In the morning he was still climbing or digging, still pushing and pulling at the door, or tearing up and down the yard. Even the coming of the delighted boy did not calm him for an instant. With red fur standing on end, eyes flashing, sharp teeth bared as he panted from exertion, he was the wildest looking creature seen on the ranch for many a day.
Finally he dropped to the ground, exhausted, but not discouraged. Blackie came timidly to him then and licked his bruised and torn feet, and the bites on his ears which, without her care in taking out the poison, might have turned into angry sores.
With her so close, Red Ben seemed to forget the wire that held him in; but the instant he heard a footstep approaching, all his fears awoke and he was once more the untamed, splendidly active creature so admired by the boy.
In the afternoon, the boy’s father, who owned the ranch, came home from a long trip he had made the day before. After seeing his family, his first thought was of the valuable foxes, so the boy, hoping to give him a pleasant surprise, said nothing about having trapped a new fox, but eagerly led him to the pens.
As these two came through the spruce trees, Red Ben flattened himself against the ground under the shed, hoping to be passed unseen. But the man noticed the tufts of fur lying about the pen and strode over there.
“Why, what’s all this, son?” he asked. “Have Blackie and her friend had a disagreement? This looks pretty bad. They are the best pair of all. If anything happened to one of them, I don’t know what I should do.”
At this the boy began to feel mighty uncomfortable. All the joy of the surprise was suddenly gone. He hung back, fearful of what his father would say when he found out what really had happened.
“This is awful!” his father went on. “Something has gone wrong. What could it be?” And then, as if in answer to the question, Red Ben sprang up in all his wildness and dashed up the wire like a cat, only to be thrown down by the netting at the top.
The old rancher stepped back in a dazed way, then with sudden suspicion, looked at his son. He read part of the story in the poor boy’s unhappy face, and drew out the rest with a few questions.
He was a sensible father. He gulped down all his disappointment about the injury to one of his favorites, gave the boy a hearty slap on the shoulder, just to show it was all right, and congratulated him on his cleverness in outwitting a fox.