[CHAPTER IV]
SLICKO SEES A CIRCUS
For a few minutes after jumping down into the empty nest of her Aunt Whitey, little Slicko did not know what to do. It had all happened so suddenly—the breaking up of the family, each one going to a different place to hide, the coming of Slicko to these woods, and the finding of the empty nest—that the little squirrel did not know what to think of it.
Slicko listened as sharply as she could for any sounds of danger. She bent her two little ears forward, just as her mamma had told her to do when she wanted to listen to any far-off sounds. But Slicko could hear nothing.
That is, she could hear nothing that sounded like danger. Of course she could hear the wind blowing through the trees, the singing of the grasshoppers, the call of the birds and noises like that.
And none of these sounds meant any harm to the little squirrel. She had heard them all her life.
“Oh, but it is so lonesome!” whispered Slicko to herself. She did not want to speak aloud in her queer, little chattering voice, for fear some one—like a bad dog or a snake—would hear her. And yet Slicko wanted to talk to some one, even if it was only herself.
She lifted up her head, from where she had nestled it down among the dried leaves in her aunt’s nest, and looked about her. The nest was rather dark, but Slicko could see better now. And what she saw made her sure that her aunt had either been taken away by some enemy, or had run off in a great hurry.
For the nest was all upset. The leaves were scattered about, and most of the nuts were gone.