Doctor Muskrat popped his head out of the pond. “What’s the matter?” he asked. “And where’s Tommy Peele?”
“He’s coming,” snapped Watch. “And he knows who did it, too.”
“Then he knows more than you do,” called Nibble Rabbit, hurrying through the Pickery Things. “Tad Coon hasn’t been out of the woods a single minute.”
“He has!” snarled Watch. “He’s slit the throats of every chick belonging to old Topknot—the hen who was good to you, Nibble Rabbit. Perhaps that’s one of his jokes.”
“Oh-h-h!” gasped Nibble. “But what makes you sure it was Tad?”
“Topknot says it was someone who wore stripes. Who else could it be?”
“The cat!” guessed Nibble. “She wears them.”
“No, it wasn’t! I smelled, and it didn’t smell like her.”
“Then smell of me,” said Tad. And he marched right out of the Pickery Things, not a bit afraid because he did-n’t have a guilty conscience. “It won’t smell like me, either.”
So when Tommy Peele came running up, there stood Tad Coon with his fur all fluffed up to let the scent out (you remember how the quails sleeked their feathers to hold it), but he wasn’t snarling. He wasn’t even angry. And Watch was sniffing carefully all around him.