Jolly Robin was too frightened to laugh when he saw Johnnie Green's
second snowball strike the moon-faced stranger in the orchard. You
see, the snowball hit one of the stranger's arms. And to Jolly's
amazement, the arm at once dropped off and dashed upon the ground,
breaking into a dozen pieces.
That alone was enough to startle Jolly Robin. But the moon-faced man
paid not the slightest attention to the accident. There was something
ghostly in the way he stood there, all in white, never moving, never
once saying a word.
But Johnnie Green did not seem frightened at all. He set up a great
shouting and began to let fly his snowballs as fast as he could throw
them.
They did not all find the mark. But the very last one struck the
silent stranger squarely upon his left ear. And to Jolly Robin's
horror, his head toppled off and fell horridly at his feet.
Jolly Robin fully expected the man in white to turn and chase Johnnie
Green then--or at least to hurl his stick at Johnnie. But nothing of
the sort happened. And Jolly did not wait for anything more. He felt
that he had seen quite enough. So he flew away to the shelter of the
woods, to find somebody to whom he could talk and tell of the strange
thing that had happened in the orchard.
Over in the woods Jolly was lucky enough to meet Jimmy Rabbit, who
was always very friendly toward him. And as soon as he had inquired
about Jimmy Rabbit's health (they had not seen each other since the
previous fall, you know), Jolly related how he had seen Johnnie Green
knock off the head of the man in the orchard.
"And the man never paid the slightest heed to what happened," said
Jolly Robin. "He had a stick in his hand; but he didn't throw it."
"There's nothing queer about that," Jimmy Rabbit remarked. "How could
he see where to throw his stick, when he had no head?"
But Jolly Robin could not answer that question. And he looked more
puzzled than ever.
"I don't understand it," he said with a shake of his own head. "The
whole affair was very odd. I'm afraid I shall not care to live in the
orchard this summer, especially if there's a headless man there! For
how can he ever see to leave the orchard?"
It was Jimmy Rabbit's turn to look puzzled, for that was a question
that he couldn't answer.
"Maybe there is something queer about this case," he said. "I'll go
over to the orchard to-morrow and take a look at that headless
stranger and see what I think about him. If you'll meet me here we can
go together."
Now, Jolly Robin had almost decided that he would never go near the
orchard again. But he felt that if he went with Jimmy Rabbit there
ought not to be much danger. So he agreed to Jimmy's suggestion.
"I'll be here before the morning's gone," he promised.