CHAPTER VIIIFLOP EAR MEETS SLICKO
Flop Ear sat up on his hind legs, once he was outside the fence, and looked about him. One of his big ears stuck up straight, and the other sort of leaned over. Flop Ear put his head on one side, and his nose trembled, sort of, for he was wiggling it in order to try if he could smell any danger. Rabbits can wiggle their noses a little, and elephants can wiggle theirs a good bit, for their nose is their long trunk, and you know how Tum Tum could sling his trunk about.
“Well, I wonder which way I shall go?” asked Flop Ear of himself. Just then he heard a bird, up in a tree over his head, laughing.
“What are you laughing at?” asked Flop Ear. “Do you see anything funny?”
“Yes,” replied the bird, still laughing, “I do.”
“What is it?” asked Flop Ear. “Tell me, and if I see it I will laugh also.”
“You may laugh if you like,” answered the bird, “but you can’t see at what I am laughing unless you get near a pool of water and look down in that. Then you will see yourself, forI am laughing atyou. You do look funny! I hope you don’t mind being laughed at.”
“Not a bit!” cried Flop Ear in a happy voice. “I like my friends to laugh even at me. It makes them jolly.”
“Then it is all right,” chirped the bird. “If you do not mind telling me, Flop Ear, where have you been and where are you going?”
“I do not in the least mind telling you,” returned the rabbit. “So you know my name, too, do you?”
“Oh, it is easy to guess your name by looking at your floppy ear,” said the bird.
“And may I ask what your name is?” asked Flop Ear politely.
“My name is Cheer-Up,” replied the bird. “I am called that because I try to make my friends cheer up and be happy by singing to them.”
“That’s fine!” cried Flop Ear. “I wish I could sing.”
“Well, I suppose it is nice,” the bird said, trilling a few notes.
“And I wish I could fly, like you,” went on the rabbit. “Then maybe I could find my home. You see I am lost. A hunter chased me far away from my burrow and I could not find it again. I have been living with a boy named Jimmie, and he taught me some tricks.
“But I grew tired of staying shut up in a box most of the time, though the boy was very good to me. So I have just run away, and I am going to try to find my home, and my father and my mother, my sister and my brother, and Lady Munch.”
“Who is Lady Munch?” asked Cheer-Up.
“She is my grandmother, and a dear old lady rabbit. And I want to see them all so much that I wish I could fly as you can. I might find them then.”
“Yes, it is nice to fly,” said Cheer-Up. “But still, if you can not sing and fly as I do, there are things which you do that I can not do. I have no thick warm fur to keep me warm in winter, though my feathers do very well. And I can not dig in the ground, as you can, to hide away from cats who often climb up the tree where my nest is. So you see you can do some things also.”
“Yes,” said Flop Ear, “I suppose we animals can do the things the best intended for us. I must not find fault. But I must hurry off. I want to get to my home. I don’t suppose you know where it is; do you?”
“No, I am sorry to say I do not. But did I hear you say you were kept in a box by a boy?”
“Yes. His name was Jimmie.”
“Well then, if I were you, and wanted to keepaway from him, I would hurry off as fast as I could right away!” chirped the bird suddenly.
“Why?” Flop Ear wanted to know.
“Because I can look down on the other side of the fence under which you just crawled,” said the bird, “and I can see a boy running over this way. He first looked in a box under a tree and then he ran this way.”
“That’s Jimmie,” said Flop Ear. “He came home from school and let me out of the box. Then he went into the house and I thought that would be a good chance for me to get away. So I ran.”
“Yes, and you had better run some more,” cried Cheer-Up. “The boy knows you have gone and he’s after you.”
“Thank you for telling me,” said the rabbit. “It is a good thing you are up so high in the tree, so you can look down on the other side of the fence. Yes, I’ll be getting along. Jimmie was a good kind boy, and gave me nice things to eat. Still this is not my home, and I do not like doing tricks. I’m going. Good-by!”
“Good-by!” chirped Cheer-Up. “I hope I shall see you again some time. And you had better hurry, Flop Ear, for that boy is now right at the fence. He’s after you.”
“Well, I’m sorry, but he won’t get me,” said the rabbit, as with a jump he hid himself behinda bush. Then, out of sight of the boy, Flop Ear ran on.
As for Jimmie, the boy, he had come out of the house, and, not seeing Flop Ear where he had left the rabbit, he looked about the yard for him.
“I wonder if he can have jumped back into his box,” said the boy. He looked, but Flop Ear was not there. It was then that the boy ran over to the fence. The bird, sitting high in the tree, saw him and told Flop Ear.
“Oh, my nice, tame, trick rabbit has gotten away!” cried Jimmie. “I see a hole under the fence. Maybe he got away through that.”
The boy hurried to the fence, near the hole Flop Ear had made, and jumped over. But by this time Flop Ear was safely away, as Cheer-Up could see from his perch. And the boy, not having as good a nose for smelling rabbit tracks as a dog, could not tell which way Flop Ear had gone.
Jimmie looked all around, and in the bushes, but he could not find Flop Ear. Looking up in the tree the boy saw the bird.
“Ah, little bird,” he said, “I wish you could talk, and maybe you could tell me which way my rabbit went.”
Of course Cheer-Up could not answer the boy in his own speech, but the bird said to himself:
“I am not going to tell you where Flop Ear is, for he wants to get away, and find his own home. You were kind to him, but he just had to go away.”
Then Cheer-Up flew off, and the boy, after looking about a little more for his pet rabbit gave it up, and went back into the yard. At first Jimmie was quite sad about Flop Ear’s going away, but a week afterward he was given a pet dog; and he trained that to do tricks, so he was happy again.
And now we shall go back to Flop Ear and see what is happening to the funny little rabbit.
Flop Ear hopped on under the bushes until he came to an open field. He was so far away from the house now that he thought it would be safe to sit up and look around. Across the field he saw some woods, and he said to himself:
“I’ll go over into those woods. Maybe that is where my home is, and I may find Pink Nose and Snuggle there. Oh! how I wish I could see them again, and have a game of tag.”
Over into the woods hopped Flop Ear. He was glad to feel again the dried leaves rustling under his paws. He liked the cool, shady woods, with their carpet of green moss. This was much nicer than being shut up in a box part of the time, even though there were good things to eat.
“Have you a nest up there?” asked Flop Ear.
“Have you a nest up there?” asked Flop Ear.
“I guess I can find something here,” thought Flop Ear. “I haven’t gnawed a bit of bark since I lived with Jimmie. I’ll eat some now.”
Going up to a tree Flop Ear began nibbling the bark. He had eaten two or three mouthfuls when he heard a chattering voice calling:
“Hello down there! who is nibbling at my tree?”
“Oh, excuse me,” said Flop Ear, “I did not know this was your tree. Who are you, if you please?”
“I am Slicko, the jumping squirrel,” was the answer. “Can you see me up in my nest?”
Flop Ear looked up, and saw a little gray animal with a big, bushy tail. In her paws Slicko held a nut which she was eating.
“Oh,have you a nest up there?” asked Flop Ear.
“Yes, this is my home.”
“Then you must be a bird if you live in a nest,” remarked the rabbit.
“Well, yes, in that way, maybe I am,” laughed Slicko. “But we squirrels only live in nests in trees in Summer. In the Winter we burrow under the ground as you rabbits do, Flop Ear.”
“So you also know my name; do you?” asked Flop Ear.
“Oh, yes. And I am glad to see you. I waswondering who was down there, gnawing at my tree.”
“That’s so, I suppose this is your tree, since you have your nest in it,” said Flop Ear. “I can easily gnaw some bark off another.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” chattered Slicko cheerfully. “Gnaw all the bark you like, as long as you do not take off so much that the tree will die. Bark, to trees, is like skin to us animals. If a tree loses too much skin it will die.”
“I won’t take too much,” promised Flop Ear. “I can only stop a little while. I am lost and I’m looking for my home.”
“Wait a minute and I’ll come down and talk to you,” said the squirrel, as she scrambled down from her nest.