Johnnie Green knew that he could never find the Cricket in the dark. So
he crawled out of bed and lighted a candle, blinking a few moments in its
flickering flame.
From his hiding place in the crack of the baseboard, in a corner of
Johnnie Green's chamber, Chirpy Cricket saw the gleam of the candle. And
he wondered whether it might be a relation of Freddie Firefly. It seemed
to have a trick of moving about in a jerky fashion, as if it didn't know
where it was going and didn't greatly care, so long as it was on the
move.
Chirpy Cricket kept still as a mouse then. He soon saw that the bearer of
the bright light was quite unlike Freddie Firefly, in one way. He made a
tremendous racket, knocking over almost everything in the room.
In a few minutes a voice called up the stairway again. "Is the Cricket
chasing you?" it asked. It was Farmer Green, speaking to Johnnie.
"Don't tease me!" Johnnie Green cried. "Come up and help me find him!"
So Farmer Green climbed the stairs and looked into Johnnie's room and
laughed.
"Maybe I ought to have brought the old shotgun," he said. "I'd hate to
have a Cricket jump at me."
Johnnie managed to grin at that. He was so wide awake that he no longer
felt like grumbling.
"The trouble with this Cricket is that he won't jump," he told his
father. "I can't tell where he is, because he keeps still whenever I
move. But when the light's out and everything's quiet he makes a terrible
noise."
"That's a trick Crickets have," Farmer Green observed. "And I must say
that if I were a Cricket I'd act the same way."
Of course Chirpy Cricket heard everything that was said. And he couldn't
help thinking that Farmer Green was a very sensible person. "I dare say
he'd be a famous fiddler if he belonged to our family," Chirpy told
himself. And for a moment or two he was tempted to play a tune for Farmer
Green. But he thought better of the notion at once. He remembered that
Farmer Green had climbed the stairs to hunt for him. And Chirpy squeezed
himself further into the crack where he was hiding until he was so
huddled up that he couldn't have fiddled if he had wanted to.
Though they looked carefully, neither Johnnie nor his father could find
him. And at last they had to admit that it was useless to search any
longer.
"What shall I do?" Johnnie wailed. "As soon as I put out the light and
get into bed he'll begin chirping again."
"In such cases," Farmer Green answered wisely, "there's only one thing to
do."
"What's that?" Johnnie inquired hopefully.
"All you can do," said Farmer Green, "is to come downstairs and have
something to eat."
Now, that may seem a strange remedy. But somehow it just suited Johnnie
Green. He pattered barefooted down the stairs. And later, when he went to
bed again, and Chirpy Cricket began to chirp once more, all Johnnie Green
said was this:
"Sing away--little Tommy Tucker! You may not know it, but you sang for my
supper!"
And the next moment, Johnnie Green was sound asleep.