FullReads

Now Sammy had flown down to the green Meadows to tell Old Man Coyote how Paddy was doing all his work on land in the daytime. But when Old Man Coyote began to call him a tattletale and accuse him of having warned Paddy, and to threaten dreadful things, he straightway forgot all his anger at Paddy and turned it all on Old Man Coyote. He called him everything he could think of, and this was a great deal, for Sammy has a wicked tongue. When he hadn’t any breath left, he flew over to the Green Forest, and there he hid where he could watch all that was going on.

That afternoon Old Man Coyote tried his new plan. He slipped into the Green Forest, looking this way and that way to be sure that no one saw him. Then very, very softly, he crept up through the Green Forest toward the pond of Paddy the Beaver. As he drew near, he heard a crash, and it make him smile. He knew what it meant. It meant that Paddy was at work cutting down trees. With his stomach almost on the ground, he crept forward little by little, little by little, taking the greatest care not to rustle so much as a leaf. Presently he reached a place where he could see the aspen trees, and there, sure enough, was Paddy, sitting up on his hind legs and hard at work cutting another tree.

Old Man Coyote lay down for a few minutes to watch. Then he wriggled a little nearer. Slowly and carefully he drew his legs under him and made ready for a rush. Paddy the Beaver was his at last! At just that very minute a harsh scream rang out right over his head:

“Thief! thief! thief!”

It was Sammy Jay, who had followed him all the way. Paddy the Beaver didn’t stop to even look around. He knew what that meant, and he scrambled down his little path to the water as he never had scrambled before. And as he dived with a great splash, Old Man Coyote landed with a great jump on the very edge of the pond.

CHAPTER XIX. Paddy and Sammy Jay Become Friends.

Paddy the Beaver floated in his pond and grinned in the most provoking way at Old Man Coyote, who had so nearly caught him. Old Man Coyote fairly danced with anger on the bank. He had felt so sure of Paddy that time that it was hard work to believe that Paddy had really gotten away from him. He bared his long, cruel teeth, and he looked very fierce and ugly.

“Come on in; the water’s fine!” called Paddy.

Now, of course this wasn’t a nice thing for Paddy to do, for it only made Old Man Coyote all the angrier. You see, Paddy knew perfectly well that he was absolutely safe, and he just couldn’t resist the temptation to say some unkind things. He had had to be on the watch for days lest he should be caught, and so he hadn’t been able to work quite so well as he could have done with nothing to fear, and he still had a lot of preparations to make for winter. So he told Old Man Coyote just what he thought of him, and that he wasn’t as smart as he thought he was or he never would have left a foot print in the mud to give him away.

When Sammy Jay, who was listening and chuckling as he listened, heard that, he flew down where he would be just out of reach of Old Man Coyote, and then he just turned that tongue of his loose, and you know that some people say that Sammy’s tongue is hung in the middle and wags at both ends. Of course this isn’t really so, but when he gets to abusing people it seems as if it must be true. He called Old Man Coyote every bad name he could think of. He called him a sneak, a thief, a coward, a bully, and a lot of other things.