“Grass!” Chirpy answered.
“I’ve never heard of it,” said Mr. Mole Cricket. “And I must say you have queer tastes—even though you are my own cousin.”
Chirpy Cricket saw that he and Mr. Mole Cricket were bound to have trouble if they saw too much of each other. So he hinted—in a delicate way—that Mr. Mole Cricket’s wife must be wondering where he was.
Thereupon that gentleman started up hurriedly and made for his tunnel.
“I’ll see you again sometime,” he said hastily over his shoulder. And in another instant he was gone.
They never met again. Chirpy Cricket took great pains never to spend another day in hiding in Farmer Green’s garden. He was afraid there might be trouble if he saw more of his cousin. And he couldn’t forget those powerful forelegs and enormous feet of Mr. Mole Cricket! They looked very dangerous.
The longer Chirpy pondered over his brief meeting with Mr. Mole Cricket, the more firmly he made up his mind that he had been in great danger and that he had been lucky to escape alive. Everybody knew that Grandfather Mole was a terrible-tempered person when aroused. He would rush at anybody, big or little. Perhaps that was because he couldn’t see what sized person he was attacking. For Grandfather Mole was blind. But he never stopped to inquire of anybody whether he was tall or short, thick or thin. He just went ahead without asking.
“I’m glad,” thought Chirpy, “that I didn’t go home with Mr. Mole Cricket. If his wife’s feet are anything like his they’d be a fearful pair to quarrel with. And even if they hadn’t quarrelled with me, they might have had trouble between themselves. And if I happened to get in their way it would certainly have gone hard with me.”
Harmless Mr. Mole Cricket never knew what a monster his cousin Chirpy Cricket believed him to be. When he reached home he told his wife that he had met a queer little cousin who spent much of his time above ground and lived on grass.
But Mrs. Mole Cricket wouldn’t believe him. She told him not to be silly. She even said that there wasn’t any such thing as grass. And she asked him how anybody could live on it when there wasn’t any anywhere.