“You were mighty smart to cut the three bottom rungs off that ladder to keep the blacks from climbing out before the other fox knocked the ladder down. Suppose you see, now, whether you can set a trap in the pen that will catch that big, red scalawag and not the others. His fur is wonderful, the longest I ever saw. We’ll make him into a fine rug for the parlor.” With that he strode off without noticing what a woeful glance the boy gave the “fine rug,” so wonderfully alive at that moment.
CHAPTER XV
FREEDOM IS SWEET
Red Ben’s doom seemed sealed. Even if he scorned the box trap set for him by the dutiful boy, he was still in the rancher’s power. He knew all about box traps. Instead of getting caught himself, he drove Blackie’s companion into it and every now and then looked in through a crack to see how the black fellow was enjoying the place. Shut in there, the other fox could growl and be as nasty as he chose.
After that, Red Ben once more began his attacks on the wire. He never lost hope of getting away. The gate, too, he worked over nearly half the night. It shook when he struck it. It seemed the weakest part of the pen. He pawed its edges, climbed up its sides, and then all at once felt it give. He had sawed the peg until it moved back. The gate swung open, he was free!
Cautiously he slipped out and started for the spruce trees, then stopped suddenly and looked back. Blackie was not following. She stood on the threshold of the pen looking after him. Instantly he turned back and began to coax her. He would run towards the thicket, and then back again. He pulled at her velvety ears and played in front of her. Still she would not venture out.
Courtesy Black Fox Magazine “She stood on the threshold of the pen”
At last, however, she very carefully took a few steps, and then a few more. With Red Ben beside her, almost shoving her along, she came to the tall outside wire, under which a hole was soon dug. Once past this she had the whole country before her, the Pine Barrens, the swamps, everything that delighted Red Ben. But the farther they went from the ranch, the more nervous she became. Twice she started back, only to he coaxed forward again by her ever faithful companion. Every bush and tree was something new to her, every shadow and strange scent a cause of fear. In all her life she had never gone farther than around and around her little pen, and now she wanted to go around and around in the same way, instead of straight ahead with Red Ben.
A dog barked from a nearby farm house. Blackie instantly stopped. The dog barked again; the wind had brought to him the scent of the foxes. He was coming nearer to investigate. Red Ben did not move. He knew it was a small dog he had seen several times from a distance. Again the bark, very near and very loud.
Blackie crouched for an instant, then turned. Red Ben could not stop her. She was panic stricken in this strange new place. Over the snow she sped, back to the pen and to her favorite bed in the old shed. This was home to her. Here she felt safe. Red Ben could love his woods, but she was a ranch bred fox.