“Right in the bank here,â€� said Doctor Muskrat, giving a scratch with his paw to show him. And Louie didn’t need any more telling. He knew about that mud himself—his mother had put some on a bee-sting. So he scooped out a good handful and slapped it on his bite. Then he did feel better. He felt well enough to remember that he was so sleepy he couldn’t keep his eyes open.
Over by his tent there were just as many beetles as ever, buzzing over his lantern. They were still fighting it, and the little skunks were still catching them. They couldn’t eat another one, but they thought it was fun to jump up and bat them. But Louie could see they’d never in the world catch them all. The only thing for him to do was to turn out his light and then the rest of the bad buzzwings would go back to the marsh where they belonged. “Pouff!� My, how dark everything was!
“Oh-h!� sighed Tad Coon in a sorry voice; “he killed it! What did he do that for? It bit me, all right, but I didn’t want it killed. And the buzzwing was the one who bit him. I saw it.� You see he thought the flame was alive.
“It’s only gone dark,� Watch comforted him. “It does that quite often, like the fireflies over in the marsh do when they fold their wings. But it always shines when he wants it to unless he forgets to feed it.� You know a lantern won’t burn if it hasn’t any oil. Watch knew that much, but he was really most as puzzled as Tad.
Inside his blanket tent Louie was already fast asleep.
CHAPTER II
CHAIK JAY CARRIES BAD NEWS
When Louie’s lantern went out, all the Woodsfolk scurried to their holes as fast as ever they could go. All but Watch, Tommy Peele’s dog, who curled up just outside Louie’s blanket tent and went to sleep with one ear open, and Chaik the Jay.
Poor Chaik was in a bad way. It was easy enough to fly over to the feast while the lantern was lit, but now, in the black dark, he couldn’t get home. He tried to fly. Bump! He hit a tree. “Ough! I can’t risk that again,� he thought to himself. “Wonder where I am? What’s more, I wonder where those Bad Little Owls are?� He began tiptoeing around the trunk. First thing he knew his foot found a woodpecker hole. In he popped, without stopping to think. “Ah,� he chuckled, “this is luck! Mussy nest, though, I must tease Taps Woodpecker about his housekeeping. Whatever is this I’m stepping on?� He scratched round, feeling carefully with his claws. Then his feathers fluffed out with fright. “Great acorns!� he gasped. “It isn’t Tap’s nest at all any more. This is a mouse’s bones I’m standing on. I’m in the hole in the dead hickory where they killed Tap’s wife last year and stole the nest for themselves.� True enough. He had a right to be scared; he was in the little owls’ own hole.
There was a soft flutter just outside. He held his sharp beak ready for a fight, but he didn’t stir. He didn’t even breathe for quite a while. Nothing happened. “It’s the queerest thing,â€� he thought. “I should think this place should smell owlier than it does. Yes, and those bones are certainly old. I wonder——â€�
Right then a whispering interrupted him. It certainly was those owls. “What did you get?� said one. “I’ve got a mouse, a pretty good one, too.�