The Curlytops on Star Island/Chapter 7

a moment after her brother had said this Janet did not speak. She, too, dropped the cookie she had just taken from the bag, and turned slowly around to see at what Teddy was pointing.

She was just in time to see something furry and reddish-brown in color dart into the hollow log, which was open at both ends. Then Jan gave a scream.

"Oh!" exclaimed Ted, who was as much frightened by Janet's shrill voice as he was at what he had seen. "Oh, Jan! Don't!"

"I—I couldn't help it," she answered. "I told you I'd scream if I saw a bear, and I did see one. It is a bear, isn't it, Teddy?"

"It is," he answered. "I saw it first. It's my bear!"

"You can have it—every bit of it," said Jan, quickly getting up from the mossy rock on which she had been sitting. "I don't want any of it, not even the stubby tail. I like to own half of Nicknack with you, but I don't want half a bear."

"Then I'll take all of it—it's my bear," went on Ted. "Where're you going, Jan?" he asked, as he saw his sister hurrying away.

"I'm going home. I don't like it here. I'm going to make Nicknack run home with me."

Teddy got up, too. He did not stop to pick up the cookie he had dropped.

"I—I guess I'll go with you, Jan," he said. "I guess my bear will stay in the log until I come back."

"Are you coming back!" asked Janet, as with trembling fingers she unfastened Nicknack's strap from around the stump to which he had been tied.

"I'm going to get grandpa to come back with me and shoot the bear," replied Ted. "I want his skin to make a rug. You know—like grandpa did with the bear his father shot."

Jan did not say anything. She got into the cart and turned the goat about, ready to leave the place. She gave a look over her shoulder at the hollow log into which she and Ted had seen the furry, brown animal crawl. It did not seem to be coming out, and Jan was glad of that.

"Giddap, Nicknack!" she called to the goat, and as the animal started off Ted jumped into the wagon from behind.

"I wish I had a gun," he said.

"You're too little," declared Jan. "Oh, Ted! what if he should chase us? Was it an awful big bear? I didn't dare look much."

"It wasn't so very big."

"Was it as big as Nicknack?"

"Oh, bigger'n him—a lot."

"Oh!" and again Jan looked back over her shoulder. "I hope he doesn't chase us," she added.

"I'll fix him if he does!" threatened Ted. "I'll fix him!"

"How? You haven't any gun, and maybe you couldn't shoot it if you had, lessen maybe it was your Christmas pop gun."

"Pooh! Pop guns wouldn't be any good to shoot a bear! You've got to have real bullets. But I can fix this bear if he chases us," and Ted tried to look brave.

"How?" asked Jan again. She felt safer now, for Nicknack was going fast, and the hollow log, into which the furry animal had crawled, was out of sight.

"Ill make our goat buck the bear with his horns if he chases us, that's what I'll do!" declared Ted.

"Oh, that would be good!" exclaimed Jan in delight. "Nicknack is brave and his horns are sharp. 'Member how he stuck 'em in the fence one day?"

"Yes," answered Ted, "I do. And I'll get him to stick 'em in the bear if he comes too close. Giddap, Nicknack!" and Ted flicked the goat with the ends of the reins. I think he wanted the goat to go faster so there would be no danger of the bear's chasing after him and his sister. Perhaps Ted thought Nicknack might be afraid of the bear, even if the goat did have sharp horns.

The Curlytops were greatly excited when they reached the camp. Trouble was playing out in front and Grandpa Martin had just landed in the boat.

"What's that?" he cried, when he heard Ted's story. "A bear in a hollow log? Nonsense! There are no bears on Star Island."

"But I saw it, and so did Janet. Didn't you, Jan?" cried Ted.

"I saw something fuzzy with a big tail going inside the log," answered Teddy's sister.

"Then it couldn't have been a bear," laughed Grandpa Martin. "For a bear has only a little short, stubby tail. I'll go to see what it is. I think I know, however."

"What?" asked Mother Martin. "Don't go into any danger, Father."

"I won't," promised the farmer. "But I won't tell you what I think the animal is until I see it. I may be mistaken."

"Maybe it's a twamp," put in Trouble, who seemed to be thinking about them as much as Ted thought about the fallen star.

"Tramps aren't animals," laughed Jan.

"Furry animals, anyway," added Ted.

"Well, you stay here and I'll go see what it was," went on grandpa, and he started off toward the hollow log with a big club. He was not gone very long, and when he came back he was laughing, as he had the night before when Nicknack gave them a scare.

"Just as I thought!" cried the children's grandpa. "It was a big, red fox in the hollow log."

"And not a bear?" asked Ted.

"Not a bear, Curlytop! Only a fox that was more frightened by you than you were by him, I guess. I knew it couldn't be a bear."

"How did you get it out of the log?" asked Jan.

"Oh, I just tapped on the log with my club, and Mr. Fox must have thought it was somebody knocking at his front door. For out he ran, looked at me with his bright eyes, and then away he ran into the woods. So you Curlytops needn't be afraid. The fox won't hurt you."

"I'm glad of that," said Jan. "Now let's go fishing, Ted."

"All right," he agreed.

"Can't you take Trouble with you?" asked his mother. "I want to help Nora and grandpa do a little work around the camp."

"Yes, we'll take him," agreed Jan. "But you mustn't put any salt in the water, Trouble, and scare the fish."

"I not do it. I tatch a fiss myself."

They gave him a pole and a line without any hook on it so he could not scratch himself, and then Jan and Ted sat down under a shady tree, not far from camp, to try to catch some fish.

They knew how, for their father had taught them, and soon Jan had landed a good-sized sunfish. A little later Ted caught a perch which had stripes on its sides, "like a zebra," as Jan said. After that Jan and Ted each caught two fish, and they soon had enough to cook.

"What do you Curlytops want me to do with these?" asked Nora, as the two children came along, laughing and shouting, with the fish dangling from strings each of them carried.

"Cook 'em, of course!" cried Teddy. "That's what we caught them for, Nora—to have you cook them."

"But won't they bite me?" asked the cook, pretending to be afraid.

"Oh, no! They can't!" explained Jan.

"They bit on our hooks, and now they can't bite any more, but we can bite them," said Teddy.

"Oh, would you bite the poor fish?" asked Nora.

For a moment the Curlytops did not know what to answer. Then Teddy replied:

"Oh, well, it can't hurt 'em to bite 'em after they're cooked, can it?"

"No, I guess not," laughed Nora, "no more than it can hurt a baked potato. Well, run along and I'll get the fish ready for dinner, or whatever you call the next meal. I declare, I'm so mixed up with this camping business that I hardly know breakfast from supper. But run along, and I'll fry the fish for you, anyhow."

"Let's go and take a walk," proposed Tan, when they had washed their hands in the tin basin that Mother Martin had set on a bench under a tree, with a towel and soap near by, for fish did leave such a funny smell on your hands, the little girl said.

"Where'll we walk to?" asked Teddy.

"Oh, let's go and look. Maybe we can find that cute little bunny we saw when we were looking for the den where the fox lived but didn't find him," proposed Jan.

"All right," answered Teddy, and they set off.

They had not gone very far before Teddy stopped near a bush and began to look about him.

"What's the matter?" asked his sister.

"Why, I saw a bird fly out of here," answered her brother, "and it seemed just as if it had a broken wing. It couldn't fly—hardly."

"Where is it?" asked Jan eagerly. "Maybe if we take it to mother she can fix the wing. Once she mended a dog's broken leg, and he could walk 'most as good as ever when he got well, only he limped a little."

"But a dog can't fly," said Teddy.

"I know it, " agreed Jan. "But if mother can mend a broken leg, she can fix a broken wing, can't she?"

"Maybe," admitted her brother. "Oh, there's the bird again, Jan! See how it flutters along!" and the little boy pointed to one that was dragging itself along over the ground as though its wings or legs were broken or hurt.

"Come on!" cried Teddy. "Maybe we can catch the bird, Jan!"

Brother and sister started after the little feathered songster, which was making a queer, chirping noise. Then Jan suddenly called:

"Oh, here's another!"

And, surely enough, there was a second bird acting almost as was the first—fluttering along, half hopping and half flying through the grass.

"We'll get 'em both!" yelled Teddy, and he and Jan hurried along. But, somehow or other, as soon as they came almost to the place where they could reach out and touch one of the birds, which acted as though it could not go a bit farther, the little creature would manage to flutter on just beyond the eager hands of the children.

"That's funny!" exclaimed Teddy. "I almost had one of 'em that time!"

"So did I!" added Janet. "Now I'm sure I can get this one!" and she ran forward to grasp the fluttering bird, but it managed to hop along, just out of her reach.

The one Ted was after did the same thing, and for some time the children hurried on after the birds. At last the two songsters, with little chirps and calls, suddenly flew high in the air and circled back through the woods.

"Well, would you look at that!" cried Teddy, in surprise.

"They can fy, after all!" gasped Janet. "What d'you s'pose made 'em pretend they couldn't?"

"I—I guess they wanted to fool us," said her brother.

And that really was it. The little birds had built a nest in a low bush, close to the ground where the children could easily have reached it if they had seen it. And they were very close to it, though their eyes had not spied it.

But the birds had seen the Curlytops and, fearing that Jan and Ted might take out the eggs in the nest, the wise little birds had pretended to be willing to let the boy and girl catch them instead of robbing the nest.

Of course, Jan and Ted wouldn't have done such a thing as that! But the birds knew no differently. Not all birds act this way—pretending to be hurt, or that they can't fly to get people to chase after them, and so keep far away from the little nests. But this particular kind of bird always does that.

Some day, if you are in the woods or the fields, and see one bird—or two—acting in this queer way, as though it could not fly or walk, and as though it wanted you to hurry after it and try to catch it—if you see a bird acting that way you may be sure you are near its nest and eggs and this is the way the bird does to get you away.

"Let's look for their nest," suggested Teddy, when the two birds had flown far away, back through the woods.

"Oh, no," answered Jan. "We don't want to scare them. Maybe we can look at the nest of a bird that won't mind if we watch her feeding her little ones."

And, a little later, they came to a bush in which was a robin's nest. In it were some tiny birds, and, by standing on their tiptoes, and bending the nest down a little way, the Curlytops could look in. The baby birds, which had only just begun to grow feathers, opened their mouths as wide as they could, thinking, I suppose, that Jan and Ted had worms or bugs for them.

But the children did not have.

"Your mother will soon be along to feed you," said Janet, and soon the mother bird did come flying back from the field. She seemed afraid at first, when she saw how close Jan and Ted were to her nest, but the children soon walked away, and then the robin fed her young.

Ted and Jan had a nice walk through the woods and then they went back to camp.

"We'll take Trouble for a walk, so mother won't have to look after him so much," said Janet. "Come, Trouble!"

"Show me where the fox was," begged Baby William, and Ted and Jan turned their steps that way. But there was no sign of the big-tailed animal in the hollow log, though the children pounded on it as Grandpa Martin said he had done.

Then they wandered on a little farther in the beautiful woods. Jan saw some flowers she wanted to gather, and leaving the path where Ted stood to take care of his little brother, she began picking a handful.

Janet saw so many pretty blossoms that she went a little farther than she meant to, and, before she knew it, she had lost sight of her two brothers, though she could hear them talking.

Suddenly, after crawling through some bushes, Jan found herself on another path. On the other side of it she saw some black-eyed Susans.

"Oh, I must get some of them!" she cried.

She darted across the path, and, as she was about to pick the flowers, she saw, standing behind a big tree, a man who had on very ragged clothes. He looked at Jan, who dropped her bouquet and gasped:

"Oh! Oh, dear!"

The ragged man looked at Janet and smiled. But Jan did not smile. One thought only was in her mind.

"Here is one of the tramps!"