Last of all came the smallest and in front of him came Striped Coat with every hair of his body on end and his tail straight up in the danger signal. Through the smoke they wandered towards the field, then along the fence, away from the path of the roaring flames.
It was a queer little company. Each stumbling along as best he could, bristling up whenever strange objects like roots or stumps loomed suddenly out of the smoke, sneezing and choking when the tricky wind blew the fire towards them. Well it was that each had showy white stripes which those behind could plainly see and follow, just as men in the dark follow a lantern. For in that way the mother was able to lead them the whole length of the fence and then around the corner to the edge of Farmer Slown’s barn where, as if she had been aiming for it all the time, the mother found the hole under the floor and slipped in. After her solemnly trooped the little ones.
And it was a strange thing that between them and the fire, their enemy, the Farmer, was working for all he was worth to save his home and at the same time to do what would also save their lives. He did not know that a skunk family was under his precious barn, but he had found out for himself that a fire in the woods was a terribly dangerous thing.
When, thanks to the help of Goose Creek, the Farmer had put out the last flame, he was nearly exhausted and in much worse condition than most of the little woods folk he had tried to destroy. To be sure many of them were homeless, but they could find or make new homes. Indeed, when that night the mother wood pussy slipped from under the barn and wandered across the field to the stretch of burned woods beyond, she found the mice already in new holes along the edge of the field and Possum carrying, in a bundle held by his tail, a lot of straw for a new bed he was making in a hollow oak.
Where the brush piles had stood, and beyond, all the way to the creek, every living thing was blackened and dying. Trees thirty feet high were scorched. The ground was almost bare. Many years would go by before the forest could cover the ugly scars.
Wandering about in an uncertain, awed way were several meat eaters besides the wood pussy. Gray Fox and his mate were slipping from shadow to shadow examining everything, a mother coon and her three young ones passed along the edge of the creek, and overhead Screech Owl and several of his kind were talking it all over in gentle crooning voices.
The wood pussy could find no trace of her old home, the brush pile. It was gone. So after a little while she left the gloomy place.
Near the field she picked up a small toad and a yellow and brown garter snake, both killed by the fire. These and a number of wild strawberries were food enough, and she was too tired to hunt more. Back then to Farmer Slown’s barn she wandered. It was not quite the kind of a place she would have selected for a den, but there seemed no other to which to take the young ones. Stealthily she circled the farm yard and slipped into the hole. It was smelly and damp and cold under the barn floor, but what she thought of most was whether it was safe. Several times she looked out and wandered about uneasily, each time returning to the young ones to lick and mother them. They seemed utterly tired out; so she began gathering together leaves for a bed in the farthest corner; she had decided to stay.
Several times she looked out and wandered about uneasily