"Oh, well. However, be that as it may," went on Professor Rat, hunching up his shoulders like an old clothes man when he wants to buy a pair of rubber boots, "no matter! Since we have started, Miss Lady Bug, we will keep on, and go to the homes of the different animal children.
"It will be a little holiday for us, and, really, I am almost as tired of school as the children can possibly be. Come along. It is a beautiful day, the sun is shining, though winter will soon be here again. The leaves are very prettily colored, and everything is lovely. Come along and let us be happy."
So he took Miss Lady Bug's wing, and away they went, side by each, through the woods after the things the animal children had purposely forgotten and left at home.
And what was happening back there at the hollow stump school? Let us go and see, as they say in story books.
When Professor Rat and Miss Lady Bug started off, Toodle Flat-tail, who had forgotten to bring his geography book, sort of looked at his brother and said:
"Well, it seems to me that this is just as good as if we went home ourselves. We have no one to teach us—no lessons to say—come, let us be jolly! No one will mind!"
"That's what I say!" cried Susie Littletail, and then such fun as there was in the hollow stump school. And, really, have you the heart to blame those little animal children? I have not, at least.
Well, they were playing stump tag, and hide the hickory nut, and all games like that, including a new one called "Never put a Snowball on a Red Hot Stove," only, of course there was only a make believe stove and a make believe snowball, too. They were playing these games, when some one knocked on the school door.
All at once the animal children were as quiet as mice. They crept to their seats on tiptoes, and no one said anything. The knock came again.
"That can't be Professor Rat," whispered Toodle Flat-tail. "He would come right in."