Paddy the Beaver was hard at work. He had just cut down a good-
sized aspen tree and now he was gnawing it into short lengths to
put in his food pile in the pond. As he worked, Paddy was doing a
lot of thinking about the footprint of Old Man Coyote in a little
patch of mud, for he knew that meant that Old Man Coyote had
discovered his pond, and would be hanging around, hoping to catch
Paddy off his guard. Paddy knew it just as well as if Old Man
Coyote had told him so. That was why he was at work cutting his food
supply in the daytime. Usually he works at night, and he knew
that Old Man Coyote knew it.
"He'll try to catch me then," thought Paddy, "so I'll do my working
on land now and fool him."
The tree he was cutting began to sway and crack. Paddy cut out
One more big chip, then hurried away to a safe place while the
tree fell with a crash.
"Thief! thief! thief!" screamed a voice just back of Paddy.
"Hello, Sammy Jay! I see you don't feel any better than usual
this morning," said Paddy. "Don't you want to sit up in this tree
while I cut it down?"
Sammy grew black in the face with anger, for he knew that Paddy
was laughing at him. You remember how only a few days before he
had been so intent on calling Paddy bad names that he actually
hadn't noticed that Paddy was cutting the very tree in which he
was sitting, and so when it fell he had had a terrible fright.
"You think you are very smart, Mr. Beaver, but you'll think
differently one of these fine days!" screamed Sammy. "If you knew
what I know, you wouldn't be so well satisfied with yourself."
"What do you know?" asked Paddy, pretending to be very much
alarmed.
"I'm not going to tell you what I know," retorted Sammy Jay.
"You'll find out soon enough. And when you do find out, you'll
never steal another tree from our Green Forest. Somebody is going
to catch you, and it isn't Farmer Brown's boy either!"
Paddy pretended to be terribly frightened. "Oh, who is it? Please
tell me, Mr. Jay," he begged.
Now to be called Mr. Jay made Sammy feel very important. Nearly
everybody else called him Sammy. He swelled himself out trying to
look as important as he felt, and his eyes snapped with pleasure.
He was actually making Paddy the Beaver afraid. At least, he
thought he was.
"No, Sir, I won't tell you," he replied. "I wouldn't be you for a
great deal, though! Somebody who is smarter than you are is going
to catch you, and when he gets through with you, there won't be
anything left but a few bones. No, Sir, nothing but a few bones!"
"Oh, Mr. Jay, this is terrible news! Whatever am I to do?" cried
Paddy, all the time keeping on at work cutting another tree.
"There's nothing you can do," replied Sammy, grinning wickedly at
Paddy's fright. "There's nothing you can do unless you go right
straight back to the North where you came from. You think you are
very smart, but--"
Sammy didn't finish. Crack! Over fell the tree Paddy had been
cutting and the top of it fell straight into the alder in which
Sammy was sitting. "Oh! Oh! Help!" shrieked Sammy, spreading his
wings and flying away just in time.
Paddy sat down and laughed until his sides ached. "Come make me
another call someday, Sammy!" he said. "And when you do, please
bring some real news. I know all about Old Man Coyote. You can
tell him for me that when he is planning to catch people he
should be careful not to leave footprints to give himself away."
Sammy didn't reply. He just sneaked off through the Green Forest,
looking quite as foolish as he felt.