Sandy Chipmunk declared that he had done exactly as he had agreed.
"I brought load after load of food to the foot of this tree," he explained. "Half of it I took for myself—just as you suggested. Of course, I had to pay Frisky Squirrel for helping me. I paid him half the food for carrying it up to your house."
"That's it!" Mr. Crow cried. "That's the trouble! You took half and
Frisky Squirrel took half. So of course there was no food left for me.
There are two halves in a whole, you know."
"You must be mistaken," Sandy told him politely. "There's only one half in my hole. I put my half there myself, and I ought to know."
Mr. Crow looked as if he thought Sandy Chipmunk must be playing a trick on him. But pretty soon he saw that it was not so.
"You don't seem to understand," Mr. Crow said. "I don't believe you've ever studied fractions."
Sandy Chipmunk admitted that he never had.
"Ah!" Mr. Crow exclaimed. "This is what comes of hiring stupid people to work for one. Here I've wasted all my corn. And I get nothing for it but trouble."
"Corn!" Sandy Chipmunk exclaimed. "I don't know anything about any corn!"
"Well, you certainly are stupid!" Mr. Crow told him crossly. "Didn't you spend the whole day gathering corn for me?"