"I see you're deaf to-day," Mrs. Ladybug observed in a pitying tone. "It's a shame. And Farmer Green ought to be very grateful to you for your help."
"He hasn't said a word to me," Daddy[p. 52] Longlegs told her. And Mrs. Ladybug declared she couldn't understand it.
But there were many other things, too, that she didn't understand. She had heard that Daddy was a harvestman. But she didn't know that some people called him by that name merely because he was seen in Pleasant Valley about the time Farmer Green harvested his crops. As for working in the fields, Daddy Longlegs knew no more about that than did that fat drone, Buster Bumblebee. And Farmer Green would have laughed heartily at the idea of either of them helping him.
XI
THE BIG WIND
For several days after his unlucky journey across the meadow, when he tried to reach the field where Farmer Green was harvesting his oats, Daddy Longlegs did not wander far from the stone wall.
But one day Rusty Wren told him that his cousin, Long Bill Wren, was going to give a party at his house in the reeds on the bank of Black Creek. And although he had not been invited to the party, Daddy Longlegs thought it would be pleasant to go to it.
Accordingly he started off at once, though the party was not to take place[p. 54] until the afternoon of the following day. But Daddy Longlegs knew that he was a slow walker—and Black Creek was a long distance away.