As soon as Tommy Fox began to dance with the strange lady (she was
really Fatty Coon, you know), he saw very quickly that she was not a
good dancer at all. She kept stepping on Tommy's feet, and tripping him.
And Tommy kept wishing that the music would begin, so he could stop
dancing. You remember that Jimmy Rabbit had said that this was to be a
dance _without_ music, and that everybody had to be blindfolded, too.
At first, Tommy Fox and his partner kept bumping into other dancers.
That was natural enough, too, because how could anyone see, with a
pocket-handkerchief tied over his eyes?
After a while Tommy noticed that they bumped into fewer and fewer
people, until at last they never ran into any others at all. But he
never stopped to wonder at that. He was only glad that it was so.
Being blindfolded, he had not seen what was going on. But Jimmy Rabbit
was very busy. He kept going up to all the rabbit dancers, and
whispering to them, and telling them to take their pocket-handkerchiefs
off their eyes and run away, because Tommy Fox and Fatty Coon had come
to the Rabbits' Ball, without being invited. So two by two the dancers
stole off, until there were only three of the merrymakers left. Two of
those were Tommy Fox and Fatty Coon, who were still dancing, still
blindfolded, and each still thinking that the other was a rabbit. The
third was Jimmy Rabbit himself. But he was not dancing. He was peeping
out from behind a tree, and wondering what was going to happen.
And all the time Tommy Fox was wishing the music would begin. Of course,
he didn't know that Jimmy Rabbit had sent the fiddlers away.
Now, the longer they danced, the oftener the fat lady stepped on Tommy's
feet. And he grew so angry that he finally said:
"Do be careful where you step!"
That remark did not please Fatty Coon.
"Don't tell _me_ how to dance!" he said. "You're a great, clumsy
creature!"
"I'm not!" Tommy retorted. "I'm the best dancer at the Ball. But _you_
can't dance any better than a coon!"
That was enough for Fatty. He tore the handkerchief off his eyes. And
Tommy Fox was just as quick. He saw that he had made an unwise speech.
And he snatched the bandage from his own face.
"You've played a trick on me!" Tommy Fox cried, when he saw that all the
other dancers--and the fiddlers, too--had gone.
"You've played one on me!" Fatty Coon shouted. And he pulled the mask
off Tommy Fox's face.
And again Tommy Fox was just as quick. He reached out and twitched away
Fatty Coon's mask.
For one second they stared at each other. And then they jumped at each
other.
Jimmy Rabbit didn't wait to see anything more. He felt that it would be
much safer somewhere else. And besides, the Rabbits' Ball had come to an
end.
That was the last time that Fatty Coon and Tommy Fox ever went to a
party to which they were not invited. Jimmy Rabbit had taught them a
lesson.
[Illustration: 19 Jimmy Grows Too Cheeky]
19