A chorus of perfectly frantic barks and squeaks broke out at once. I heard my enemy move uneasily, and, summoning all my courage, I let myself go and dropped.
I struck the branch beneath, fair and square. Alas! its twigs were thin, elastic, and slippery with frozen snow. A wild grasp with all four paws failed to stop me. Down I went to the ground below.
Oddly enough, this was where my luck turned. If I had fallen on to the hard frozen surface I should almost certainly have been too stunned to move at once. As it was, I alighted on a spot where only a thin coating of powdery snow covered a deep soft cushion of dead leaves. Before the cat was half-way down the birch trunk I was in the beech-tree.
Rusty and Cob were awaiting me.
‘Good squirrel, Scud!’ cried my brother, in tones of such warm praise as absolutely astonished me, for I was intensely ashamed of myself for my cowardice, and for having had such a tumble.
However, there was no time to waste. With Rusty leading, we were away through the beech into the next tree, and so across the coppice at full speed. The cat, lashing her tail with rage, followed for a while across the snow beneath, and once or twice started climbing again after us. But we were most careful to keep in the thickest part of the wood, and whenever she climbed we merely jumped to the next tree. Soon she tired of this—for her—unprofitable pursuit, and stole softly away.
Not until we had watched her out of the coppice and away along the hedges in the direction of Merton Spinney did we venture to return to our respective homes, where we shut ourselves up snugly and went to sleep again.