The Adventures of Fleetfoot and Her Fawns Part 4

In less time than it takes to tell it, he was out circling the field, gun in hand. And the bright moonlight soon showed him where the cornstalks rustled with Frisky's pa.s.sing.

"Hi, there!" yelled the Hired Man, gun in hand, as he raced around the corn-field.

But Frisky was an excellent judge of distance, and he knew to a certainty that he was out of gun range.

He therefore deliberately stopped where he was and s.n.a.t.c.hed a bite of his hen.

As the Hired Man came nearer, the fox pup ran farther, always keeping just about so much distance between himself and the gun. He could easily have out-distanced his pursuer. But he was in a mischievous mood to-night, and it pleased him to see how far he could go toward devouring the entire hen while the angry man looked on.

He did it, too, saucily enough, gobbling a bite here and a bite there, looking back over his shoulder the while at the man with the gun. One or two shots did ring out on the crisp night air, kicking up the dirt a few rods behind him, but Frisky Fox ate on, secure by those few rods of s.p.a.ce, as well he knew.

Only once did he miscalculate, the shot landing so near him that he knew the next one would surely get him if the Hired Man tried again.

Quick as a flash the clever rascal toppled over on his side, playing dead. The ruse worked, for the Hired Man did not shoot again. And while he was fumbling his way through the corn-field to where he believed the fox lay waiting, Frisky was making for the woods with his nimble black feet fairly twinkling over the ground.

Throwing himself at last on the soft pine needles on a little hill-top, he peered through the moonlight to where the Hired Man was staring helplessly about him wondering where the dead fox lay. Frisky laughed silently at the success of his ruse,-the first time he had ever played 'possum himself, though he had seen it done once before, when his mother had been hard pressed. In her case she had actually let the boy pick her up, when he found her with one foot in a trap. But to her surprise he had only released her with pitying words and a caress on her silky red head.

No such treatment could be expected of the Hired Man, Frisky knew.

Lop Ear, slinking back to the barn-yard with tail between his legs, was just unlucky enough to catch the Hired Man's notice as the latter was returning foxless.

"Here," he ordered threateningly. "Put your nose to that trail and follow it, or I'll show you what's what!"

The next thing Frisky knew, he heard the baying of his one-time friend close on his trail. With a yawn and a lick at his jaws, where a feather still clung, he struck off as easily as if he had just arisen from a sound night's sleep.

He didn't even bother to keep very far ahead of the dog.

CHAPTER VII.-A WIT OUT-WITTED.

Not that Frisky Fox believed greatly in Lop Ear's friends.h.i.+p.

Not after the way the hound had given the alarm at the chicken coop!

But he knew that at any moment he could so far outdistance that doubtful ally that he wasn't in the slightest danger. The ground was firm and dry, and he had all the advantage of his lighter weight and nimbler feet.

Had there been soft snow on the ground it might have been different. But the first frost had not yet ripened the hazel nuts in the woods around Mt. Olaf.

Once, just to punish him, Frisky turned back and bared his teeth so viciously at Lop Ear that the hound was driven back-to the Hired Man's amazement.

Then Frisky tripped his way down to Rapid River and crossed on the wet brook stones, leaving no scent for Lop Ear to follow.

The hound well off the trail, Frisky again crossed the stream farther up on a fallen log. And circling around through the shadows, he was soon following the Hired Man, slipping behind trees and boulders and smiling from ear to ear as the latter stumbled along with his useless gun.

When at last the hound stopped short at the river bank, where he lost the scent, the Hired Man gave it up in disgust, and went back home to his bed.

And Frisky, the handsome little scoundrel, calmly sought out the dry south side of a hill which would shelter him from the wind and slept with his black legs doubled under him and his white-tipped brush of a tail curled comfortably around him to keep out the draft.

Shrewd, cautious, daring, the Red Fox Pup bade fair at this stage of his career to develop the best set of brains in all the North Woods.

Yet there was one at the Valley Farm that could out-wit him.

Frisky was sitting on his haunches a few days later in the midst of the now deserted hay field, listening for the squeak of a meadow mouse, when something made him p.r.i.c.k up his ears.

There was something about that squeak that sounded just a wee bit different from any squeak he had ever heard before.

But no, there it was again, unmistakably the tiny voice of a mouse on the other side of the field. The fox pup had such needle-sharp ears that he could hear fainter sounds than any human being ever could have.

But though Frisky Fox was clever, the Boy at the Valley Farm was more so. And the Boy sat behind a bush at the farther end of the field, as motionless as the gray stump that Frisky thought he was. This time the joke was on the Red Fox Pup, for the squeaks he heard issued from the Boy's pursed lips. It was an excellent imitation.

He tip-toed nearer and nearer the tiny squeaks, while the Boy gazed at the graceful fellow through his new field gla.s.ses.

He was a handsome fellow, was Frisky Fox, with his yellow-red coat s.h.i.+ning sleek in the sunlight. And my! How his great plume of a tail fluffed out behind him! His tail was nearly as long as the rest of his body put together, and it fluffed out nearly as broadly. Mother Red Fox certainly had a son to be proud of!

Of a sudden a little breeze s.h.i.+fted around to where it brought the foxy one a faint scent. It told his keen black nose there was something down there besides the bush.

It wasn't a mouse, either!

"No, sir, that's no field mouse," said Frisky's nose, as the Red Fox Pup circled to windward of the tiny squeaking sounds.

"That's the Boy at the Valley Farm! That's what that is! Now I'll just pretend not to see him at all till I get behind that rock, then I'll race for the woods."

For Frisky didn't know that the thing the Boy was pointing at him was only a pair of field gla.s.ses. And it wouldn't have made much difference even had he known. Frisky did not like to be watched. He therefore did exactly as he had planned, crossing the field with seeming lack of interest in anything save the purple and yellow of asters and golden-rod and the scarlet of woodbine, and the blue of the Indian summer sky, till he felt himself out of range.

At the instant of his discovery that it was one of those dangerous human creatures that sat there like a stump he had c.o.c.ked his ears sharply and leaped fully two feet into the air in his surprise.

That was the only sign he made, however, of the extreme anxiety that set his heart to thumping, till he was just on the edge of the woods; then he suddenly looked back with one of his thin, husky barks, to know why the Boy should have tried to fool him.

But afterwards, from the shelter of the barberry vines that fringed the old stone wall, he peered and peeked and wondered about it all as long as the Boy remained.

CHAPTER VIII.-STEEP TRAILS.

These hot days in August, when the trout took to the very deepest, coldest pools they could find, and hid themselves all day under the over-hanging rocks, and every creature that couldn't take to the water longed for rain, Fleet Foot used to lead her little family up the steep trails to the top of Mount Olaf or some near-by mountain-top, where the wind blew cool night and day.

These trips were full of much joy for the fawns, for there was all the spice of adventure in following a winding hoof-path that led-they knew not where. For one never knew what might be just around the next turn.