“But that can’t happen to me here,” thought Slicko. “No matter how cold it is outside, or how much snow there is, I shall be warm in this house, and Bob and his sisters will give me enough to eat. After all, maybe it is a good thing Bob caught me and brought me here.”
Bob taught his pet squirrel other tricks. He taught Slicko to crawl right up to his pocket, and go to sleep there. He also taught her to go into his pockets after lumps of sugar, and other good things to eat. When she had found them, she would come out and sit on his shoulder to eat them. This always made the children who saw it laugh, and they thought Slicko was a very cute squirrel indeed.
Bob’s sisters tried to teach Slicko tricks. But they wanted to make a sort of doll of her, and, though Slicko was a girl squirrel, she knew nothing of dolls.
“Oh, wouldn’t she look cute dressed up in one of my dolls’ dresses?” asked Mollie of Sallie, one day.
“Yes, indeed! Let’s try it!” exclaimed Sallie.
They took Slicko out of her cage, and, though they handled her very gently, the little squirrel did not like being put inside a doll’s dress.
“Oh, isn’t she too cute!” cried Mollie.
“Yes,” said Sallie. “Now let’s put her in the doll carriage and wheel her about.”
But this was too much for Slicko. It was bad enough to be dressed up as a doll, but when it came to being put in a thing on wheels, and ridden about the room, that was more than Slicko would stand. She did not mind her wire wheel in the cage, but she did not like to be wheeled in the carriage.