But they were both very much excited about the trap and the weasel. They could not sleep. Finally they sat up in their beds and began to throw pillows at each other. Their father and mother were reading down in the dining room. They heard what the children were doing; but they said nothing.
Suddenly the pillow-throwing stopped; and after a moment the little boy called:
“Papa! Papa! The weasel is in the trap. Don’t you hear Tuké barking? Let us go too, papa!”
Tuké, you see, was the name of the dog!
Their father said they might, provided they put their shoes on. He would never let them go out at night, barefooted, for fear of coral or rattlesnakes.
So they went in their pajamas, just as they were.
And what, if you please, did they find in the trap? Their father stooped down in the doorway of the hen coop, holding Tuké back by the collar. When he stood up, he was holding a little raccoon by the tail; and the little raccoon was snapping and whistling and screaming “Mamma! Mamma!” in a sharp, shrill voice like a cricket’s.
“Oh, don’t kill him, papa! He is such a pretty little ’coon!” said the boy and the girl. “Give him to us, and we will tame him!”
“Very well,” said the father. “You may have him. But don’t forget that raccoons drink water when they are thirsty, the same as little boys and girls.”
He said this because once he had caught a wildcat and given it to them for a pet. They fed it plenty of meat from the pantry. But they didn’t dream that it needed water. And the poor wildcat died.