CHAPTER XLIGHTFOOT IN THE WOODS
Without stopping to look back at the canal boat from which he had escaped, Lightfoot ran on through the bushes, and soon found himself in some woods. He was afraid some one from the boat might run after him, and take him back there.
“Not that it was such a bad place,” thought the goat, as he went in and out among the trees; “but it is no fun to be in a place from which you can’t get away when you want to. If it had not been that they made a little hill of coal in the boat maybe I’d never have gotten away.
“I liked those horses, though I never saw them, and the hay and grain in the cracks was good eating. Still I had rather be out here and free.”
No one except the canal horses knew Lightfoot had been on the boat. The captain and his wife had not seen him jump down into the hold, nor had the boys picking coal. They only imagined the goat might be somewhere near the boat when they asked about him, but they really had not seen him get aboard.
Lightfoot ran on a little farther and then, thinking he was safe, hidden behind a bush, turned and looked back. He was on a side hill that ran along the canal, and he could look down on the towpath. He saw a team of horses hitched to a long rope, which, in turn, was fast to the canal boat.
“There are my kind friends, the horses,” thought Lightfoot. “But I don’t know which ones they are. I wish I could stop and speak to them, but it would not be safe. Anyhow I said good-by to them, and thanked them.”
As Lightfoot looked, the team pulling the canal boat turned around a curve in the towpath and were soon out of sight. Then, once more, the goat turned and went on into the woods.
“Well, I shall not be hungry here, anyhow,” thought Lightfoot. “There are more bushes and trees here than in the park where Mike used to drive me about, hitched to the little wagon. I wonder if I am allowed to eat these leaves.”
Lightfoot looked around. He saw no policemen or park guards, such as he had seen when he was in the other place, and, as he felt a bit hungry after his run, he nibbled some of the green leaves. They had a good taste and he ate many of them. No one called to him to stop, and no one hit him with a stick.
“This is a good place,” thought Lightfoot.
As with most animals, when he had eaten well, the goat felt sleepy, and picking out a smooth grassy place beneath some trees he cuddled up, and was soon asleep.
How long he slept Lightfoot did not know, but when he awakened he had a feeling that he wished he was back with Mike again, drawing children about the park. Whether Lightfoot had dreamed about his shanty home amid the rocks I do not know. I do not know whether or not animals dream, but I think they do.
At any rate Lightfoot felt lonesome. He missed the cheerful whistle of the Irish boy, and he missed, too, the nice combing and rubbing-down that his master, Mike, used to give him every morning in order to keep his coat in good condition.
Some of the goats that lived on the rocks had coats very rough with tangled hairs, to say nothing of the burrs and thistles that clung to them. But Mike kept Lightfoot slick and neat, brushing him as a groom brushes his horses.
“But I don’t look very slick now,” thought Lightfoot, as he turned his head and saw a lot of burdock burrs on one side, while the other side carried a tangle of a piece of a briar brush. “I must clean myself up a bit,” thought the goat.
By twisting and turning about, using first one hind foot and then the other, as a cat scratches her ears, Lightfoot managed to get rid of most of the things that had clung to him as he tore his way through the bushes. Then he walked on again, until, feeling thirsty, he began to sniff the air for water. For goats and other animals can smell water before they can see it, though to us clean water has no smell at all.
Lightfoot soon found a little spring in the woods, and from it ran a brook of water, sparkling over the green, mossy stones.
As Lightfoot leaned over to get a drink from the spring he started back in surprise.
“Why!” he exclaimed to himself. “Why! There’s another goat down there under the water. He’s a black goat. I’m white.”
Lightfoot thought for a moment as he drew back from the edge of the spring. Then he said to himself:
“Well, if it’s only another goat I needn’t be afraid, for we will be friends.”
He went to the spring again and looked down into the clear water. Again he saw the black goat, and he was just going to speak, asking him how he felt, what his name was, where he came from and so on, when Lightfoot happened to notice that the black goat moved in exactly thesame way, and did the same things that he, himself, did. Then he understood.
“Ha! Ha!” laughed Lightfoot to himself. “How silly I am! That is only my reflection in the spring, just as if it were a looking glass. But what makes me so black on my face, I wonder?”
Then he remembered.
“It’s the black coal dust, of course!” he cried. “It must have stuck to me all over, but I brushed some of it off when I went to sleep in the grass. Now I must wash my face.”
He glanced once more into the spring looking glass, and saw that indeed he was quite dirty from the coal dust. Taking a long drink of the cool water he went below the spring to the brook, and there he waded in and splashed around in the water until he was quite clean. This made him feel hungry again, and he ate more leaves and grass.
“And now,” said Lightfoot, as he noticed the sun going down in the west, and knew that it would soon be night, “it’s time for me to think of what I’m going to do.”
Lightfoot was not afraid to stay out alone in the woods all night. He had spent many a night on the rocks, though of course the other goats had been with him then. But he was a bigger and older goat now, and he was not afraid ofbeing alone. Of course a little kid might have been, but Lightfoot was a kid no longer.
“I’ll stay here to-night, I think,” said the goat after a while. “It is good to be near water so you can drink when thirsty. I’ll stay here to-night and in the morning I’ll try to find my way back to Mike.”
Lightfoot slept well that night, for it was not cold, and in the morning, after he had eaten some leaves and grass and had drunk some water he started out to find the Malony shanty near the rocks.
But a goat is not like a dog or a cat, some of which can find their way home after having been taken many miles from it. So, after wandering about in the woods, and finding no place that looked like his former home, Lightfoot gave up.
“It’s of no use,” he said. “I guess I am lost. I must have come farther in that canal boat than I knew. Well, the woods are a good place to stay. I shall not be hungry here.”
Lightfoot wandered on and on for several days. Once some boys, who were in the woods gathering flowers, saw the goat behind some bushes.
“Oh, let’s chase after him!” called one, and they ran toward Lightfoot.
But the goat leaped away and soon left theboys far behind. If one of them had been Mike, Lightfoot would have gone to him, but Mike was not there.
One day as Lightfoot was wandering through the woods, wishing he were back in his home again, for he was lonesome, having no one to talk to but the birds, he heard a noise in the bushes.
It was a smashing, crashing sort of noise, as though made by some big animal.
“Maybe it is one of the canal horses,” thought Lightfoot. “I hope it is. They’ll be company for me. Maybe one of them ran away.”
He looked through the underbrush and saw a big, shaggy, brown animal, standing on its hind feet. With its front paws it was pulling berries from a bush and eating them.
“Excuse me,” said Lightfoot in animal language. “But could you tell me the way to the Widow Malony’s shanty?”
The big animal stopped eating berries, looked up at the goat in surprise and asked, in a sort of growly voice:
“Who are you?”
“I am Lightfoot, the leaping goat,” was the answer. “Who are you?”
“I am Dido, the dancing bear, I am glad to meet you. Come over and have some berries,” and Lightfoot went.