"And I guess I know your voice when I hear it!" replied Peter Rabbit. "It's bad enough in daytime, but if I was you, I'd quit yelling in the night. Some one of these times Hooty the Owl will hear you, and that will be the end of you and your noise. Now go away; I want to sleep."
Sammy went. He was mad clear through, and yet he didn't know what to make of it. Were they just trying to make him mad, or had he really been screaming in his sleep? He flew over to the Smiling Pool. Jerry Muskrat looked up and saw him.
"What were you yelling about in the night, Sammy Jay?" asked Jerry.
This was too much. Sammy Jay let his wings and his tail droop dejectedly and hung his head.
"I don't know. I really don't know anything about it," he said.
VI
SAMMY JAY THINKS HE'S GOING CRAZY
"Sammy Jay screams all day long,
And now what do you think?
Why, Sammy sits and yells all night
And doesn't sleep a wink!"
Everywhere he went Sammy Jay heard that shouted after him. Dozens and dozens of times a day he heard it. At first he lost his temper and was the very maddest Jaybird ever seen on the Green Meadows or in the Green Forest.
"It isn't true! It isn't true! It isn't true!" he would scream at the top of his lungs.