“I must run away!” thought poor Winkie. “I must run away and take this trap with me. Then, maybe, when I am in a safe place, I can pull my leg out! Oh, how it pinches! I wish I had never tried to get the carrot!”
The little woodchuck no longer thought of the yellow carrot which was placed near the trap. She seemed to have got over her hunger because of the pain in her leg.
“Yes, I must run away and take this trap with me!” thought Winkie.
But that was easier said than done. As Winkie tried to walk away, with the spring trap still fast to her leg, she was suddenly stopped with a jerk that gave her another pain. She almost fell down, and she had to cry “Ouch!” Of course, in the way woodchucks say it.
Then she looked and found there was a chain attached to the trap, and the other end of the chain was fast to a big log. If Winkie should walk away with the trap, she would also have to drag the log with her. And this was more than the little woodchuck girl could do.
“Oh dear! Oh dear!” thought poor Winkie, lying down on the soft grass near the trap. “This is dreadful!”
And indeed it was! It was worse than the blasting in the field which had closed the door holes of the burrow house. It was worse than Farmer Tottle and his dog. It was worse than the big storm when the tree in which Winkie was sleeping had been struck by lightning.
“Oh, what shall I do?” sighed poor Winkie.
Well, there was little she could do. She again tried to pull her leg out of the trap, but it would not move, and the pain each time she tried made her chatter her teeth and whistle. Then she tried to pull the trap loose from the log to which it was chained. But she could not do that, either.
“Oh, I shall have to stay here forever!” thought poor Winkie. “I never can get loose! I shall never see Blinkie nor Blunk again, nor my father and mother! Oh dear!”