Jack Frost was in a flower bed looking up into the face of a beautiful pink hollyhock and thinking which of its blossoms he would pinch first, when he heard a loud shout and saw the gardener with his red nightcap and his big stick coming in at the garden door. He was most dreadfully frightened, and began to run with all his might. The gardener was after him at once, so he tried to reach the gooseberry bushes and hide himself among them, hoping it would be too dark for anybody to see him.
But the owl, who could see everything at night, flew after him, calling out, “There goes Jack Frost among the gooseberry bushes! There he is! This way! This way!” So he found it impossible to hide himself. It was a good thing for him that he could run much faster than the gardener, because he was so thin and had such long legs.
He ran and ran, and the gardener puffed and blew and could not catch him, so at last he took up a flower pot and threw it as hard as he could at Jack Frost. It hit him in the very middle of the back and knocked him flat on his face on the path. He tried to get up, but the gardener got hold of him by the collar and shook and beat him with his big stick till he prayed for mercy. Then he took him by the ear and dragged him out of the garden.
At last Jack Frost wriggled out of his grasp and ran for his life; he dashed into the larch-tree and climbed up the branches to the topmost bough where the weathercock was. There was no moon for him to get on to, for she had gone to bed and the sky was so high that he could not jump up all the way at once, so he was obliged to sit hidden in the tree until the next night.
The next night was misty and the moon came only occasionally out of the cloud. The little boy who lived in the stone house got out of his bed again to see her.
While he was looking, Jack Frost took a mighty leap and sprang up right through the clouds.
“Look! Look!” cried the little boy, “there is the funny man again!”
“It’s you who are funny,” said the nurse; and she hurried him back into bed and gave him one of his favourite toys to put under his pillow.
She knew nothing about little men who jumped among the trees.
Jack Frost landed safely on the moon and then flew high, high up. But he never came down into that garden again.