little rabbit girl, as she hurried forward to speak to the green monkey.
And then, when she turned back again, to swing the hammock, lo and
behold! her dollie was nowhere to be seen.
"Why--why, that's queer," said Susie. "Did you take my dollie, Jumpo?"
"No, indeed," answered the green monkey. "Perhaps she has fallen out of
the hammock." So they looked under the hammock, but the doll wasn't
there. Then they looked all over, and in many other places, but that
dollie had disappeared, which means gone away.
"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Susie, beginning to cry. "She was my best dollie,
and now she is dead and I'll never see her again. Oh, boo-hoo, boo-hoo!
Why did I ever bring her here?"
"Don't cry," said Jumpo kindly, "I'll help you look for her." So he
looked in all the places he could think of but it was of no use.
"Oh, I just know a bad giant has taken her!" cried Susie. "Or else it
was an eagle."
"I didn't see anything like that," spoke Jumpo. "But maybe the burglar
fox came up softly when we weren't looking and took her." Then he called
out: "Say, Mr. Burglar Fox, if you don't give back Susie's doll I'll
have you arrested!"
There was no answer, but a moment later there was a rustling up in an
oak tree which had some brown leaves on it, and then Jumpo caught a
glimpse of the doll's blue dress, and he also saw a big crawly snake,
with his tail wound around a limb of the tree, and that snake was
holding the doll fast in his coils. He had reached down and taken the
doll when Susie wasn't looking.
"Oh, the snake has your doll!" cried Jumpo.
"And how shall I ever get her?" asked the rabbit girl.
"Leave it to me," said Jumpo.
"You'll never get this doll," hissed the snake, like a steam radiator.
But Jumpo knew a good trick. He went off in the woods until he met a
cow. And he asked the cow for some milk and the cow gave him a whole
pailful. Then Jumpo went back and put the pail of milk where the snake
could see it.
Now you know snakes like milk better than anything--better even than
boys and girls like ice cream cones. So as soon as the snake in the tree
saw the milk, he at once let go of the doll, uncoiled himself, and
hurried down for the milk, before the cow could take it away.
"Oh, now I have my dollie back!" cried Susie in delight, and she quickly
caught and hugged Clotilde Raspberry Shortcake, which was the doll's
name, and then Susie and Jumpo ran away before the snake could get them,
and they found Jacko, and each had a lot of chestnuts.
So that's how Jumpo helped Susie Littletail, and that's all there is to
this story. But the next one will be about Jacko and the little
mouse--that is, if the water pitcher doesn't turn over and go to sleep
in the baby's crib and scare the gold fish.
[Illustration]
STORY XII
JACKO AND THE LITTLE MOUSE
"Jacko, will you go to the store for me?" called Mamma Kinkytail to the
little red monkey one afternoon when he had come home from school.
"Yes, mother," he said. "What do you want?"
"Well, I need a dozen cocoanuts and two pounds of sugar, and some
chocolate and some flour."
"Oh, you must be going to make a cake!" cried the monkey boy, tying two
hard knots in his tail.
"You have guessed it," answered his mother. "Hurry now, and the cake
will be baked in time for supper."
"Oh, but I wish Jumpo was here to go with me," said Jacko, as he started
off.
"Why?" asked his mother.
"Because if I carry such nice things as cocoanuts and sugar and
chocolate, a burglar may take them away from me on my way home."
"Nonsense!" said his mother. "Burglars don't want such things as that.
Besides, it is daylight, and burglars don't come around then."
"I was thinking of the burglar fox," went on Jacko. "However, Jumpo
isn't here, as he went over to play ball with Bully No-Tail, the frog.
So I'll have to go alone."
Off he started, and of course, he wasn't a bit afraid going to the
store, for he had nothing with him but the money, and that was away down
at the bottom of his pocket, and Jacko held his little brown paw tightly
over the coins, so they couldn't jump out. Then he reached the store,
and gave the money to the grocery man.
"Now don't drop the cocoanuts," said the grocery man, as he made up a
package of the nice things Jacko had bought. "Can you carry all of
them?"
"Oh, yes," said the monkey boy, confident like, which means sure.
"And do you think you could also carry two sticks of candy, one for
yourself and one for your brother Jumpo?" asked the grocery man, sort of
smiling.
"Well, I'll try--very hard," answered Jacko, and he wondered why the
grocery man laughed. Then the man took from a jar two red and white
striped sticks of candy. One of these sticks Jacko put safely in his
pocket for his green brother, and the other he ate slowly, as he started
for home. He was so interested in the stick of candy that he never even
thought of the burglar fox.
But all of a sudden Jacko looked around in surprise, and he found that
he had taken the wrong path home. It was one that led through the woods,
and right past the house of the burglar fox.
"But there is no use now in going back around the other way," thought
the red monkey; "it will take too long, and mamma won't get the cake
baked for supper. I'll keep on this way, and I'll run past the burglar
fox's house so fast that he can't see me. I guess it will be all right."
So, taking tight hold of his bundle of cocoanuts and sugar and chocolate
and flour, and holding fast to the candy stick, Jacko went on. Pretty
soon he came to the house where the fox lived, and then the monkey boy
got ready to run as fast as he could.
But, all of a sudden, when he was right in front of the house, he heard
a voice crying:
"Help! Help! Oh, will some one please help me?"
"Hark! I wonder who that can be?" thought Jacko. "It doesn't sound like
the voice of the fox, and yet he may be calling to play a trick and get
me in there so he can eat me. I guess I'd better run on."
So he started to run, but he heard the voice again, a sad, squeaky sort
of voice, and it cried:
"Oh, do please some one help me!"
"That isn't the fox," said Jacko bravely. "I'm going in to help whoever
it is. Perhaps it is one of the Bushytail brothers."
Into the house he went, and he saw no signs of the fox. Then Jacko,
standing in the front hall, called out:
"Who are you and what is the trouble?"
"Oh, I'm a poor little mouse," was the answer, "and I'm caught in a trap
in this fox's house. Please help me out."
"Is the fox home?" asked Jacko.
"No, he has gone out to get a friend of his, and then they are coming
back to eat me. Hurry and you can get me out before they come back, and
then we'll run away together."
"I will," said Jacko bravely, so he ran to where he could hear the
mousie scurrying around in the trap, which was in a room upstairs in
the house of the fox.
Well, it didn't take Jacko long, with his nimble fingers and toes, and
his long tail, to get the little mouse out of the trap. Then, when she
walked over toward a window, the monkey said:
"Why, I do believe you are little Squeaky-Eeky, the cousin mouse of
Jollie and Jillie Longtail."
"That's just who I am," said the mouse. "You see, I was going past this
house, and I smelled cheese. I didn't know the fox lived here, so I came
in, and then I was caught in the trap."
"But now you're free," said Jacko. "Come on, and we will hurry away
before the fox and his friend get back."
They started down the stairs, but just then there was a noise outside,
and Squeaky-Eeky, looking from the window, cried:
"Too late! Here come the two foxes."
Then Jacko heard a voice saying:
"Walk right upstairs, Mr. Robber Fox; I have a fine meal waiting for you
in my trap."
"Oh, what shall we do?" whispered Squeaky-Eeky.
"Leave it to me," spoke Jacko in a whisper. Then he quickly opened the
bag and took out two cocoanuts. He peered over the edge of the stairs
until he saw the two foxes coming up and then the brave monkey rolled
the cocoanuts down. Bumpity-bump-bump! they went, rolling right down the
stairs, and they hit the foxes and knocked them over backward.
"Oh, it's thundering, and the thunder is in the house!" cried the
burglar fox. "Come on, quick!" Then, as the burglar fox and the robber
fox ran away Jacko threw some flour and sugar after them. "Oh, it's
snowing and hailing!" cried the robber fox, as he jumped out of the
front door. "We'll freeze to death! Hurry! Hurry!"
Then Jacko tossed some brown chocolate at the bad foxes, out of the
window.
"Oh, it's raining mud!" they both cried, and away they ran faster than
ever, and then Jacko and Squeaky-Eeky could come safely down stairs,
Jacko picking up the two cocoanuts on the way.
So that's how Jacko saved the little mousie girl, and there were still
plenty of things left with which to make the cake. And Mamma Kinkytail
gave Squeaky-Eeky some, and Jumpo gave her some of his candy. So
everything came out all right, you see.
And if the lead pencil doesn't dance the fox trot on the bread board and
mark it all over with black ink I'll tell you next about Papa Kinkytail
and Grandpa Goosey Gander.
STORY XIII
PAPA KINKYTAIL AND GOOSEY GANDER
"Come, Mr. Kinkytail," said Mrs. Kinkytail to her husband one morning
after breakfast, "it is time for you to go to your work in the
hand-organ factory."
"Oh, I'm not going to work to-day," said the papa monkey, as he slowly
folded the news-paper inside out so that he might read about whether it
was going to rain or snow.
"Why aren't you going to work?" asked the monkey mamma.
"Because," answered her husband, "something is the matter with one of
the music machines, and the engineer has to fix it. So the factory is
closed, and I have a vacation. And, as it is Saturday, I'll take the
boys for a walk."
"Oh, goody!" exclaimed Jacko Kinkytail.
"That will be fine!" shouted Jumpo, and he tied his tail in such a hard
knot in his excitement that his mamma almost had to cut the knot out
with the scissors. But finally it was loosened with a knitting needle.
"Come on, boys," said their papa. "The paper says it will be a fair day,
so we will go off in the woods. And, who knows? Perhaps we may have an
adventure."
It was a fine, cool day, and the monkey boys and their papa hurried
along. Soon they came to the woods, where the ground was all covered
with leaves that rustled under foot like tissue paper in a box of candy.
"Oh, look there!" suddenly exclaimed Jacko in a whisper. "There is a big
elephant!"
"Where?" asked his brother, and the red monkey pointed off through the
woods. Surely enough, there was something that looked like an elephant
with a bushel of peanuts on his back.
"Why, that's not an elephant," said Mr. Kinkytail, when he had looked
most carefully, "that is only a stump, though I admit there is something
about it that seems like an elephant's trunk. Well, that was almost an
adventure. Come along, and after a while we may have a real one."
On they walked a little farther, and, all of a sudden Jumpo stopped and
grasped his brother by the paw.
"Look," whispered the green monkey. "Isn't that a big lion over there?"
"Sure enough it is!" exclaimed Jacko, as he looked toward where his
brother pointed.
"Nonsense!" cried Mr. Kinkytail, as he saw the object. "It is only a
pile of yellow leaves, though it is big enough for a lion, and the same
color. But soon we may have a real adventure."
So they went on some more--about as far as two oranges and half a
banana--and, all at once, all three saw something moving in the bushes,
and they knew that was real, for the bushes wiggled to and fro like a
rabbit's ears.
"Look out!" exclaimed Mr. Kinkytail, and the next instant they saw
Grandfather Goosey Gander come waddling out, with his shiny, tall, silk
hat on his head.
"Why, how do you do?" asked the old gentleman goose, as he walked toward
them. "I'm real glad to see you, as I am quite lonesome. I guess I'll--"
But Grandfather Goosey Gander didn't have time to say what he was going
to guess, for at that very particular instant a big, fat cow, with two
crumpled horns, stepped out from behind a tree, and with one swoop she
grabbed Grandfather Goosey Gander's tall hat in her mouth.
"Why, the very idea!" exclaimed Grandfather Goosey. "The very idea! To
take my hat! How dare you! What do you want with it?"
"I want it for a milk pail, to be sure," said the cow, as she stuck the
hat on one of her horns. "I want to take some milk to a sick cousin of
mine, and I need a pail in which to carry it. This tall hat will do very
nicely."
"Why, the very preposterous idea!" gasped the gander gentleman. "My fine
silk hat to be used as a milk pail! I'll never allow it--never!"
"Ah, but you see you can't help yourself," said the cow, as she hung the
tall hat on the branch of a tree, and sat down under it to rest. "I'm
going to walk away, directly, with your hat, and don't you dare come
here and get it, for I'll jiggle you with my crumpled horns if you do,"
went on the cow supercilious like which means sort of proud.
"That's right, she will," whispered Mr. Kinkytail. "You must let her
have her way, grandfather."
"But my nice, tall silk hat!" objected Grandfather Goosey Gander. "I
can't let her have it. I need it to wear to church, and also down to the
bank when I go to put in my money. Oh, this is terrible! I must get
it."
He started toward the tree, where his hat was hanging, but the cow got
up and shook her crumpled horns at him in such a savage way that he was
afraid to go any farther.
"Perhaps I can get it," whispered Jumpo. So he crept up behind the tree,
thinking he could grab the hat away, but the cow heard him, and almost
snitched him with one horn. Then Jacko tried, by climbing up one tree,
and getting ready to drop down into the other one where the hat was. But
the cow heard him and she almost kerfuddled him with her left crinkly
horn, so that plan failed.
"I think I know a way to get your hat," said Mr. Kinkytail at last.
"Oh, if you only can I will be so thankful!" cried Mr. Gander.
"You stay here with Jacko and Jumpo," said the monkey boys' father, "and
watch the cow so that she doesn't run away with the hat. Jacko, you and
your brother make some funny faces, and do some funny tricks so the cow
will be interested in watching you and will stay. I'll go off and get
something I need."
So the monkey boys did a lot of tricks for the cow. Jumpo made a face
like half a cherry pie, and Jacko did the trick of standing on his two
ears and making a noise like a trolley car. It was too funny for
anything, and the cow was real interested.
Then, all of a sudden, off in the woods there sounded the music of a
hand organ. And the tune it played was one called "I'm a Yellow-striped
Tiger and I'm Very Savage Now, So I Think I'll Make a Sandwich of a
Crinkled-crumpled Cow!"
Well, as soon as the cow heard that, up she jumped, crying out:
"No you don't, Mr. Tiger! You can't catch me!" And with that the cow
with the crimpled-crumpled horns ran off in the woods, leaving
Grandfather Goosey Gander's tall hat hanging on the tree.
And then, from the other side of the woods, came Mr. Kinkytail, and it
was he who had played the hand organ to scare the cow. He had hurried to
the factory to get the music machine just especially for that.
"Now your hat is safe, Mr. Gander," said the papa monkey, and soon Jacko
had scrambled up and got it, and then the goosey grandfather and the
monkey boys took turns playing the hand organ until it was time to go
home.
But I see it's your bedtime, so I can't tell any more stories for a
while. The one on the next page will be about Mrs. Kinkytail and Aunt
Lettie the lady goat--that is, if the dining-room table doesn't put its
legs down the back of the chair and tickle it so it sneezes its seat
off.
STORY XIV
JUMPO AND THE CHESTNUT BURR
"Who wants to do something for me?" called Mamma Kinkytail to her two
monkey boys as they came home from school one afternoon.
"I do!" chattered Jacko, the red chap.
"So do I," exclaimed Jumpo, the green chap.
"That's what I love to hear," said their mamma, real pleased like.
"Well, now, I have two things I want done. Some one has to go to the
store for a pound of butter, and the other one I would like to have take
some jam tarts over to Uncle Wiggily Longears, the rabbit gentleman. He
is not feeling so very well, and I thought the tarts would make him
better."
"Oh, I'll go to Uncle Wiggily's," cried both boys at once.
The reason for this was that the old gentleman rabbit always gave his
animal boy or girl visitors some chocolate peppermints, or marshmallow
candies, or something like that, and of course Jacko and Jumpo were
always glad to go to his house. That's why they both spoke at once.
"Now, that's too bad!" exclaimed Mamma Kinkytail. "Only one of you can
take the jam tarts over, because there won't be time, after you come
back, to go to the store for the pound of butter. So I guess you will
have to draw straws to see who goes to Uncle Wiggily's."
"Draw straws! What's that?" asked Jumpo, curious like.
"It's this way," his mamma explained. "I will hold two straws in my paw
so that you can only see the tip ends of them. One straw will be short,
and the other long. Then, Jumpo, you can draw one straw out of my paw,
and Jacko can take the other. Of course, you can't see which is the long
or which is the short one, and that will be perfectly fair, as the tip
ends look just alike. Then, whoever pulls out the long straw can take
the jam tarts to Uncle Wiggily."
Well, the monkey boys thought that would be nice, so they drew the
straws, one after the other, and Jumpo got the long one.
"Oh, goody!" he cried. "I'm to go to Uncle Wiggily's."
"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Jacko, and he felt a bit badly at having to go to
the store. But then he soon became pleasant again, and said: "Never
mind, it will be my turn next time."
"Of course," agreed Jumpo, "and if Uncle Wiggily gives me anything, I'll
save you half, Jacko."
So off the two brothers started, one going one way to the grocery and
the other in a different direction to the house of the old gentleman
rabbit. And Jumpo carried the tarts very carefully, so as not to spill
out a bit of the jam.
It didn't take Jacko long to get to the store and buy the butter. And on
his way home a big wolf chased after him. But what do you s'pose the
monkey boy did? Why, he just spread a little of the butter on the path
behind him, and made it so slippery that the wolf slid all over as he
ran, and so he couldn't catch Jacko.
But I must tell you what happened to Jumpo. The little monkey walked on
and on through the woods, and he was thinking of how nice it was under
the trees. Every once in a while he would pick up a chestnut to eat, and
this took him so long that soon he noticed it was getting dark.
"Oh, I must hurry faster than this," he said, and then, holding the
basket of jam tarts under his paw, he fairly ran on. And then, all of a
sudden, he saw a big chestnut burr on the ground in front of him. The
burr wasn't open yet, and it had a stem, like a handle to pick it up by,
so the stickers wouldn't stick you.
"Oh, there must be at least three big chestnuts in that burr," thought
Jumpo. "I'll pick that up, and then I won't stop a bit more." So he
picked up the chestnut burr, and on he hurried to Uncle Wiggily's house.
But he got a bit tired just as he was almost out of the woods, and he
thought he'd sit down to rest for only a few seconds.
So Jumpo was sitting on a flat stone, looking at the chestnut burr and
wondering if perhaps there might not be four brown, shining nuts inside,
when, all at once, he heard a rustling in the leaves beside him.
"Hark! What's that?" he cried as he leaped up and looked at the basket
of jam tarts which he had set down. "Perhaps that is some of the tarts
trying to jump out," he said.
Then he looked again, and what he saw frightened him very much. For
there was a big, fat, crawly snake on the ground moving toward the
basket of jam tarts.
"Oh, ho!" exclaimed the snake, sticking out his tongue, which was like a
fork--in two parts. "I'm glad I happened to come this way." Then he
wound his pointed tail around the handle of the basket, and hissed: "I
am very fond of jam--especially in nice flaky tarts."
"Do you--do you happen to mean these tarts?" asked Jumpo, sort of
sad-like.
"Indeed, I do," answered the snake, and then he stood upon the end of
his tail on the cover of the basket and sang:
"Oh, I am happy, light and free,
Jam tarts are the things for me.
I eat them morning, noon and night,
For jam tarts, they are my delight."
Then that snake began to lift off the cover of the basket to get at the
tarts, and Jumpo cried:
"But those are for Uncle Wiggily, if you please, Mr. Snake."
"Oh, what do I care?" asked the snake, most impolitely. "I will eat
these tarts, and then I will eat you."
Well, of course Jumpo felt dreadfully on hearing that, and he was
wondering how Uncle Wiggily would feel not to get the tarts, when, all
of a sudden, the monkey boy thought of the sticky chestnut burr he still
held.
"I'll fix that snake!" he cried. And then, just as the snake was going
to eat the tarts Jumpo threw the sharp burr at the wiggly, crawly
creature. The prickly stickers went into his skin, next to his
forty-'leven ribs and land sakes goodness me and some roast peanuts!
That snake was so tickled that he laughed and he sneezed and he coughed
and splittered and spluttered, and he fell over backwards off the basket
of jam tarts, turning a somersault.
Then Jumpo saw his chance. He made a grab for the basket and ran off
with it before the snake had finished sneezing and laughing and
coughing, and so the crawly creature couldn't catch him.
Then the green monkey boy went on to Uncle Wiggily's house and gave him
the tarts. The old gentleman rabbit was very glad to get them, and after
thanking Jumpo gave him ten peppermint candies--five for himself and
five for Jacko.
And then Uncle Wiggily sent a policeman dog back with Jumpo, so the
snake wouldn't hurt him, but the crawly creature had to go to a dentist
to have the chestnut burr stickers pulled out of his ribs and so he
wasn't able to catch anybody that night.
And that will be all for this evening, if you don't mind. Now for the
next story how about Jacko and the roast chestnuts, eh? Well, that's
what it will be if the ashman doesn't take our door mat to make a pair
of roller skates for the pussy cat so she can play tag with the puppy
dog.
STORY XV
JACKO AND THE ROAST CHESTNUTS
"Who wants to stay in this afternoon, and help me clean the
blackboards?" asked the owl lady teacher one day as it was almost time
for the animal pupils to go home.
"I do!" cried Jacko and Jumpo Kinkytail.
"I do!" cried Jackie and Peetie Bow Wow the puppy dog boys.
"So do I!" exclaimed Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, the squirrels.
And all the other children, including the three Wibblewobbles, Dottie
and Munchie Trot, Buddy and Brighteyes Pigg--all of them--said they also
would be glad to help teacher.
"But I only need one," said the owl lady, "and as Jacko has been a very
good boy lately I'll let him stay."
Well, of course the others were somewhat disappointed, which means
sorry, but there was no help for it, and they always did as teacher
told them to, except sometimes, but this was not one of those times.
So they all went out, leaving Jacko the monkey boy and the teacher in
the schoolroom, with the blackboards all covered with words, and
sentences, and examples, and number work and maps of different
countries, including the one where cocoanuts grow.
Jacko took the erasers and a cloth and so did the teacher and they began
work. The red monkey boy could hear the other animal chaps playing ball
outside, and getting ready to fly their kites, and the girls were
shouting and giggling and screaming like anything, and they didn't know
why they did it, either, but girls most always scream, you know.
"They are having lots of fun," said the owl teacher to Jacko, "aren't
you sorry you stayed in to help me?"
"No'm," said Jacko, politely, and he brushed the chalk marks off the
blackboards harder than ever. Then, after a while, when there was only
one more board left to clean, the teacher said:
"Well, Jacko, thank you very much. You have been a great help to me. Run
along now and have a good time."
But it was getting late then, and the other animal boys and girls had
gone home. So Jacko, putting his books in a loop in his kinky tail,
also started for his house.
He had to go through rather a dark piece of woods, but he didn't mind
that, for he made up his mind to run as fast as he could, so the burglar
fox, or the wolf, wouldn't get him.
And pretty soon he came to the woods, so, holding his books tighter than
ever in his tail, away he started. And, just as he got to a hollow stump
a voice called to him: