“Maybe,” Nibble agreed; “but the real question is what will Tommy do to Tad Coon. Tad can’t run away, and Watch knows he’s here. If Tommy is very angry because Tad made those striped buzzers bite Trailer he’ll make Watch find him.”
“If Tommy’s eaten Grandpop he won’t be a bit hungry,” began Doctor Muskrat hopefully. Then a bright idea struck him. “And Tommy’ll never know Tad’s to blame. No one can tell him!”
“That’s so!” Nibble exclaimed. “No one can!”
All the same, when Nibble heard Watch bringing Tommy to the woods to show him the paper wasps’ nest so he’d know who bit Trailer, the rabbit couldn’t help feeling that something would go wrong. Tommy would find out and then wouldn’t he be angry with Tad Coon! And neither Nibble nor Doctor Muskrat could bear to have Tad hunted like Silvertip the Fox. Poor Tad couldn’t even run.
Watch galloped up to the wasps’ nest and barked. “There they are, Tommy. They did it. Those are the buzzers with hot tails I’ve been trying to tell you about.”
“That’s funny,” said Tommy, and he looked right up into the tree. The wasps up there were buzzing over which was the best twig to begin building another nest on. “I wonder how it came to fall down.”
Of course Nibble didn’t understand him—but Watch did! “Yow!” he barked. “That coon made it fall. Trailer was trying to tell me. Coon, coon, coon!” he sang, sniffing around to find him.
“Lie still,” warned Doctor Muskrat, who was hiding with Tad in the Pickery Things.
“I can’t,” whimpered Tad. “This place is all right for a rabbit, but the pond is where I belong.” And with that he staggered to his feet and started for it. But right on the edge of the bank he stumbled. Down he rolled, paws over fur, with Nibble Rabbit and Doctor Muskrat scuttling after him.
“Look out!” barked Watch. “Let me get at him. He’ll fight like anything! They always do.”