WINKIE MEETS DON
Tired by their hard work in making their way out of their burrow, and
weary with the journey to the woods, Winkie, Blinkie, and Blunk slept
rather late the next morning. Father and Mother Woodchuck were up and
astir early, however, rustling around among the dried leaves.
“How do you like it here, Mrs. Woodchuck?” asked her husband in a
whisper, for he did not want to awaken the children.
“Of course,” answered his wife, “it isn’t as nice as the burrow we had
to leave. But it will do very well for the summer. I think it will be
very pleasant, if you think it will be safe.”
“It will be safe enough,” declared Mr. Woodchuck. “We can hide in the
leaves and hollow logs if danger comes. And we are not far from the
clover field. Besides, there is plenty of bark here to gnaw.”
“Yes, there is plenty of bark,” agreed Mrs. Woodchuck, looking around
at the trees, through which the morning sun was just beginning to
shine. Woodchucks sometimes eat bark, you know, as well as clover.
“Yes, there is plenty of bark,” said Winkie’s mother again. “And I had
rather eat the _bark_ of a tree than listen to the _bark_ of a dog,”
she added, smiling as she made this little joke.
Mr. Woodchuck smiled, too――that is, as much as woodchucks ever
smile――and he felt happy. When his wife made little jokes this way he
knew that she, too, was happy. Really, you could hardly have blamed
the woodchucks for being unhappy, when they had to get out of their
underground house in the way they did.
“Yes, I think we shall like it here in the woods,” proceeded the
woodchuck lady. “But of course it would never do for winter.”
“Oh, my, no!” agreed her husband. “When winter comes we will dig
ourselves a new burrow.”
Just then Winkie awakened and cried out in some fear:
“Oh, where am I?”
“Hush, Winkie! You’re all right!” her mother called. “We are in our new
home――in the woods. You’ll like it very much!”
“Oh!” murmured the wily woodchuck girl. “I was dreaming, Mother, that I
was playing tag with Blunk, and he tickled me.”
“Well, these leaves are tickling me!” cried Brother Blunk, who just
then awakened.
They all laughed at this, and at Winkie’s dream, and after they had
washed themselves they were ready for breakfast. I don’t mean to say
that the woodchucks went to a bathroom and washed their faces and paws
or took a bath as you do when you get up in the morning. At least, as
you wash your faces and _hands_ or take a bath.
But I am sure you have all seen a cat wash its face; and though the
woodchucks did not cleanse themselves in just this way, they made their
ruffled fur smooth and sleek before they ate their breakfast.
After a few nibbles at the bark of some trees, which they liked very
much, the woodchucks went over to the edge of the woods near the clover
field. There they ate some green leaves and red blossoms.
All at once they saw a flash of fire and a puff of smoke, and they
heard that rumbling sound which had so frightened them before.
“Look out!” cried Mr. Woodchuck.
But there was no danger to the woodchucks now, even though Farmer
Tottle was again blasting stumps and rocks in his field. The
woodchucks, however, were afraid, and back toward the woods they ran.
And as they did not keep together, but scattered, it happened that,
after the first frightened rush, Winkie found herself running along
alone.
It was the first time Winkie had ever been in the woods, and the first
time she had ever been anywhere alone. Always, except perhaps when very
near the burrow, she had been with her brother or sister, or father or
mother. Now, as she ran along, she looked on either side, she peered
amid the trees and under the bushes and saw――no one! No Blinkie, no
Blunk, no father, no mother!
“Oh, where are you?” cried Winkie, in woodchuck language, of course.
“Where are you all?”
But so frightened were the other woodchucks that they had scurried here
and there, one running this way and the other that way until they were
widely separated. Neither Blinkie nor Blunk, neither father nor mother
was within sound of Winkie’s voice.
“Oh, what is going to happen to me?” cried poor Winkie. “What is going
to happen?”
If she had been a real little girl, instead of an animal one, Winkie
might have cried, for she was lost for the first time in her life, and
away from father, mother, brother and sister. I believe almost any of
you little girls, and probably a good many of the boys, would have
cried.
But Winkie was a brave little woodchuck girl, and she was also wily,
which, as I have told you, means smart and cunning.
“No, I’m not going to cry!” said Winkie to herself. “If I cry, and make
a blubbery noise, some of the farmer’s dogs may hear me and chase me.
Or maybe a fox will hear me. I’m going to keep still and see if I can’t
find Blinkie and the others.”
So saying, Winkie came to a stop in the midst of her mad, frightened
rush amid the dried leaves. She became very quiet, listened and looked
about her. At first she could hear nothing but the beating of her own
little, frightened heart and the whispering of the wind among the
trees. This last sound came to Winkie’s ears as rather friendly. She
was beginning to like it in the big woods.
“Perhaps nothing will harm me here,” she said to herself. “And I may
have adventures, such as my father and mother have told me about having
had when they were younger.”
Thinking thus made Winkie feel better. She was not so frightened.
Though she no longer ran on as fast as when she had heard the distant
blast set off by Farmer Tottle, she still kept running.
“For,” she said to herself, “I want to find my father and mother if I
can.”
So Winkie’s wanderings were all done toward the end of finding her
family again, and the adventures came in between, so to speak.
After her run Winkie began to feel a bit thirsty, as most wild animals
do when they journey fast through the woods or fields. The wily little
woodchuck looked about for some water to drink. Winkie could smell
water as you smell cookies baking in your mother’s oven, and it did
not take the ground-hog girl long to reach a little stream. She was
thirstily drinking when, all of a sudden, she heard a noise.
She stopped drinking, and looked across the little brook. There she
saw, sitting on the opposite bank, a brown animal, not very much
different from herself, except as to the tail. This animal had a broad,
flat tail, marked in scales like those of a fish, while the tail of
Winkie was round and covered with fur. And, as she looked, somehow or
other Winkie did not feel that this strange animal would harm her.
“Who are you?” asked Winkie.
“I am Toto,” was the answer.
“You aren’t a woodchuck, I know,” said Winkie. “Are you a muskrat?”
“No. But I can swim under water,” answered Toto. “I am the bustling
beaver, if you please. And who are you?”
“Oh, I am Winkie, the wily woodchuck, and I’m lost!” came the answer.
“Why do they call you a bustling beaver? Have you seen any of my
family?”
“My! You are very fond of asking questions!” laughed Toto. “But I will
do my best to answer you. I am a beaver, because I was born a beaver,
that’s all I can tell you about that.
“But the reason I am called ‘bustling’ is because I am such a fast
worker. I bustle about, digging canals, making dams, cutting down
trees, and all such work as that. And I’ll soon have to run along and
help build a new dam we beavers are putting across the brook.”
“What’s a dam?” asked Winkie.
“There you go again! Asking more questions!” laughed Toto. “Well, a dam
is a lot of sticks, stones, and grass piled across a stream to make it
stop running away. Then the water makes a big pond back of the dam, and
in that pond of deep water we beavers build our homes. With our teeth
we gnaw down big trees so they will fall across the brook to help in
making the dam.”
“My! I should say you were bustling!” exclaimed Winkie. “But in all
your bustling about have you seen Blinkie, Blunk, or my father or
mother?”
“More questions!” laughed Toto, the beaver. “No,” he answered, after
taking another drink of water from the brook, “I haven’t seen them, I
am sorry to say. Are they lost?”
Then Winkie told of the blasting, how the Woodchuck family had been
shut up in the burrow, how she had found a way out and how they had all
separated, much frightened, when the big noise came again that morning.
“You certainly have had a lot of trouble,” agreed Toto. “I wish I could
help you, but I must now bustle back to my work――we beavers are very
busy animals. However, if I see any of your family I’ll tell them where
to find you.”
“Please do,” begged Winkie, as Toto hastened along. The beaver waddled
off a little way, moving in a queer fashion, for beavers are rather
awkward on land, though very swift in swimming.
Then Toto came to a stop. He turned and looked at Winkie.
“I say,” asked Toto, “were you ever in a book, Winkie?”
“Book? No, I never was in a book,” answered Winkie. “What is a book?”
“I’ve been in one,” went on Toto. “I haven’t time to tell you about it
now. Maybe I will some other day. Good-bye, Winkie. I’m glad I met you!”
“Good-bye,” echoed the wily woodchuck. She felt a bit lonesome when
Toto was gone. “I wonder what a book is,” murmured Winkie, as she
walked along after she had lapped up all the water she wanted. “Toto
said book. I wish I knew what a book is!” And she spoke aloud this time.
“A book! Ha! I can tell you what a book is!” suddenly exclaimed another
voice. “Come over here and I’ll tell you all about a book. I have been
put in one!”
Winkie looked through the trees, and what she saw made her heart beat
faster than it ever had before.
“Oh, it’s a _dog_!” she gasped. “One of the farmer’s big dogs! Oh, this
is the end of me! Oh, I must run!”
Away leaped Winkie. The dog ran after her barking and shouting:
“Don’t run! Don’t be afraid! I’m only Don! I’m Don, the runaway dog,
but I don’t run away any more, and I won’t hurt you. Wait! I want to
tell you what a book is!”