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THE SINS OF SILVERTIP THE FOX

By John Breck

CHAPTER I
HOW NIBBLE RESCUED THE RED COW

NEVER before, in the early, early spring, had there been so much excitement down at Doctor Muskrat's Pond. Of course, spring's the season for visitors. They were always on the lookout for old friends winging up from the south. The Beautiful Duck and his mate, who'd warned Nibble Rabbit about the Terrible Storm, stopped in to wish everyone a happy summer. Then they laughingly beaked their way northward through a flurry of late snow. Bad weather couldn't scare them now. They kept a lookout for old enemies, too, as wise Woodsfolk always must. But there was one visitor who puzzled them. Was he an enemy, or was he a friend? Doctor Muskrat himself couldn 't say. Or rather, he wouldn't. But that wasn't what started all the discussion.
The visitor was Tommy Peele. And his old dog Watch said he owned the Woods and Fields. Now did that mean he owned the Woodsfolk who lived in them? That's what everyone wanted to know. For the Woodsfolk were wild. Could a wild beast ever belong to any one? Doctor Muskrat had never heard of such a thing.
“I certainly wouldn't mind,” chirped Cheewee the Chickadee. “I get a full crop 'most every time I see him.”
“I guess you'd mind if he locked you up like he did Nibble,” remarked Chaik Jay. “That's what it means to belong to him.”
“No, it doesn't,” contradicted Nibble. (He really knew more about the little boy than any one else. He hadn't liked being locked up, but he did like Tommy.)  “Watch says I belong to him just the same out of my cage as I did in it. And he feeds me just the same, too.”
“Hmm!” sniffed Doctor Muskrat. He was wondering if it was that way with traps. 'Cause you remember Tommy'd caught him in one, and then let him go again. And Tommy'd fed him, too.
“You know,” said Nibble, “all the beasts up at the barn say-” And then for the first time he heard the swishing in the bulrushes behind him.
“Ow!” he squealed. And he jumped. For the starey eyes of the cross Red Cow came peering through them.

“Swish!” went Doctor Muskrat through his hole in the ice. “Flutter!” went the scary wings of Chewee the Chickadee, and even Chaik the Bluejay, who isn't afraid of many things, went off with a startled “squawk,” while Nibble Rabbit dashed through a tunnel he knew in the Quail's Thicket. But you know Nibble. First he's scared- and then he's curious. As soon as he was safely hidden he stopped to listen. “Stupid beast,” he said to himself. “Why couldn't she have waited until we got done talking?”
“M-rn-moo!” lowed the Red Cow in a troubled voice.
Nibble came creeping back again. Pretty soon he sat up and stretched his neck to get a good look at her. “What are you doing here “ he demanded. “Is anything the matter?”
“M-m-m-yes,” moaned the Red Cow, swinging her head restlessly from side to side and looking terribly troubled. “I don't know just what it is, but I'm all afraid! Isn't there any place where wolves don't come? Or Men?”
“No Man comes here,” said Nibble, “'cepting only Tommy Peele-and he's just a little one.” Then, because the Red Cow looked so unhappy, he burst out cheerfully, “Come on. I'll show you where you can hide, even frorn him.”

But she looked at him very doubtfully with her near-sighted eyes. “Mm-no-no,” she hesitated. “You haven't forgotten that I tried to kill you when you hung that flapping thing on my horn.” She meant the door of his cage that she jerked off to get at the carrot Tommy Peele had given Nibble for breakfast. But she insisted on thinking that he had fastened the door to her. She was a very stupid thing.
“That's all right,” he explained. “You let me out of the cage, so we're all fair and square.”
By this time she was so puzzled she couldn't remember anything. But she could tell that Nibble wasn't angry, so she followed him. And he showed her a fine dry spot on the top of a little hillock, all shut in by clustering thorns. For Nibble wouldn't trust anything but the Pickery Things for even a cow to hide in.
There she stayed and there she slept very comfortably. Even the cold wind that came up with the sunset couldn't reach her. And Nibble dug down a little way into the mud and ate the top off a mallow root and a couple of plantains for his supper. And then he had to lick himself very dry and clean before he popped into his own comfortable hole.
He slept late next morning because he'd stayed awake puzzling over that Red Cow's doings the night before. But as soon as he had washed his face he set out to find her, for he'd thought of a lot more questions to ask. And there she was, crouched down close in her hiding-place, with her eyes bigger and starier than ever. “Hssh!” she snorted through her wide, windy nostrils. “There was a Man! But he didn't see me at all!”

CHAPTER II
WHY TOMMY 'MOST LOST HIS TEMPER

"NONSENSE!” said Nibble Rabbit. “There wasn't any Man. They don't come here. You must have had a bad dream.”
“No, I didn't,” she insisted. “I was wide awake and I saw him as plain as plain.”
Nibble sniffed the air, but the wind had blown all the scent away, so he didn't believe her. When he turned to her again she was trying to eat the twigs that she could reach with her long tongue.  

“Hey! Don't you know better than that!” he demanded. “You'll get pickers in your mouth, and, what's much worse, you'll feel awfully queer and sick inside of you. Doctor Muskrat says you should only eat that tree for medicine.”
Nibble felt very wise and grown-up beside this foolish cow. She wasn't really wild and she wasn't really tame. Poor beast! No wonder she was scary. She didn't know enough to be either thing properly. “Come along!” he ordered. “I'll take you down for a drink and then you can eat the willows. If you're like the partridge you can nip the tips off a cottonwood that your long neck will reach up to.”
So the Red Cow hove herself up to her feet, tail first, as is the custom of cows, and followed him obediently. And he showed her the way to the warm spring that was Doctor Muskrat's front door.
It was a good thing he was polite and let her drink first.  For as soon as she began dragging her clumsy toes in the muck to spread them far enough apart so she could get her nose into the water-“Clang!” went the cold steely jaws of another trap.
She jumped back, snorting and waving her tassely tail, while she cocked her eyes to try and see it. But Nibble wasn't paying any attention to her. He was thumping and bumping as hard as ever he could with his soft furry feet and calling “Doctor Muskrat! Doctor Muskrat! Doctor Muskrat!”
“Eh “ said the old doctor as his nose came up out of the water (and the cow snorted at him harder than ever), “what's all this “ He sniffed at her inquiringly.
“Oh, Doctor Muskrat,” Nibble almost cried. “Look! It's more jaws!”
“Ah!” The old beast examined them wisely and shook his head. “What did I tell you You can't trust even Tommy Peele! He was just pretending to make friends with us so we'd forget to be afraid and he could catch us again!”
“I guess you're right,” murmured Nibble. But he felt very badly about it-for he really liked Tommy.
Just then the Red Cow spoke up. She didn't understand Doctor Muskrat, but she caught Tommy's name. And although she didn't like Tommy herself, even a stupid cow knows enough to be honest. “I told you I saw that Man,” she said to Nibble. “Well, it surely wasn't Tommy!”

“It wasn't, eh?” snapped Doctor Muskrat. “We'll just see about that.” He dove again. He came up looking puzzled. “Tommy's jaws are still biting the mud, just where he threw them,” he reported. “We'll watch what he does when he finds these.”

It was Saturday, so as soon as Tommy finished his chores up at the barn, whistled to his old dog, Watch, and came tramping down the fields with his tall rubber boots. He had a cap full of meal and an ear of corn in his pocket. Yes! And he had a nice lump of fat for Chewee the Chickadee and a string to tie it to a branch with.
But Nibble didn't come running to meet him. He was crouching back in the reeds with Doctor Muskrat. And the Red Cow had lumbered off to her own hiding-place in the thicket that Nibble had showed her.
“Come, Bunny, Bunny,” called Tommy, in his nice voice that fairly made Nibble's feet itch to run to him. He crept up softly near the warm spring so as not to scare his muskrat. Then he saw the footprints-the big ones of the Red Cow, and the little ones of Nibble Rabbit, and the paws of Doctor Muskrat with his toe gone, for now it was healed so he could step on it. And there was the trap, sticking right straight up where the cow's clumsy foot had jerked it.
And wasn't he angry! Just wasn't he? He was the crossest little boy in all the woods and fields, and the houses, too. Because someone was trying to catch his very own wild things that he was trying to make friends with!
The trap was chained to a bulrush stalk and he yanked it right off, stalk and all, he was so angry. And then he did something that showed he was really learning to think quite like a wild thing. It was just what wise old Doctor Muskrat would have done if he hadn't been so troubled, deep down inside, that he forgot about everything but Tommy. He trailed the footsteps of that other man and he found two other traps. Right in his own woods!
“Clang! clang!” He had given each of those cold steel jaws a stick to bite
on. Then he rooted up their chains and tied them all together. “Crash!” They went plump down into the mud beside his own. “Yah! Yah! Hooray!” barked Watch. He thought that anything Tommy did was perfect. And he wagged his big wavy tail so very hard that at last his tail wagged him and he waltzed around and around.
And then Nibble came bouncing up with his ears in the air, and Doctor Muskrat waddled after him. But Doctor Muskrat stopped at the edge of the reeds because, you know, he and Watch hadn't made friends. Still, he looked very kindly at Tommy and he came out in a great hurry to get his meal when Tommy moved away.
But Watch nearly scared him when he turned around to ask: “Nibble, do you know where I'll find that Red Cow?”

CHAPTER III
THE RED COW'S SECRET

NIBBLE RABBIT was so surprised at Watch's question that he stopped eating. And he was eating the delicious meal that Tommy had brought, so it was a big Surprise. For that was just the question he didn't know how to answer. He'd hidden the Red Cow himself. She was trusting him. How could he show where she was when she was specially hiding from Tommy?
"I know,” said Nibble, at last, “but it isn't fair to tell. Why do you want her?"
"Why, I want her because we keep our
cows in the barn, not in the wet woods like you silly Wild Things,” Watch answered, smiling. “It doesn't matter, anyway. Do you think I can't go sniffing around and find her for myself if you won't tell?" And he ran out a sly, pink tongue.
“Well, she's all wild and scary, 'specially of Men,” pleaded Nibble. “You remember how she chased Tommy before. You'd better take him to the barn first and come back after her alone.” Nibble still had an idea that Watch herded Tommy Peele the way he did the cows.
“That's perfectly true, Bunny,” said Watch. And he went bounding off ahead of his Boy, urging him to hurry as though he had something particularly interesting to show him. And he had, but he didn't know it.
As soon as they had finished the meal Tommy had brought them, Doctor Muskrat went off to sleep on his sun-warmed stone, spread out flat with his paws hanging over the edges, and Nibble went lipity, lipity up his tunnel in the thicket to tell the Red Cow Watch was asking for her.
He heard the strangest noises as be came along-but they weren't sad and scary. She was talking to someone in a new voice, very soft and gentle, very loving and happy.
"Who's there?” Nibble called. “Red Cow, can I come?"
“Come quick, quick!” she lowed. "Isn't it lovely? That's why I was afraid. I came here to hide so that no one could take it away from me.” Then she added in her new voice that wasn't meant for Nibble at all, “Lie still, wee thing.”
Nibble poked his head through the Pickery Things and peeked at her. And he saw what she was talking about. It was the cunningest little red calf with a white spot in the middle of its forehead. It had bright black eyes, wide open, and it perked a pair of wide, round ears at Nibble. Then it tried to get up on its spindly legs, but they were pretty shaky.
“Does it seem all right?” asked the Red Cow. It was her first calf and she wasn't quite sure what to do with it.
“It seems very queer,” said Nibble honestly. Of course it did to him. Because baby rabbits are blind and haven't any fur. “Can't I call Doctor Muskrat?" He was wondering, too, whether he oughtn't to call Watch and Tommy.
“Yes, go call the doctor,” said the Red Cow.
You just ought to have seen Doctor Muskrat wake up when he heard Nibble squeal for him so excitedly. “I'm coming! I'm coming!” he called in his high, thin voice, and he flopped along through Nibble's tunnel as fast as ever he could, for his webby paws aren't for running.
"What is it?” he asked. And then saw the little calf. And it sniffed its turned-up nose at him with a cunning pink tongue-tip showing. He walked all around it, inspecting it very carefully. It seemed strange to him, too, because baby muskrats are born as blind and helpless as baby rabbits.

“Is there anything the matter with it?" asked the Red Cow, anxiously.

"I think not,” he said, sensibly, “excepting that it's pretty cold and shivery. You must lick it hard and get its blood to circulating.”
So she licked it and licked it. And her tongue was very strong and very gentle, because that's one of the things all cows' tongues are made for. And the baby calf grew livelier and livelier.  And pretty soon it got up on its spindly legs, waving its little tail that was still too new to have a tassel on it. “Now what'll I do?" asked the Red Cow.
“Feed it,” advised Doctor Muskrat.

So she did, though it took quite a little coaxing to show the silly baby how to find what he wanted. But the milk was trickling from the corners of his little mouth in about three minutes. And then wasn't he happy?
“Let me say, madam,” began Doctor Muskrat, in his most professional tone, “that is the most remarkable youngster I have ever attended.” You see he was only used to bunnies and muskrats and field mice.
But the Red Cow heaved a great sigh of pride when she heard that. And just wasn't she the happiest cow in the world?
“Nevertheless,” went on the doctor, “this is no place for it. You should have a nice quiet hole for it. There's nothing in the woods big enough for you. I believe the bairn is where you ought to be.”
“But they'll take it away from me “ moaned the Red Cow, getting all scary again.
“Not if you trust Tommy,” put in Nibble Rabbit, eagerly.
“Madam, if you'll take an old muskrat's advice,” said the doctor, “you will place your confidence in Tommy Peele.” He used those long words because they sounded wise and important. And the Red Cow was really impressed.
“All right,” she agreed. And on the word Nibble Rabbit darted out across the Broad Field and down the Pasture, where he could see Watch and Tommy Peele.

CHAPTER IV
WHY LOUIE THOMSON DIDN'T ENJOY HIS VISIT

"Watch, come back!” Nibble squealed breathlessly, when he caught up with Tommy and the old dog in the end of the Pasture. “Come back and bring Tommy, too. I can tell you the Red Cow's secret. She has a little new baby calf and she says she'll trust it to Tommy Peele.”
“Er-r yah!” barked Watch, very pleased and proud because the other animals were beginning to love his Tommy. And he turned right around to follow Nibble.
But of course Tommy hadn't heard a word they said. They talk too low, for one thing, and they use all sorts of sign languages, too, for another. He thought Watch was chasing Nibble. So he shouted and scolded and called him a bad old dog. But Watch only wagged his tail and kept right on.
Meantime, something had been happening back at the pond. The strange Man who set all those strange traps had come to look at them. And the Red Cow heard him. But she wasn't scary any more because she had her new calf and she meant to take care of him. And she didn't mean to let any one else in the world but Tommy Peele lay a hand on him.

He had a nice meal of warm milk inside of him and he'd gone to sleep. Besides, Doctor Muskrat was still there to look after him. So out of the thicket she bounced and after the Man.
“M-m-moo!” she roared, just like the first cows did when they told Mother Nature they'd punish the wicked wolves for themselves if she gave them their teeth again. But you remember Mother Nature couldn't do that, so she gave them horns longer and sharper than the teeth of any wolf. The Red Cow's horns certainly were. So that strange Man climbed up the nearest tree to get away from them.
“Get out!” she snorted. “Go away from here!” But of course he couldn't because she was walking around and around the trunk of that big tree, roaring at him and sending the mud over her shoulders with her big, horny toes. Only she never thought of that, because she was rather stupid. Then Watch came bouncing up and he barked and snapped very fiercely. But Tommy just laughed.
“Oh, Louie Thomson,” he jeered. “You will set your traps in my woods, will you? See what you get now!” For this was the greedy boy who had sold him the trap that wouldn't work.  "You'll see what you get if that crazy takes after you!” yelled Louie.
Tommy was just a little bit afraid, for the cow was watching him with that scary look in her eyes. But he wasn't going to let Louie Thomson know it. So he stood perfectly still and called her, "Come Bossy, Co' Boss.”
"Go along, Red Cow!” barked Watch.

"I know,” squealed Nibble, “I can see Chaik Jay's present sticking right of Tommy's pocket. Ask him for that ear of corn.”
Now the Red Cow was really very hungry. She reached out her sniffing nose. Tommy didn't move. So she picked the corn right out of his pocket her long curling tongue. And then he laid such a gentle hand on her she knew she wouldn't be afraid of him ever again.

So here was Tommy Peele stroking the Red Cow's neck while she ate the corn he had meant to give Chaik Jay. Here, too, was Nibble Rabbit enjoying the haws off a wild rose bush the Red Cow had trampled down, while old Doctor Muskrat watched the Red Cow's sleepy new baby, and pricked his ears to hear all that was going on.
Even Watch the Dog was happy. He was lying at the foot of the tree, with his nose on his paws as though he expected to stay there all day, and wagging his tail.
But Louie Thomson, perched on one of its branches in the cold wind, was very unhappy. Whenever he moved Watch would raise the hair all along his back and growl, and the Red Cow would roll her scary eyes at him. “Hey, Tommy!” he called. “Drive off those brutes and let me come down!”
“No, I won't,” said Tommy. “This is two times you've cheated me. You cheated me with that old trap, and now you tried to come over here into my very own woods and catch my very own Beasts. That's stealing. I'm going to let them watch you while I go up to the house and get my father to come for you."
Of course not one of the Woodsfolk knew what he meant. But they knew he was very angry.
“Oh, please, please don't do that!” begged Louie. “I'll promise never to set foot in your woods again. Honest, cross my heart and hope to die, I will! Please let me go this time.”
Nibble sat straight up and listened hard. For Louie sounded just like Chatter Squirrel the night of the Terrible Storm when he was so terribly afraid. “My whiskers, but isn't Tommy wonderful,” he breathed to Watch. “You and the Red Cow can scare that Man when you can reach him, but Tommy scares him without doing anything.” And he came close up to Tommy's tall rubber boots and cocked his head on one side, trying to see how Tommy did it.
“I know you'll promise,” Tommy was saying, “and you'll keep it, too, or else I'll know about it.” He just meant he and Watch would find Louie's footprints.
But Louie saw that rabbit sitting by Tommy and looking exactly as though he were talking to him.
“And if you want your traps,” Tommy went on, “you'll have to get that muskrat to find them.” He just meant he'd thrown them into the pond.
But Louie Thomson didn't know what to think of that. He guessed perhaps he'd better leave Tommy Peele and his wild things very much alone.

CHAPTER V

NIBBLE TELLS ONE SECRET AND HEARS ANOTHER

Now when Tommy Peele followed Watch back to the woods it was because he thought the old dog was chasing Nibble Rabbit. Then he made up his mind Nibble had warned Watch about that bad Louie Thomson. He never dreamed Nibble whispered a secret that belonged to the Red Cow. So as soon as he'd made Louie promise to behave, be whistled to Watch and began to lead the Red Cow away so Louie could climb down.

Well, right then the Red Cow remembered that secret she bad to show him. So she insisted on leading him.

She fairly galloped around the end of the thicket, with Tommy running after her in his tall rubber boots and Watch bounding after him. But Nibble took a short cut through his tunnel. And he met Doctor Muskrat coming to meet him.
“Climp, clump, climp, clump!” went a sound outside.
“What's that?” asked Doctor Muskrat.
Nibble peered along the ground. And he could see Louie Thomson's boots moving very fast. “It's that Man,” he exclaimed. “He's running like Silvertip the Fox did when the Red Cow took after him.”
“Fine!” chuckled Doctor Muskrat. “He'll never bring his wicked jaws back here again. And we can thank Tommy Peele for that.”
Then there was another sound. “What's that?” asked Nibble. And Doctor Muskrat laughed. For it was Tommy Peele squealing with surprise because he'd found the secret that belonged to the Red Cow. “A calf! Oh, the cute little thing!”
So Nibble and Doctor Muskrat both crept back down the tunnel to watch what was going on. The calf raised his head and looked at Tommy; then he got up on his shaky legs and sniffed at him. Because Tommy was a strange Beast with a strange smell and even a baby knows enough to be careful about strange things. But when he touched his little turned-up nose to the hand Tommy held out to him he smelled his mother. You know Tommy had been stroking her. So the foolish little rascal put out his little pink tongue, trying to lick Tommy's fingers. And wasn't his mother pleased because they were friends the very first thing!
Watch led the way, and Tommy walked beside the Red Cow and helped to steer her wobbly-legged calf all the way up to the barn. And the baby kept trying to kick up his silly little heels the way Nibble used to when he felt playful. And he just would run splash into all the puddles, and bunt and wriggle when they caught him. The Red Cow kept getting prouder and prouder every step, but even she was glad when they got safely home with him.

Nibble went with them as far as the Pasture. Doctor Muskrat was enjoying a nice sweet flag-root (the first one he'd dug that spring) when Nibble came loping back again. And he was the messiest rabbit you ever heard of. And so cross and disgusted!
“That bad baby!” he complained, beginning to clean the mud spots off his white shirt front. “He wouldn't do anything I told him to. And then, the very first time I wasn't looking, he danced in a puddle and splashed it all over me. From whiskers to-” he craned his neck about to look-"to tail! He all but drowned me!”
“You don't have to tell me that,” said Doctor Muskrat, and his fat sides were shaking with laughter. “I've eyes to see with. You're as wet as ever you were when I fished you out of that pond there.” For you remember how Nibble tumbled right into the water, he was so frightened the first time he ever saw the kind old muskrat.
“And then,” Nibble went on indignantly, “the impudent little scamp sniffed his little turned-up nose at me because I was spluttering.”
“You can't expect a calf to be born with manners, can you?” soothed Doctor Muskrat, "'specially if it belongs to the Red Cow. But, as I told her, that's the most remarkable youngst--" He flattened his ears, ready to dive, for a shadow came swooping down and he was expecting the Marsh Hawk back any day.
But it was only Chaik the Jay. “Hello,” he piped. “Who was she and what did you tell her?" And he pounced on an acorn that was half-buried in the ground.
“The Red Cow,” answered Doctor Muskrat, “has a little new calf who's the most remarkable youngster I've ever seen.” And he was going to tell Chaik all about it, only--
Didn't Nibble Rabbit just interrupt and tell it all himself? Just didn't he? He was that puffed up because he was the first one to see it that he couldn't wait. He described how bright its little eyes were, and how it wriggled its tail like Chatter Squirrel does when he's in a temper, and-everything there was to tell about that Red Cow's red baby with the white star in his forehead and the turned-up nose.
And all the time Nibble was forgetting to clean his fur. And the mud spots showed worse than ever as the wind dried them. But Nibble was too busy talking about that very same bad little Beast who had splashed them on him.

Chaik was preening and tucking in his feathers every once in a while. He didn't have his new spring coat yet, so he was very particular over his old one. Presently he noticed Nibble. “By the Worm in the Acorn, Rabbit, what's happened to you ?" he wanted to know.
Do you think Nibble would tell on that Red Cow's bad baby? Not at all. He just said, “Oh, I wasn't looking- you don't know what the walking is this spring.” Then he got very busy with his mud spots and Chaik flew away.

“Hm,” giggled the doctor. “What do you really think of the Red Cow's calf, what you told me about it or what you told Chaik?"
“I mean,” said Nibble shamefacedly, “that I'm going up to see it to-morrow morning.” And off he hopped to his bed.

He woke up early, early, before the darkest night had begun to melt into the gray of dawn. He yawned sleepily and rolled over. My, but that hole of his was warm and comfortable! Suddenly he jumped up and began to scrub his face with his paws.
In about three minutes he was down by the pond, thumping for Doctor Muskrat. And weren't the doctor's eyes all sleepy when he poked his head out of the water? “Ouf,” he shivered, “what do you want at this hour of the night? Spear me with an icicle, but this pond is cold!” (If one of the Woodsfolk is found frozen to death the saying is that he's been speared by an icicle.)
“Come along,” said Nibble. "I'm going up to the barn to see the Red Cow and her bad baby.”
“What do you take me for?” snorted the old doctor. “Don't you forget that Silvertip the Fox is living there! Gimlet the Woodpecker said so. I can't run like you can and there isn't any water for me to dive into.”
“I forgot,” apologized Nibble.
“Well, you just be careful,” warned the wise old beast, “and you come straight back and tell me about him.”
So off went Nibble, creeping about among the puddles. He dove into the Brushpile for a minute because he heard two birds talking. But they were only little downy Mr. and Mrs. Screech Owl, smaller than Bobby Robin. “I tell you it's too early for nesting,” one was saying.
“Not if Silvertip keeps on leaving all that nice food for us in the fence corner,” insisted the other. “He scarcely eats half of what he catches, and chickens are the best eating in the world for our owlets. We wouldn't have to do any limiting.”
“So,” said Nibble to himself, “Gimlet was right. Silvertip's catching Tommy Peele's chickens.”
He sniffed carefully about the haystack and, sure enough, there was a nice nest that smelled of Silvertip-it's almost the same smell as the seeds of the “cranes-bill,” as the Woodsfolk call wild geranium. It was empty, so Nibble cocked an ear at the chicken coop. Sure enough, there was a tiny rustling in the straw. As he sat there listening he heard the scared shout of a pullet, “Squa-awk!” Squa-a--" and that was all. Silvertip had throttled her.

Bounce! Down he came from the perch and slam! Out he slipped through the little back door his snoopy nose had learned how to open. But Nibble didn't dare call Watch for fear Silvertip would hear him.