Part 6

“Yes,” said Anthony, “that is where all but the dried berry and the Worm came from. Have you been there?”

“Often,” answered the Firefly. “I always stop there on my way home from a band concert at night for a little cake or two and a cup of Wild-Rose Berry Coffee. They make a specialty of that coffee there, and there is nothing like it to rest a person after an evening’s flitting. I flitted nearly every evening of June, and pretty nearly all of July, without missing a night, lighting up things with my lantern. But now I go only occasionally, for the season for flitting is nearly over for us, and we are spending our time on vacations a bit for a rest from our hard season. This cake is delicious and is my favorite sort. You were wise to pick out this kind of cake. It is the best they make there.”

“I didn’t pick it out,” said the Ant, and told how his friends had taken him there, and also all about the way he had left home.

“Maybe you were sick,” suggested the Firefly, who seemed really kind-hearted and not one who would lecture him for not working. “You know that work is such an old sort of thing, that it was invented when the world was made, and everybody works at something or other always, whether it is hard work or more the kind of work one would rather do. So any one who suddenly, like you, does not want to work, nor even help bring in the family’s food, must be sick--not sick enough to go to bed, probably, nor to take medicine out of a bottle, perhaps, but just sick enough so that if he does not have a change he may be sick in bed. Anyhow, I’d keep at Dr. Beetle Bug’s prescription long enough to find out how it works--for even prescriptions have to work, you see!” And he laughed a cheerful laugh at the joke he had made.

“How can I tell when the prescription has worked enough?” asked Anthony, for here was some one worth meeting. He seemed to know all about things.

“Well,” said the Firefly, “do you feel that if you were at home now, this very minute, you would be glad to work hard all day as the others do?”

“No!” cried the Ant.

“And are you lonesome for your mother and the others in the family?”

“Well, ye-es,” said Anthony Ant slowly. “It would be nice to see them, but I do not have to cry yet because I can’t see them.”

“How about nights?” asked the Firefly. “Do you wake up in the night and feel scared, and wish your mother were there, and all that sort of thing?”

“Well, I’m not so scared since I had the pass, you see, though I do sometimes wish I was where Mother could talk to me.”

“I don’t think you’re ready to give up your trip yet,” declared the Firefly, “but the way to know is to ask yourself all those questions every day. Then when the time comes that you think there is nothing finer than a good, long, honest, hard day’s work, and you are so lonesome you’d give anything you had to see Mother, and the lump in your throat, which sometimes gets too big to keep you from choking out loud almost, really does make you choke out loud--then you may know that the doctor’s prescription has worked enough, and you are cured, and can go home and live happily ever after, just as Fairies do in stories.”

“I’ve had lumps in my throat several times,” Anthony Ant told the Firefly, “but I’ve swallowed them. And it did seem sort of nice to carry out earth again when I was working for the Grasshopper, but I might not like to carry earth all day as I used to, and I’m sure I’m not crazy about hunting even my own next meal.”

“Oh, then don’t think of giving up the cure yet!” said the Firefly. “If you give up cures too soon, you often become worse than before you tried them.”

“Oh, thank you!” cried Anthony Ant. “Now suppose I should have all those feelings before I got all the way around the world. Shall I keep on, or go home at once?”

“You won’t need my answer on that question,” said the Firefly, “for you will _just know_, and when any one _just knows_, he never has to be told. You may be sure you will do the right thing without the advice of any one. Thank you for the cake--especially since you soon will have to do a little work to fill your lunch basket again. I hope we meet again some time. I want to know how this cure business comes out. Good-by!” And off he sailed through the warm air.

AT THE HOLLOW-LOG INN

Oh, my, my, my! If ever Anthony Ant thought the cure had worked, it was the very next morning! The rain was pouring more like a Niagara Falls than a plain, hard shower, and he just had to grab his things and run into a horrid, dark, toadstooly-smelling log where anything might live, and anything might happen to him, too. There was not another place to go unless he ran into an Angleworm’s hole, and he had had all he wanted to do with Angleworms for one while. The rain swished and swooshed and bliffed and bluffed so against things and on them that it was not safe to stay under a leaf, nor under most stones however far the hollows went under them. He would have been drowned.

Away back in the middle of the great, horrible log there was not so much as a drop of rain. At any rate, the log did not leak, even if it was as dark as the darkest cellar and might have things in it. He was lucky not to have gotten his new hat soaked, and he had all his things with him, though there was not much in his lunch basket.

[Illustration: _Anthony had to grab his things and run into a dark log_]

He found that all sorts of creatures were gathered in the center of the great log. There were Crickets, and Thousand-legged Worms, and Daddy Long-legs; and little Bugs, and medium-sized Bugs, and big Bugs; and a Toad, and a Lizard, and a green Snake, and a draggled Moth, and a Walking-Stick Insect, and a Snail in a shell, and a Snapping Beetle, and a Berry Bug, and a Katydid; and a funny thing that might have been a Katydidn’t; and an unpleasant, wiggly thing part Bug and part Worm; and a Locust, and a Slug; and goodness knows what else besides. For there were all sorts of things he could not see that wiggled, and twisted, and shoved, and poked, and pushed, and slithered, and slid, and joggled, and the dark made it impossible to see.

Although the place might be full of ladies, Anthony Ant found the safest way to keep his hat at all was to leave it on his head. So he did, for no one was thinking much of manners, he knew. The only thing any one could think about was getting away from the rain. Why, there were creatures in there that almost always ate each other when out in the open. But here they were glad enough not to think of such a thing, but just to be content with keeping from being killed by the rain.

That was indeed the moment when Anthony Ant would have given everything he had if he could have been safe and sound in Ant-Hill Manor. An awful lump, Size Sixty-seven, got into his throat, and was almost unswallowable! The noise of the rain thumped upon the log until it seemed as though it would pound it all to smithereens or splintereens. And the roar of the wind and the rain together sounded through the log until you couldn’t think, blink, or wink. There were twenty-seven other noises besides, which the Ant thought he never had heard before.

All at once, whatever light had managed to creep faintly in at one end of the log was blocked out, making that end as black as the blackest night.

“Snoof, snoof, snoof!” said something as big as the log nearly.

The whole company made a dash for the other end of the log, and the rain and wind drove them back, so there they were. If they got out, they would be thumped to pieces by the rain in about half a second. If they stayed in, the awful Snoofer, whatever he was, might trample them to nothing at all. What to do, they didn’t know!

[Illustration: _The birthday luncheon_]

The Snoofer really was a Woodchuck, perfectly friendly, though too big for any of them to get too near in a crowded place where there was no room for him and them to pass each other.

“Hello, folks!” said he. “Don’t move. Plenty of room. You’re all welcome to Hollow-Log Inn. It’s not fit weather for any of you to get out into, so you stay in. This is an inn, and you’re in, so there you are for a joke worth having. Make yourselves at home.”

Well, at least they were not so frightened after that, though they jolly well knew they would have to look out if he turned around much or came their way.

“Seems good to get in,” said he. “I like my other underground house better than this, but I was caught when I was making a run for it from a long hunt in the woods, and I happened to think Hollow-Log Inn had a better roof than Burrow Hall. Why, I’ll wager Burrow Hall is full of water. If the rain hasn’t run down through all the entrances, it must have soaked through the ground above the halls by this time and flooded them badly. I hope all of you are all right and none the worse for the big drops, nor for the poundings and bruisings you may have had from it before you came inside.”

Mr. Woodchuck spoke such kind words, which they managed to hear in spite of the thumping of the rain and the roar of the wind, and in spite of all the twenty-seven noises besides, that they knew some one ought to thank him politely.

But, mercy! Who could thank him in all that noise, when their voices were so little and his voice so big? They were sure they could not make him hear, so they bowed politely and smiled. As he could see well in the dark, he knew what they meant, and said he would do all the talking, and they need not try to answer till the storm was over.

They all bowed again.

“Before I do much talking,” said he, “I’ve got to have a snooze. I’ve been on the go all day, and a little snooze will fix me right up. Maybe the rain and wind will quiet down a little so we can hear ourselves think better by that time.”

Well, sir, the Woodchuck curled himself into a fat ball of wet fur that smelled--well, just like wet fur--and to sleep he went, and not a bit more for the wind, and the rain, and the noise they made, cared he! And he even snored, and that made the twenty-eighth noise to be heard in and out and around about Hollow-Log Inn!

THE WOODCHUCK’S DREAM

Maybe you think that after the kind words of Mr. Woodchuck, and the harmless way in which he just curled himself up and went to sleep, there was nothing more to be feared from him, but there was!

The snoring itself was pretty bad, but they could stand that. And the smell of the wet fur, that began to steam when he grew warm and snuggly as he slept, was pretty bad, but they could stand that too.

The real scary thing about it was that in his sleep he did something besides snore. He talked to himself, and made horrible, deep noises in his throat, and sometimes snoofed so suddenly that it made them jump. The whole log shook with the rain, wind, snoring, snoofing, and other noises, and trembled like the whole company.

[Illustration: _In his sleep the Woodchuck did something besides snore. He talked to himself_]

All at once he wakened with such a start that they thought their last minutes had come this time. But after the big start that terrified them he was all right, and wakened the rest of the way more slowly and gently, though he still did a lot of short, muffled snoofings for a few minutes.

The rain and the wind died down meanwhile, and there were not quite all of those twenty-seven noises outside, so things really were much better.

“Hello, folks!” he said as he slowly and carefully uncurled himself. “How’s the weather? Any better?”

They all nodded, so he said, “Good! I hope I did not snore and make other noises. Did I?”

Well, to be honest, they all had to nod again, and they did.

“Now, that’s too bad,” he said. “It must have frightened you, and you shall have an explanation. You see, I had a fierce dream, and when I have a fierce dream I suppose I make fierce noises. This time I dreamed I was a Pirate with a capital _P_. Want to hear about it?”

Well, of course they had to nod again, and, to tell the truth, they were all curious to know what a Pirate was, for none of them had seen one. The Woodchuck was so kind too, for all his noises, that if they were careful to keep out from under him they were safe enough. He had them come as close to the center of the log near him as they could, and then, in as low and soft snoofly sort of voice as he could, he talked to them.

“I suppose dreams come to us because of things we have been thinking hard about in the daytime, or things that have happened to us out of the common. That’s why I dreamed my fierce dream, no doubt. Here’s the thing that made me dream:

“As far back as yesterday, I was off near a fine cornfield a good bit of a distance from here, where in the spring I nearly got caught once for eating some of the corn the farmer had just planted in the hills. My farthest entrance to Burrow Hall is near that field, and it was easy to get up there and find plenty to eat in those hills freshly planted. I had such a scare that time that not till yesterday did I have any more to do with that field than to run along the thickly tangled border of tall weeds once in awhile when I wished to go to another field. But yesterday the field was lying so quiet in the warm sunshine that I thought it quite safe to leave the tangled border and go into the thick rows of cornstalks. There is nothing that smells much better to me than the corn when the sun shines on it. Oh, my, but I like to take long whiffs of it!

“When I walked into the nice, long green hallways between the rows of corn, I was so happy I could have sung a song I used to sing years ago about ‘How Pleasant It Is in My Old Ground Home,’ but I kept perfectly quiet, for I knew it would not do to sing, as there might be men in that field. But I wandered slowly in and out of the rows, and felt the cool, green leaves of the corn brushing against my sides. I took the longest, deepest breaths I could, and the sweetness of the warm, ripe tassel blossoms on the top of the stalks came down to me and made me want to smell that sweetness forever. It made me drowsy too, and there was such a quiet, snuggly spot to curl up in on the sun-warmed ground close to a bunch of the thick stalks that I made myself forget about men and all things bad, and crawled into the smallest ball I could make of myself. The last I remembered was the good, clean, sweet perfume of the corn.

“I may have slept a long while, and I may have slept only a few minutes, but I could not tell. Yet all at once I was flying for my life through the rows of corn. I dodged here and there into other rows and then doubled back on my tracks to keep the man who was chasing me from knowing where I was. At last I was back in the friendly tangle of the weeds along the fence, and shivering with fright from head to tail. Through the weeds I could see the cornstalks moving where the man was rushing about hunting for me. Soon I saw him come out of the field and look all around.

“‘You old Pirate, you!’ he cried, shaking his fist toward the place where he thought I was hiding myself.

“Now that is the very worst name any good, innocent Woodchuck can be called. Do any of you know what it means?”

They all shook their heads.

“Neither do I,” said the Woodchuck. “That is, I don’t know much except that a Pirate is an awful thing. Once I saw pictures of a Pirate in a book two boys were reading in the farmer’s barn. They hid the book in the hay, and afterward part of it was under the corncrib where I strolled through, one day. The Pirate in the pictures was lean and dark and fierce-eyed, and he had knives, and a sword, and pistols, and a great black hat, and a black ship, and awful boots, and the worst lot of men like him on the ship, you ever saw. The words in the book were dreadful. I don’t know the meaning of them, but I am sure no good Woodchuck ever would want to say them and couldn’t invent such bad words if he tried. I saw a lot of things said about pieces of eight, about the Jolly Roger, about scuttling the ship, and about walking the plank. Anyway, I know from the farmer’s looks, and the way he shook his fist, that he could not have called me a worse name.

“That made me dream I was off on the big ocean in that black ship, and that I had that black hat, and looked mad as mad, and took my sword and waved it around my head, and hollered all those words I read in the book. Then all at once another ship came sailing along the ocean and fired a big cannon at me--bang, smash! Off I rolled into the ocean--ker-plunk, splash! Then I woke up, and glad was I to find I was not so awful a thing as a Pirate with a capital _P_, as they spelled him in the book. If that farmer had seen the picture of the Pirate and then looked at me, he would have seen at once there was no reason to call me such a thing--an innocent Woodchuck like myself who never carried a sword in my life, nor would think of such a thing!”

[Illustration: _Stepping as carefully as they could, out marched the whole company from Hollow-Log Inn_]

The whole company thought the same thing, and as the storm had stopped, and they could make the Woodchuck hear, they thanked him, not only for letting them stay, but for telling them his dream. It had been like a lecture, for a lecture teaches things, and they had learned what a Pirate is.

Then, stepping as carefully as they could on the nearest dry places, out they went from Hollow-Log Inn: Anthony Ant, the Crickets, the Thousand-legged Worms, the Daddy Long-legs; the little Bugs, the medium-sized Bugs, and big Bugs; the Toad, the Lizard, the green Snake, the draggled Moth, the Walking-Stick Insect, the Snail in a shell, the Snapping Beetle, the Berry Bug, the Katydid; the funny thing that might have been a Katydidn’t; the unpleasant, wiggly thing part Bug and part Worm; the Locust, the Slug, and goodness knows what else besides!

A VENTURE WITH NEW FRIENDS

Anthony Ant did not wait long to see what became of the others in the company. Some of them were creatures that might like to eat Ants, once there was no more rain to make them forget they were hungry. But he soon found that to get over the ground was not a good thing to try to do at present, by any means. It was so full of puddles here and there, and the whole place was still so drippy from so much rain, that he would have to walk maybe miles out of his way in going any distance at all. Then there was the danger of big drops falling on him.

He went back to the log, but not inside. Instead, he climbed up outside and sat on top of Hollow-Log Inn.

It was all pretty forlorn. There was no one nearer to talk to than Mr. Woodchuck down inside the log, and probably he had gone to sleep again. The log was wet and unpleasant, so that Anthony could not sit there long, but had to stand up. In Ant-Hill Manor even wet days like this were not bad at all. Mother Ant read stories to them. They could play in the tool house, and do picture puzzles, and paint in their painting books, and make the phonograph play cheerful tunes, and do seventeen other different things. Never had they been obliged to sit out on logs in a wet world.

The Ant could not even take any interest in eating his lunch, for he was too lonesome to feel hungry. Besides, he would have to stand up to eat, and it would be no fun at all. He did not know how soon he might need food badly when he could not find any to catch, and the little he had left in his basket he thought he’d better save for awhile. So he did not even unstrap his basket, but stood around first on some of his legs and then on some other of his legs, feeling sort of miserable and whiney--the way some children feel when they make that noise that is almost like the cry of a little puppy dog.

All at once the sun came out, and one of the Crickets that had been in Hollow-Log Inn began to crick, crick, crick from some high place near by, and the world seemed a little better. Anthony Ant went to the end of the log and peered over at things, and he saw by looking down at a puddle on the ground that the sky above was blue, for it had given the puddle a blue face.

He was crawling down toward the ground near the puddle, and stepping very carefully around on the dry inside of the entrance of the log, when suddenly Mr. Woodchuck thought he would go out to see the world too. In coming through the entrance--or exit, as it now was to the Woodchuck--he brushed poor Anthony Ant right along with him. The little Ant had only time to clutch tight hold of Mr. Woodchuck’s fur as well as possible, and to trust to luck.