The Tale of Nimble Deer Part 7

"No, I didn't," Nimble confessed.

"But here you are!" Cuffy Bear retorted. "You _must_ have been waiting for me. And if I've kept you a bit longer than I intended to, I'm sorry.

I think I fell asleep in that den and had a short nap."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Nimble Deer Tells Cuffy Bear About His Horns.

_Page 71_]

"A short nap!" Nimble repeated. "You've been asleep in there all winter!

It's weeks and weeks since I last saw you. And I'm here now only because I happened to wander this way, when I heard old dog Spot baying."

Cuffy Bear was so surprised that he couldn't say another word. His mouth fell open. And he gazed blankly at Nimble.

But at last he spoke. "I must apologize to you," he said, "though it was really no wonder I called you 'madam.' You have changed a great deal since I left you here."

"And you--" Nimble told him--"you have changed too."

"I have?" Cuffy Bear cried. "How's that? How have I changed?"

"You look much hungrier," Nimble explained.

Cuffy Bear laid a paw across his waistcoat.

"I _am_ hungry," he admitted. "And if you're going down the mountain I think I'll stroll along with you and see what I can find to eat."

"Very well!" Nimble agreed.

"One moment!" Cuffy Bear said hastily. "Just one moment, please! Wait till I go inside my cave! I believe I left my cap in there."

"I'm not going to wait for you," Nimble replied firmly. "For all I know you might not come out again till haying time."

And then Nimble trotted off down the mountainside, heading for Cedar Swamp. For he didn't think old dog Spot would wander in that direction.

XIV

ANTLERS

Although Nimble had lost his horns he managed to go through the winter without missing them as much as he had expected. And in time he had almost forgotten the pair of spikes that he had worn on his head the summer before. Then, one day, he made a great discovery. He found that new horns were sprouting to take the place of those that he had lost!

"Now I can have some mock battles again--when my horns get long enough,"

he thought. And then he stopped short. What if the Spike Horns of the year before had no more horns? If they were hornless they certainly wouldn't care to take part in any mock battles.

Nimble's fears were soon set at rest. His old playmates soon let him know that they were all going to have new horns too.

And then, a little later, Nimble made another great discovery. He was looking into a pool one morning when he saw something that gave him huge delight. His new horns were not like last year's horns. He beheld, mirrored in the water, a handsome pair of Y-shaped antlers, each with two points!

"Hurrah!" he cried. "I'll make those Spike Horns feel like hiding themselves again."

He had expected to have a pleasant time showing his new antlers to his old friends. When he met Dodger the Deer, Nimble called to him: "See what I've got! Antlers! Two points!"

"Ho!" said Dodger. "So have I got antlers. And they have two points, too."

Nimble had been so interested in his own horns that he hadn't looked at Dodger's. And now when he gazed at them he saw that they were like his.

"What about the rest of the Spike Horns?" Nimble asked Dodger. "Have they----"

"Yes, they have!" Dodger interrupted. "I tell you, 'two-pointers' are common this season."

"So there aren't any more Spike Horns!" said Nimble somewhat sadly.

"Oh, yes! Plenty!" Dodger answered. "But they're an entirely new crop.

They were fawns last year."

When he heard that bit of news Nimble felt happier. And as soon as he parted from Dodger the Deer he went and found some of the new Spike Horns and showed them his wonderful two-point antlers.

But somehow they didn't seem at all impressed. They were too much taken up with their own spikes to pay any attention to Nimble.

"Anyhow," he said to himself, "we 'two-pointers' can have some good mock battles together."

And they did. They had mock battles that became famous all around Blue Mountain. And of all the "two-pointers" that lived in that neighborhood, Nimble and his friend Dodger the Deer were known as the best sham-fighters. They could look fiercer and act angrier than any of their young friends. And the way they tore into each other was almost enough to frighten you, if you had seen them.

Old Mr. Crow said it was worth flying a mile to watch one of their set-tos.

XV

A MOCK BATTLE

When Nimble had three-points on each of his antlers, in his fourth summer, he felt that he was at last grown up. He was now a "three-pointer." Some of the older bucks had no more points than he.

Many of them were but "four-pointers." His own father had been a "five-pointer." So Nimble hoped, secretly, that he would have five-point antlers in another two years.

As soon as his new horns were ready Nimble and his friend Dodger the Deer began their mock battles again. And Nimble found them greater fun than ever.

Dodger was a spry fellow. He was quick as a flash at dodging. When Nimble ran at him with head lowered and horns aimed straight at him Dodger could wait until Nimble all but struck him, before leaping aside.

And then Nimble would go rus.h.i.+ng past him.

But Dodger did not always dodge when attacked. Sometimes he stood his ground, with his own head lowered in a threatening fas.h.i.+on. And then Nimble checked his headlong rush and merely clashed his horns pleasantly against Dodger's.

There was something about the sound that sent a thrill through Nimble and started his coat to bristling along his backbone with a queer, creepy feeling.

One day in the fall Nimble's mother came upon them in the woods when they were having one of their sham fights.

"You'd better stop that!" she said to them severely. "Somebody will get hurt sooner or later if you're not careful."