"My! What can have happened?" thought little Pinky, and she looked around, and there she saw a great big fuzzy fox, standing behind her. And the fox cried out, as he rubbed his nose:
"Did you hit me with that rubber ball?"
"Yes—yes—perhaps I did," said poor Baby Pinky, trembling so that she nearly shook the curl out of her tail. "I tossed my ball up in the air, but I'm sure I didn't mean to hit you with it. Please forgive me."
"No, indeed, I will not!" exclaimed the fox. "Your rubber ball hit me right on the nose when it came down, and I caught it. And, just for that, I am going to carry you away with me and make a pork pie of you!"
"Oh, please don't!" begged Pinky, shaking more than ever, and she squealed as loudly as she could, but her mamma did not hear her, for she was beating up some eggs to make a cake, and the egg beater made so much noise that she couldn't hear her own little girl. And Curly and Floppy were shooting off their make-believe guns, and making so much noise in the woods that they couldn't hear, and there was the fox about to carry off the poor little piggie girl to his den. Oh, wasn't it terrible?
"Here we go!" cried the fox, and with that he grabbed up poor Pinky, tossing her rubber ball on the ground. Up it bounced, and, hardly knowing what she did, the little pig girl caught it in her foot, holding it tight. Then the fox slung her across his back and ran off with her, Pinky squealing all the while as hard as she could.
"Squeal away!" growled the old fuzzy fox. "You'll soon stop it when
I put you in the pork pie!"
And Pinky kept on squealing. Pretty soon the fox ran through the woods where Curly and Flop were playing soldier, but the fox didn't know that. Pinky did, however, and when she got beneath the trees she squealed louder than ever, hoping her brothers would hear.
"Keep quiet!" barked the fox.
"No! No!" exclaimed Pinky, and she squealed again. Oh! she squealed like anything. Then Curly heard her. So did Flop.