"Indeed it is," said Dr. Possum. "I can climb trees very well, and hang on by my tail, but I never tried cutting one down. I don't believe I could do it. Though often I have heard of hunters, who when they are after friends of mine, cut down trees to get them out."
"How dreadful!" exclaimed Mrs. Flat-tail who was baking some apple-bread for dinner. "But, Dr. Possum, do you think Toodle will have to stay in the house long?"
"Well, maybe two or three days more," said the old gentleman doctor.
"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Mrs. Flat-tail, the beaver lady. "Boys are so troublesome when they are in the house!"
And I guess this is so. Anyhow Noodle, who was the brother of Toodle, stayed in to play with him, and the two of them frisked around and got up all sorts of games, and nearly upset the piano and did all things like that. At least Noodle did, for Toodle was too sore and stiff to do much. But Noodle was trying to amuse his sick brother you see, and really he did not mean to make trouble.
"I'll tell you what I'll do," said Dr. Possum, as he closed up his birch bark satchel filled with all sorts of colored medicines. "On my way back home I'll stop and tell Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy, the muskrat lady, to come over and take care of Toodle. Then Noodle can go out and play, and your house will be quiet, Mrs. Flat-tail."
"Oh, that will be fine!" exclaimed the beaver lady, and Toodle said the same thing.
Noodle said he would be very glad to go out and play, for though he did not much mind staying in the house to amuse his brother, still he would much rather have gone out, to swim around in the pond, play on top of the big dam, that made the beaver pond, or even cut down a little tree so he could gnaw the green, sweet bark.
So Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy came from Uncle Wiggily's hollow stump bungalow, and she read stories to Toodle and told him how she could swim under water, almost as well as the beavers could, and how she could make a fiddle out of a cornstalk and play a tune on it. And she did, and it was such a nice, sleepy sort of tune, all about going to by-low land, that, before he knew it, Toodle was fast, fast asleep, and the house was quiet.
But what happened to Noodle? Ah, ha! We must find out about that before we go much further. For Noodle had made up his mind to do something, and when he did that something almost always happened.