XI
A SEARCH IN VAIN
It was true that Dickie Deer Mouse and all his relations feasted on the horns shed by the deer. But of course they didn't find horns in the woods every day. Only at a certain season of the year did the deer drop them. And since that time was now past, and the Deer Mouse family had scoured the woods until they found—and devoured—them all, it is clear that Fatty Coon had started out on a fruitless hunt.
But he didn't know that, even if Dickie Deer Mouse did. And that was the reason why Dickie smiled as he watched Fatty Coon dodging about among the trees, looking for deer's horns where there couldn't possibly be any.
"It's the finest thing that could happen to Fatty," Dickie Deer Mouse thought. "While he's hunting for horns he can't go to the cornfield. And so long as he stays away from the cornfield, old dog Spot can't catch him there."
And then Dickie set forth to find his friends and enjoy a romp in the moonlight.