought he.
alas! running in the snow was a very different matter from running on the bare ground. one trick after another he tried, the very best he knew, the ones which never had failed before; but all in vain. wherever he stepped he left a footprint plain to see. though he might fool the noses of the dogs, he could not fool the eyes of their masters.
now one thing he had long ago learned, and this was never to seek his underground den unless he must, for then the dogs and the hunters would know where he lived. so now tommy ran and ran, hoping to fool the dogs, but not able to. at last he realized this, and started for his den. he felt that he had to. running in the snow was hard work. his legs ached with weariness. his great plume of a tail, of which he was so proud, was a burden now. it had become wet with the snow and so heavy that it hampered and tired him.
a great fear, a terrible fear, filled tommy’s heart. would he be able to reach that snug den in time? he was panting hard for breath, and his legs moved slower and slower. the voices of the dogs seemed to be in his very ears. glancing back over his shoulder, he could see them gaining with every jump, the fierce joy of the hunt and the lust of killing in their eyes. he knew now the feeling, the terror and dreadful hopelessness of the meadow-mice and rabbits he had so often run down. just ahead was a great gray rock. from it he would make one last long jump in an effort to break the trail. in his fear he quite forgot that he was in plain sight now, and that his effort would be useless.
up on the rock he leaped wearily, and—tommy rubbed his eyes. then he pinched himself to make quite sure that he was really himself. he shivered, for he was in a cold sweat—the sweat of fear. before him stretched the snow-covered meadows, and away over beyond was the old pasture with the cow-paths showing like white ribbons. half-way across the meadows, running toward him with their noses to the ground and making the echoes ring with the joy of the hunt, were two hounds. a dark figure moving on the edge of the old pasture caught his eyes and held them. it was a hunter. reddy fox, handsome, crafty reddy, into whose hungry yellow eyes he had looked so short a time before, would soon be running for his life.
hastily tommy jumped to his feet and hurried over to the trail reddy had made as he ran for the green forest. with eager feet he kicked the snow over those telltale tracks for a little way. he waited for those eager hounds, and when they reached the place where he had broken the trail, he drove them away. they and the hunter might pick up the trail again in the green forest, but at least reddy would have time to get a long start of them and a good chance of getting away altogether.
then he went back to the wishing-stone and looked down at it thoughtfully. “and i actually wished i could be a fox!” he exclaimed. “my, but i’m glad i’m not! i guess reddy has trouble enough without me making him any more. he may kill a lot of innocent little creatures, but he has to live, and it’s no more than men do.” (he was thinking of the chicken dinner he would have that day.) “i’m going straight over to the old pasture and take up that trap i set yesterday. i guess a boy’s troubles don’t amount to much after all. i’m more glad than ever that i’m a boy, and—and—well, if reddy fox is smart enough to get one of my chickens now and then, he’s welcome. it must be awful to be hungry all the time.”
