“Luckily they didn’t,� he said sulkily. “They’d have shouted it all over the marsh. It’s no use having the birds picking on us, I tell you. We have troubles enough without that. Now that I’ve got a full set of feathers growing in I mean to keep them. This flying about without my tail is no fun.� He was so full of his troubles he forgot all about what he smelled. “Now you say you’re going to bring Killer the Weasel into these Woods and Fields. That’ll make the most trouble of all. He won’t do any more good than Silvertip the Fox nor Slyfoot the Mink, and they were a whole lot safer for us. They didn’t climb. Why, his very mate can’t trust him.� He said this in a very shocked voice because he was just a little bit afraid of his own bossy wife.
“Teeth and toenails!� she squawked. “Don’t you ever think? I don’t expect to do any of the trusting; I’ll leave it all to that whining skunk who’s even afraid of Bob White Quail, and that sly, slippery-clawed Tad Coon, and that honey-whiskered Nibble Rabbit. They want to make friends, do they? I’ll show them a new friend all right enough. Killer can eat every last tail-tip of them if he’ll listen to me, and just so long as he keeps away from the barns, the men won’t bother to come after him.�
Chaik Jay heard every last word. Then he heard one of the owls flit away, but the sound was so faint he couldn’t tell whether the other had gone, too. He began to move, very carefully. But just the least scratch of his wings caught the ear of that scary little he-owl, who was still sitting on the limb outside. Pit-pit-pit, he clawed over toward the hole. Chaik could hear him sniff. Now he’d look into it and see.
“Wauk! Waourr!� shrieked his wife from over by the pond. He stopped to listen. She was fluttering about like a crazy bird just outside of Louie Thomson’s tent. “Wah! Ur-r-rh, yah!� yapped Watch who had been sleeping with one ear open. “Wuk-uk-uk!� answered the bad little bird who had just been going to peek and see poor Chaik crouching inside, ready for a battle in the dark, a battle which could only have one ending, a bunch of mussed blue feathers at the foot of the tree.
But the little owl never looked. He flapped his wings noisily because he was too excited to fly in proper owl fashion.
Off he flew to help his mate.
And that smart Chaik Jay did the cleverest thing—he flew right after the owl. He knew that owl hole wasn’t any place to hide in, and he knew he couldn’t find his way home. And the only way he could find Watch was to follow the owl.
It wasn’t any good for Chaik to fly quietly; his wings were so mussed he couldn’t, anyway. And he couldn’t dodge in and out of the twigs because he couldn’t see them as plainly as the little owl. All he could do was to follow the sound and be ready to dodge if the bad little bird took it into his head to pounce at him.
But the owl wasn’t thinking about anything in the world but his mate. He really did love her, even if they quarreled. And he really meant to fight for her as bravely as ever he knew how. But he didn’t have to. For she came to meet him, squawking between each flop, so crazy scared that she flew right past him and all but collided with Chaik, who was following close on his stubby tail.
Chaik dipped, to get out of her way, and struck his wing against a branch. He went whirling tail over crest, not a bit like a bird, but quite like a cluster of leaves the caterpillars bite off for an airplane to carry them back to earth when they want to dig down and make their homes for the winter time. He struck a bush and then went bouncing and sliding to the ground. For a minute he lay there, almost dazed, his poor little head in a whirl. How his poor wing did ache! He listened.