As for Cousin Greylegs, why, he laid down to the running as though he had never been born for anything else. But it is hard work running with a cowhide flapping about one’s legs, so they caught him just over the hill, and then, dear, dear, what a drubbing they gave him.
But as soon as everybody was safe away after Cousin Greylegs and the cowhide, the Great Red Fox came down from the loft, and marched off with the corn-factor’s money without anybody being about to say “No” to him.
Off he went as happy as a cricket, until he came to the cross-roads over the hill and back of the woods, and who should he see sitting there but Cousin Greylegs rubbing the places that smarted the most.
“Hi!” says the Great Red Fox, “and is that you, Cousin Greylegs? Why, I have been looking up and down, over hill and over hollow for you. Here is a whole bag of money that I found at the inn over yonder, and if it wasn’t for the trick that I played you, there was never a penny of it that would have come into our pockets.”
“So!” says Cousin Greylegs. “Well, that was a different matter;” and he swallowed the drubbing he had had, for it was to be share and share alike with the money, and that was a salve for sore bones. So off they went together arm in arm.
By and by they came to another inn. “We’ll stop here,” says Cousin Greylegs, “and have another bite to eat before we go any farther.” And that suited the Great Red Fox well enough, so in they went, and gave the bag of money into the landlord’s keeping, and Cousin Greylegs ordered a supper fit for a lord.
But the Great Red Fox had his wits about him all this time, for he was not one to be caught napping when the sun was up. “Yes, yes,” says he to himself, “Cousin Greylegs is up to some of his tricks, sure enough; we’ll put a stopper in the bottle before the luck has dribbled out.” So while Cousin Greylegs was pottering about in the kitchen down-stairs, seeing that the cooking was done to his mind, the Great Red Fox took a bag like the one they brought with them, and filled it full of old rusty nails and bits of iron. Off he marched with it to the landlord. “See,” says he, “Cousin Greylegs will come asking for a bag by and by; here it is, give it to him and he will be satisfied.”
Sure enough, when the supper was over and the Great Red Fox was snoring in front of the fire, for all the world as though he were sound asleep, off packed Cousin Greylegs to the landlord. “Look,” says he, “that bag that the Great Red Fox left here, just hand it over to me, will you? for I must be jogging. As for the Great Red Fox, you may let him have his sleep out.”
Yes, that was all right, and the landlord knew nothing about the tricks of the two rogues, so he handed over the bag of rusty nails and bits of iron. And Cousin Greylegs never once thought of looking to see, for the bits of iron jingled, and the sound was enough for him, for that is the way with folks out in the world.