Still she knew that if she did not pull herself away, something else dreadful might happen to her.
“Well,” said Slicko to herself, when she had tried several times to pull her leg out and could not, “if I can’t get loose from the trap, maybe I can pull the trap with me, off into the woods, and I can find some other big man-squirrel to help me get loose. That’s what I’ll do.”
But when Slicko tried to run off, with the trap still fastened to her leg, she found that she could not. The trap was chained to a tree, and Slicko was held fast.
“Oh dear!” cried the little squirrel. “I’m never going to get loose. I wish my mamma or papa would come!”
But Papa and Mamma Squirrel were away off in the woods, and they thought their little daughter was safe with her Aunt Whitey. They did not know all that had happened.
Slicko tried and tried again to get out of the trap, or to pull the trap away with her, but she could not. Then, as she was pretty tired, and as her little heart was beating very fast, she lay down to rest.
Finding some of the nuts close to her nose, she began to eat one, for she was quite hungry, even if she was fast in a trap.
After Slicko had eaten a few nuts, she felt better. She was a little stronger, too, and she thought perhaps now she could get out of the trap, but, when she tried, the jaws of it held her as tightly as ever.
“Oh dear! Oh dear! Oh dear!” cried poor Slicko.
All at once she heard, off in the woods, the sound of bushes being trampled down. Twigs and branches snapped and broke, and Slicko knew something was coming.