The alligator was furiously angry. “Well, he tricked me that time,” he said, “but the next time I catch him he will not get away so easily.” So he hid himself again in the mud and waited and watched. But the little jackal came no more to the river. He was afraid. He stayed up in the country and lived on figs that he gathered under a wild fig-tree.
But the alligator was determined to have the jackal, so when he found the jackal came no more to the river he crawled out one morning very early, and dragged himself to the wild fig-tree and gathered together a great heap of figs, and hid himself under them.
In a little while the jackal came running toward the fig-tree, licking his lips, for he was very hungry. When he saw the great heap of figs he was delighted. “How nice!” he said. “Now I will not have the trouble of gathering the figs together; they are there all ready for me.”
He went nearer and nearer to the heap of figs, and then he stopped. “It really looks almost as though something might be hidden under those figs,” he thought. Then he cried out loud, “When I come to the fig-tree all the figs that are any good roll about in the wind, but those figs lie so still that I do not think they can be fit to eat. I will have to go to some other place if I want to get good figs!”
When the alligator heard this, he thought, “This little jackal is very particular. I will just shake myself and make the figs roll about a little, or he will not come near enough for me to catch him.” So he shook himself, and away the figs rolled this way and that.
“Oh, you stupid old alligator!” cried the jackal. “If you had stayed quite still, you might have caught me. Ring-a-ting, ring-a-ting! Thank you for shaking yourself and letting me know you were there!” And then he ran away as fast as his legs would carry him.
The alligator gnashed his teeth with rage. “Never mind! I will have this little jackal yet,” he cried, and he hid himself in the tall grass beside the path that led to the fig-tree. He waited there for several days, but he saw nothing of the jackal. The jackal was afraid to come to the fig-tree any more. He stayed in the jungle and fed on such roots and berries as he could find there, but as he could find but little, he grew very thin and miserable.
Then one morning the alligator made his way to the jackal’s house while the jackal was away. He squeezed himself in through the doorway (for it was very narrow), and hid under the heap of dead leaves that was the jackal’s bed.
Toward evening the little jackal came running home, and he was very hungry, for he had found little to eat all day, and he was very tired too. He was just about to go in and throw himself down on his bed when he noticed that the sides of the doorway were scraped and broken as though some big animal had forced its way in.