Now the dog was not really a friend of the chicken at all. In fact he hated it. It was always creeping up and trying to steal his food. Again and again he had tried to catch it, but always it kept just out of reach. But now it had come so near, that it almost seemed as though, with one bound he could grab it. Very, very quietly he drew himself together, without the chicken’s noticing it, and then suddenly with a bound and a roar he was up and at the chicken. He would have caught it, too, if his chain had only been a little longer. As it was his teeth just grazed its feathers.
He gave them one scornful look and stalked away
The chicken gave a wild squawk, and fled with spread wings toward the hole in the fence. The ducklings tumbled after it, almost scared out of their wits.
The chicken squeezed through the hole and rushed on down the road, and the little ducks, too, squeezed through the hole and ran after it.
On and on ran the chicken, and on and on ran the ducklings. For all they knew the dog might have broken his chain and be close at their heels.
After a while they came to the river and could go no further. But it was a part of the river that the ducklings had never seen before. Here the chicken turned on them angrily.
“Why don’t you go home?” he cried. “Why do you keep following me? I don’t want you. Go home I tell you.”
“But we don’t know how to get home,” cried the ducklings, and Curly-Tail began to cry.
“Well, I don’t care where you go, only don’t keep following me because I won’t have it. I’m tired of you.”