University of Virginia Library

2. II
HOW BILLIE FOUND THE NUTS

AFTER Billie and Johnnie Bushytail learned to jump, they kept at it nearly all the while. You know how it is; when a boy learns to go on roller skates, he doesn't want to stop, does he? Anyway, in a few days the little squirrels got to be very good jumpers, and they could do almost as well as their Grandpa and Grandma Lightfoot.

"Keep on practising,” said Grandpa. “You will need to be very nimble when the hunting season opens.”

One day Billie and Johnnie thought it would be fun to go off in the woods and wander about, jumping from tree to tree.

“Don't you want to come, Jennie?” asked Billie.

“Oh, I have to do the dishes,” answered Jennie, with a laugh, that showed her sharp little teeth.

“Do you like to do dishes?” asked Billie.

“Yes; it's lots of fun to splash in the water, and get your paws nice and white. I just love it!” and Jennie laughed so heartily that she rattled down some of the acorn-top cups that she had just set on a shelf to dry.

“Let's help her,” suggested Billie, “then she can come with us in the woods.”

“Sure,” agreed his brother; so they set to work and those dishes were done up in less than no time, which, as you all know, is very quick, indeed.

Grandpa and Grandma Lightfoot were out for a walk, and Billie, Johnnie and Jennie did not have to lock any doors when

they left, for there were no doors to the nest. They ran down the tree trunk, jumped from branch to branch, and were soon nearly a half mile from the place where they lived.

“Supposing something happens to us?” suggested Jennie, with a laugh, as they leaped along.

“What could happen?” asked Billie.

“An adventure,” replied Jennie, and she laughed again. “I would just love to have an adventure happen to me.”

“Maybe one will happen,” went on Billie.

Then they went on for some distance farther, until they came to the edge of the woods. There stood a house — a house just like the one you boys and girls live in, only, perhaps, it was smaller.

“What is that?” asked Billie, for it was the first house he had ever seen.

“That,” said Jennie, “is a house where

people live,” and she laughed so that the little dried fern she was standing under shook as though the wind had blown it. Jennie had traveled around more than the little squirrels had, so she knew more than they did.

“Maybe there will be an adventure here,” said Johnnie. “Let's go look.”

“All right,” agreed his brother, and, after Jennie had stood up on her hind legs, and listened with all her might, moving her whiskers to and fro, like a cat smelling for a mouse, she said:

“I guess it will be safe. No one lives there. It is a deserted house, and, very likely, we shall meet with an adventure.”

Then the squirrels and Jennie ran up the porch pillars and down the chimney of the house, coming out through a fireplace into a large room. No one was in it — in fact, no

one was in the whole house. Billie ran across the floor, and in one corner what do you think he found? Why, a stocking filled with nuts. There were many kinds, such as you get at Christmas, and they were strange to the squirrels, who only had such kinds as hickory-nuts, acorns, beech-nuts and black walnuts. But they ate some of each kind, and liked them very much.

“How do you s'pose they got here?” asked Johnnie.

“That must be the adventure part of it,” said Billie.

“No,” said Jennie, “these are Christmas nuts, they are not adventure nuts. Some little boy or girl hung this stocking by the fireplace for Santa Claus to fill, but something happened, and they did not take the nuts out. Maybe the family had to move away in a hurry, and forgot them, or maybe

the little boy or girl got sick on candy, and was not allowed to eat the nuts. Anyway, here are the nuts, and I think we ought to take some home to Grandma and Grandpa.”

Which the squirrels and Jennie did, and, just as they had all they could carry, what should happen but a big rat came running right into that room, and scared them so that Jennie almost forgot how to smile. They ran home in a hurry, I can assure you, and all agreed that it was a most wonderful adventure indeed, but it was nothing to what happened the next day, as I shall tell you to-morrow night, when the bedtime story will be about a trick that Billie Bushytail played.