His cleverness and growing strength made him a wonderful companion for the old fox. She would go nowhere without him, and began to rely more and more on his help in their hunts.
It happened that wild strawberries were especially good that year, and so were eaten occasionally by the foxes, who picked up those the village children did not find. After them the cherries ripened, and the big mulberry tree at the corner of Ben Slown’s fence began to drop delicious fruit. Fat robins, starlings and black birds picked their share, but at night, especially after a rain heavy enough to knock down a good supply, the Oak Ridge animals fairly swarmed around the mulberry tree.
The shy red foxes usually reached it after the last sign of the sun had left the sky, so it was not strange that on one evening they found there ahead of them one of the deer from Cranberry Swamp with her two spotted fawns. The watchful doe scented them, gave one quick snort and led the fawns away in great bounds, for fear they were in danger. All three leaped over the field fence as if it had been a bush in the path.
The rush of the deer to cover frightened two rabbits just as the foxes came cautiously out of the wood. Away dashed Red Ben to head them off, but too late. When he returned, a huge coon hurried to the tree and began to swallow mulberries as fast as he could pick them up. The mother fox, however, took no notice of old Ring Tail, and he was too busy to worry over the foxes just then.
Up in the tree, Red Ben heard an occasional squeak, and soon spied a little brown squirrel which was quite the prettiest creature he had ever seen. While he watched, it suddenly sprang into the air with feet outstretched and sailed to a fence post near the wood; there it alighted almost as softly as a leaf, looking so much like a clinging piece of bark that the pup could hardly believe it was anything alive. This was Flying Squirrel, one of the very nicest of the woodsfolk.
While he was busy with the juicy mulberries the pup did not keep a very good watch behind him, and so was surprised suddenly to find White Stripe, the skunk, nosing around close by. He, too, liked the mulberries, it seemed. The fox kept one eye on him, but found he attended strictly to his own business.
A moment later a furry gray creature, nearly his own size, came stealthily along the fence. The pup was worried and ready to run at the slightest sign from his mother, but she kept right on nosing about, and old Possum joined the feeding. He, however, crawled up the big tree, where he wandered from limb to limb, picking off the ripest fruit and often by mistake knocking down some to the creatures below.
“Flying Squirrel, one of the very nicest of the woodsfolk”
It was a weird assemblage that the moon looked down upon that night. Two small coons came from the swamp with their mother for a hurried look around; White Stripe’s mate, a wonderful white skunk, also appeared, and a brown screech owl sat on a nearby pine limb to watch and whinny softly, so that his mate, who was looking for mice farther along the fence, might always know where to find him.