TROUBLE IN THE CLUB
"It took Jimmy a long time to get down to the pond, because he had to
stop every now and then to rub it into me on account of the Bobby Coon
business, and by the way he talked you'd thought I was the only thing
in the big woods who'd not done right," Mr. Bunny said as he nursed
his knee carefully, swaying his body to and fro slowly, but keeping a
sharp watch around lest some one of his many enemies should creep upon
him unawares.
"If it had been at any other time, except when I counted he was going
to get it good and hot mighty soon, I'd have had it out with him then
and on the spot, for there isn't any hedgehog that ever walked who'll
be allowed to give me cheap talk about what I hadn't any finger in,
except to tag on behind when the two of 'em were going toward Mr.
Man's barn, and I wouldn't have done even as much as that if I hadn't
known they'd call me 'fraid cat' unless I stayed with the crowd.
"Oh my! how big Jimmy did feel, and how he threw out his chest while
we were going to the pond, and the more he talked the surer he was
that there wasn't anything in the big woods that could so much as hold
a candle to him! As I told you, I let him run on, because I had a
mighty good idea of what was going to happen, and whenever we came to
a big bunch of ferns I crept among them to have a chance for laughing
without his seeing me, for if he'd caught a glimpse of the littlest
kind of grin on my face he'd have suspected that something was up,
when it would have been good-bye to Mr. Crow's plans.
"As luck would have it he never tumbled to a thing and when we got to
the pond there was old Mr. Turtle lying out in the sun as if his very
last day had come. He acted so sick that even though I knew he'd never
had a tooth in his head I almost began to believe he really did have
the toothache.
"'What's the matter, Mr. Turtle?' Jimmy asked, ruffling up his quills
so's to make himself look as big as he felt, and old Slowly said,
speaking as if the breath had about gone out of his body:
"'I'm in a mighty bad way, Mr. Hedgehog, and I allow you're the only
one in all the big woods who can give me a lift. I've never done
anything wrong to you, and a young chap ought to be willing to help a
poor old fellow who's got the misery in his tooth that I'm having.'
"'Of course, I'll do what I can, Mr. Turtle,' and Jimmy bristled
around like a red and green auto that's gone wrong in its
steering-gear. 'Suppose you show me the tooth and perhaps I can pull
the thing out for you.'
"I thought for sure Jimmy had the old fellow then and that Mr. Crow's
plan had failed, but old Slowly Turtle isn't half as foolish as he
looks for he never turned a hair when he said:
"'It's no use for me to try to show it, Mr. Hedgehog, because I've had
the pain so long that I've regularly got the lock-jaw. If you'd be
willing to let me have one of your stoutest quills I'm most certain I
could fix the thing up myself. You see, I've got the thick part of a
snail's shell in my tooth and the minute that is out I'll be all
right.'
"'You're welcome to a dozen quills, if that's what you want; but
you'll have to get Bunny to pull 'em out, for I can't do it,' and
Jimmy looked around at me as if expecting I was going to thrust my
paws among all those sharp-pointed toothpicks.
"'I don't believe I'd care to trust Bunny in such a job as that,' Mr.
Turtle said, looking out of the corner of his eye at me as if to say
that I was to keep my paws out of his pies, which I was perfectly
willing to do. 'If you'd turn around, Mr. Hedgehog, so's I could see
just which quill I wanted it wouldn't take me long to get what I
needed.'
"Jimmy still believed that he must be the biggest kind of fellow among
the wood folks if he was the only one who could save Mr. Turtle's
life, and around he swung, his quills rustling like dry leaves in a
strong wind. I caught just one glimpse of old Slowly's eye as he
winked it wickedly, and then I saw his jaws come together on the
middle of Jimmy's tail, where there wasn't a chance of his being
pricked. Now don't you think there was any need of telling Jimmy that
things had gone wrong in the rear! It was just the same as if old
Slowly had telegraphed, for at the very minute Mr. Turtle got the
hold he wanted, that hedgehog let out a yell which you could have
heard from one end of the big woods to the other, and off he started
at full speed.
Mr. Turtle never said a word, and he couldn't on account of his mouth
being so full. He didn't have time to wink at me again before I saw
him whisking through the bushes just as if he were flying. It was as
much as a minute before I came to understand what was happening, and
then you can make up your mind that I put in my best licks to be on
hand when the end came, for Jimmy isn't great at running, and it stood
to reason he couldn't keep up that pace very long.
"I don't allow that the frightened hedgehog knew where he was aiming
for when he started. You see old Slowly must have hurt him a good bit,
if he shut his jaws together right hard, as Jimmy said he did, for Mr.
Crow declares that he could bite off the end of an oak stick and not
strain himself very much. It so happened, though, that when Jimmy
struck his two-minute clip he was heading straight for the big oak,
and nothing could have suited the president of the club any better.
"It wasn't very hard for me to get well up with the procession before
the race was more than half run, and as we came within sight of the
big oak I saw that nearly every member of the club was there, as if
notices of a special meeting had been sent out. I afterward heard that
all Cheeko's boys had been running around the country a full hour to
get the wood folks gathered where they could see the fun, and surely
those young fellows had done their work well, for it didn't seem as if
any one was absent, though I'm allowing that more than one wished,
before the day was over, that he hadn't been so prompt in answering
the president's invitation.
"As near as I could figure it out, Jimmy didn't have an idea that any
one was near until he found himself in the very midst of the crowd,
and then he swung around in order to stop quickly, when, of course,
old Mr. Turtle flew out like a rock on the end of a string, without
any idea of where he'd bring up. Cocky Robin and Mr. Jay were roosting
quite near the ground, where they could keep an eye out for foolish
worms which might happen that way, and Mr. Turtle swept them off the
branch like ninepins, knocking the two senseless.
"Mr. Jay let out a screech as he fell, and Jimmy, who couldn't seem to
understand how hard he was swinging old Slowly, turned the other way
like a flash, Mr. Turtle hitting Bobby Coon's mother such a clip on
the head that I thought for certain she was dead. Then Mr. Crow hopped
down to tell Slowly to let up, when Jimmy turned again, and over the
old fellow went like the down of a thistle.
"I really haven't the time to tell you all that happened before old
Slowly could be made to understand that he had carried out his part of
the plot and a little more. Jimmy had regularly lost his head, what
with the pain caused by Mr. Turtle's jaws, together with the uproar
that began when he first appeared, and kept swinging around and around
like a windmill that has suddenly gone crazy, with old Slowly flying
out at the end of his tail knocking down everything and everybody in
his way.
"It seemed as if Mr. Turtle must have been splintered into little
bits, for whatever he struck was hit hard; but yet he really seemed to
enjoy it, and when the rumpus was over the old fellow acted as if he
were quite disappointed at having the circus over so soon.
"If you'll believe me, fully seven out of every ten of the club
members had been knocked over from one to three times before we got
any sense into Jimmy's wild head, and those who hadn't already come to
harm were roosting mighty high, as if afraid that Slowly might lose
his grip and come sailing up among the branches, as he would have done
if any part of Jimmy's tail had come off suddenly. It didn't seem to
me as if I had any call to mix up in the show, even though the
president kept singing out for me to jump in and catch the crazy
hedgehog, for when you find me mixing myself up with a lot of quills
that are moving around as Jimmy's were then you'll catch Butcher
Weasel asleep.
"There's no telling how long the performance would have lasted if
Senator Bear, who had been awakened by the uproar, hadn't come up just
when he did, and he got there in time to have old Slowly strike him
fairly on the side; but it takes quite a blow to knock the Senator
out, and Jimmy didn't have time enough to swing around again before
Mr. Bear put one of his big paws on him.
"That held the crazy hedgehog down for a minute, and President Crow
yelled savagely:
"'Let go his tail, you foolish old turtle! Do you count on killing the
whole club?'
"'I'm only doing what you asked me to do,' Slowly grumbled as he let
go his grip, and the minute his mouth was opened you can set it down
as a fact that Jimmy took mighty good care to get his tail in out of
harm's way.
"Now, as I've told you before, more than half the club members had
been knocked around by Slowly and Jimmy, and the minute they heard
that the job had been put up by Mr. Crow they sailed into him, calling
the old fellow more names than there are days in the month. Jimmy lay
there under the Senator's paw, but never said a word; he'd lost his
breath after scrambling around so fast, which was one reason why he
had nothing to say, and I reckon he was so frightened that he didn't
dare to move his tongue for fear something worse would happen.
"Well, say, I've heard rows before, but never anything that came up to
what we had right there under the big oak. The members who had been
bruised couldn't find hard words enough to sling at the president, and
those who came off without a scratch were cross because they'd been
obliged to move around so vigorously in order to keep out of Mr.
Turtle's way.
"Mr. Crow stood the abuse for quite a while without making any back
talk, and then he lost his temper, as even the blindest rabbit that
ever lived could have seen, for he hopped around first on one foot and
then on the other, acting as if he were choking because he couldn't
get the words out fast enough.
"'I'm through with every one of you!' he croaked, ruffling up the
feathers on his neck, and flapping his wings. 'You'll never catch me
being president again of such a club of dummies as this, not if I live
to be a thousand years old!'
"'You won't get the chance in this section of the country even if you
should live two thousand years!' cried Mr. Jay, fairly boiling over
with wrath because one of his eyes had been blackened, and the greater
portion of his tail torn away.
"It's no use for me to try to tell you all that was said while every
one was so worked up over what I had counted was going to be the joke
of the season. If there were any harsh names which they didn't call
Mr. Crow, it was because they were forgotten in the excitement, and
the scolding might have been kept up to this very day if the
Professor, hearing the noise, hadn't come snooping around to see what
he could pick up in the way of table dainties.
"Yes, that was the end of the Fur and Feather Club. Mr. Crow wouldn't
speak to a single soul of us for ever and ever so long; Jimmy and his
folks were so angry at us all that they moved away down to the lower
end of the swamp, while old Mr. Turtle took it into his foolish head
that he hadn't been treated right, and threatened to make it hot for
the first member of the club who dared come near the pond, which he
claimed was his private property. There was a warm old time in the big
woods during the rest of that season, and Mrs. Bunny says it was the
most fortunate thing that ever happened in our section, because we
members had been regularly idling our time away under pretense of
transacting club business, but of course you and I know that she puts
it altogether too strongly.
"Look! Look over in the ferns!" and Mr. Bunny pointed excitedly with
one paw. "There's Mrs. Bunny herself! I reckon she thinks you may be
here with the idea of starting another club, and she has come after
me. She's got Sonny Bunny by the paw, which is the same as saying if I
don't do as she wants she'll take him and go to her mother's, so I
guess, in order to keep peace in the family, I'd better say good-bye."
Then Mr. Bunny Rabbit hipperty-hopped away to where his family awaited
him, and there could be no question but that the long story had come
to
THE END