“Hey? What’s that? A wild man? There isn’t any such thing!� snarled Killer.
“Well, he’s wild. You could see for yourself even the rabbits weren’t afraid of him,� the owl kept on arguing.
The weasel thought for a minute. That certainly was true; so were the corncobs, left from Louie’s feast, he saw piled beside the little blanket tent. “All right,� said he. “Then show me the mouse’s stump. Flap along, bird, flap along!�
CHAPTER X
THE BIG RAIN PUTS AN END TO EVIL DOINGS FOR A TIME
I just tell you the wife of the Bad Little Owl was glad to get on her wings. She flew so fast that her mate, flying along behind her, said: “Hey! Killer can’t keep up with us at this rate. Where are you going?�
“I’m scared to death of that wicked weasel,� she answered. “I’m going as fast and as far as ever I can.�
“What a way to talk!� he hooted indignantly. “The poor fellow was hungry. No wonder he was cross. Just as soon as he gets a good meal he’ll be friendly again. We can’t change our hunting ground with this storm coming on. There won’t be any grasshoppers to speak of, and it takes so many of them to make a meal. We mightn’t have the luck to catch a sparrow, and we wouldn’t know a single mousehole. It’s too dangerous.�
“It’s not nearly as dangerous as Killer!� snapped his wife. “He didn’t make you come right down close to him, the way he made me. He could have caught me. I won’t risk it again.�
“He made me give him that robin,� answered the little he-owl. “But I don’t care a bit. I’m tired of eating robins. Think of all we had to carry home from the Robins’ Roost. And we didn’t help him kill a single one. Now, if we help him kill the mice we’ll get every other one of them. Um-m!� And he smacked his beak. Wasn’t he just a greedy little bird?
