CHAPTER XIII
BIG WHITE BEAR'S KITCHEN
"I mustn't lose Big White Bear," thought Little White Fox, "and I mustn't let him see me. Oh! My! No! I mustn't do that, for he is a big, big fellow and who knows what he might do to me?" So he slipped along behind very slyly, hiding behind this rock and that one, behind this snow pile and that one, very carefully indeed.
But Big White Bear was nearly as badly frightened as Little White Fox. "What was that great big laugh?" he kept thinking to himself. And every time he thought of it, he looked behind him, and I am sure he really expected to see Omnok, the hunter, step right out with his terrible gun. But by and by, when he had gone down the mountain and across the tundra and over the little lakes, he was not so much afraid, and he began to grow hungry. Now that was just what Little White Fox hoped would happen, for he was very hungry himself and very curious besides to see where Big White Bear kept his pantry. Where would it be? Would it be in the tall mountains, or on the tundra, or out on the roof of the sea? How interesting it would be to know!
Pretty soon Big White Bear began to go straight ahead, without turning to one side or the other. Then Little White Fox was sure he had started for his kitchen, and he was glad as could be! Big White Bear went right out on the roof to the ocean and on and on and on, till Little White Fox was good and tired. When he came to the dark, dark waters of the ocean, Big White Bear didn't stop one moment. He just tumbled right into the water and disappeared all at once!
"My!" said Little White Fox, opening his eyes very wide. "He will surely be drowned." And then all at once he thought of the fine dinner he had been expecting to get and how far it was back to the great rock where his mother was to wait for him. And then, of course, he remembered what his mother had said about coming back to call her. How sorry he was now that he had forgotten all about that. Oh! if they could only find Big White Bear's kitchen! Just then Little White Fox heard a scratching on the ice and bounded behind an ice boulder before he was seen. Big White Bear had come right up out of the ocean with the biggest dinner you have ever seen. His kitchen was right down in the water under the roof of the ocean, and he had brought his dinner out on the ice to eat it in the sunshine.
Little White Fox thought Big White Bear would never, never get through eating, but he finally did. And there was quite a big dinner left for Little White Fox. When Big White Bear was fast asleep on the ice, taking his after-dinner nap, Little White Fox crept up and began to eat his dinner too. "He didn't ask me," said Little White Fox, "but then I didn't give him a chance, I am sure he would if I had." It was a very good dinner and how Little White Fox's sides did stick out when he had finished! But he didn't stay to say thank you, so I guess he wasn't very sure that Big White Bear would have invited him. He just hid behind an ice boulder and waited for Big White Bear to wake up. He mustn't lose Big White Bear. He began to think about that fine dinner he had just eaten and about how he had found Big White Bear all by himself and how he had frightened him. It made him feel so good he just wanted to laugh. The more he thought, the more he wanted to laugh, and the first thing, before he knew it, he was laughing right out loud, "Ha! Ha! Yak! Yak! Yak! Yak!"
Just that minute Big White Bear woke up, and he didn't stop to see who was laughing! He tumbled right into the ocean and went paddling away as fast as ever he could. He didn't stop till he was almost out of sight, then he looked back once for just a moment and went paddling on and on, till he was way out of sight. Little White Fox had lost Big White Bear. All the fine dinners he was to have in the future were lost, just because he had laughed at the wrong time.
I don't know what Little Mrs. White Fox had to say to him when he came home, for I wasn't there, but there are some very fine switches made out of reindeer moss lying all over the tundra. However, Little White Fox was a very young fellow and had a great many things to learn, so perhaps his mother did not punish him very hard.