One was enough. Precious Sue, sleeping on the porch, heard and correctly interpreted. A silent trailer, a hound that made no noise until quarry was bayed, she came rushing through the night.
Old Joe did not hurry, for haste was scarcely consistent with his dignity. But he had not left his den to play with a hound, and there was a simple way to be rid of Precious Sue.
Coming to Willow Brook, and still clutching his hen, Old Joe leaped in and surrendered to the water. A half mile downstream he left the brook, stopped to feast leisurely on the fat hen, and made his way to a swamp so dense and thick that even full sunlight never penetrated some parts of it.
Deep in the swamp he came to his destination, a hollow oak, a huge old tree as massive as his sycamore. Unhesitatingly he climbed the hollow, and the female coon that had chosen the oak as her winter den awoke to snarl and bite him on the nose.
Repelled, but by no means resigned, Old Joe found another den in a nearby ledge of rocks and made plans to meet the situation.
HARKY
At twenty minutes past five, just four hours before Old Joe startled the owl that watched him come out of his den, Harky Mundee peered furtively around the rear of the cow he was milking to see if his father was watching. He was. Harky sighed and went back to work.