So into the shock of corn crawled Curly and Flop pulling a lot of stalks behind them to close the hole, and they were only just in time, for, an instant later, up rushed the alligator man. Of course he could not see the piggy boys, and he was much surprised.
"But I know they're hiding somewhere!" he growled. And it all happened just as the mousie girl said. The alligator man peeked in nearly all the corn shocks, but he didn't happen to look in the one where Curly and Flop were hiding. And pretty soon it was dark, and then the piggies came out and the mousie girl showed them the way home, and the alligator man did not get them. So, you see, the mousie helped the piggie boys after all.
And next, in case the salt cellar doesn't hide in the pepper caster and make believe it's a mustard plaster I'll tell you about Flop having a tumble.
STORY XVI
FLOP HAS A TUMBLE
"Come boys!" called Mamma Twistytail, the pig lady, one morning, to her two little boys, Curly and Flop. "Come, hurry, or you'll be late for school!"
"Oh, I guess we have time enough," spoke Flop, as he looked around for the football he and his brother had been playing with. "It's early yet."
"No, it isn't," answered his mamma. "Our clock is slow by your papa's watch. Hurry now, I think I hear the bell ringing!"
"All right," answered Curly. "Come along, Flop." You see, he sometimes called his brother Flop, for short. So they kissed their little sister, Baby Pinky, good-by, and went on to school.
As they hurried along, they met Jackie Bow Wow, the puppy dog boy, and Curly said: