"Ha! What happened you two chaps?" asked the bunny uncle. "Why did you run off without cleaning the black-boards for the lady mouse teacher?"
"We forgot," said Johnnie, sort of ashamed-like and sorry. "That's what we came back to do—clean the boards."
"Well, that was good of you," spoke Uncle Wiggily. "But I have the boards nearly cleaned now."
"Then we will give them a dusting with our tails, and that will finish them," said Billie, and the squirrel boys did, so the black-boards were very clean.
"Now it's time to go home," said Uncle Wiggily. So he locked the school, putting the key under the doormat, where the lady mouse could find it in the morning, and, with the Bushytail squirrel boys, he started off through the woods.
"You and Billie can go back to your play, now, Johnnie," said the bunny uncle. "It was good of you to leave it to come back to do what you were told."
The three animal friends hopped and scrambled on together, until, all of a sudden, the bad old fox, who so often had made trouble for Uncle Wiggily, jumped out from behind a bush, crying:
"Ah, ha! Now I have you, Mr. Longears—and two squirrels besides. Good luck!"
"Bad luck!" whispered Billie.
The fox made a grab for the rabbit gentleman, but, all of a sudden, the paw of the bad creature slipped in some mud and down he went, head first, into a puddle of water, coughing and sneezing.