Green Forest Stories, Thornton W. Burgess [ebook reader color screen .TXT] 📗

“Where is your mother?”

“I don’t know and I don’t care. I’ve left home,” said Boxer, trying to look big and important.

“You don’t say!” exclaimed the little stranger. “Aren’t you rather small to be starting out alone in the Great World?”

Now Boxer was so much bigger than this little stranger in black-and-white, and the little stranger was so very polite, that already Boxer felt that the little stranger must be afraid of him. All Boxer’s previous feeling of bigness and importance came back to him. He wanted to show off. He wanted this little stranger to respect him. To have that stranger suggest that he was rather small to be out alone in the Great World hurt Boxer’s pride. In fact, it made him angry.

“If I were as small as you, perhaps I would feel that way,” retorted Boxer rudely.

“I didn’t use the right word. I should have said young instead of small,” explained the stranger mildly. “Of course, I am small compared with you, but I am fully gown and have been out in the Great World a long time, while you are very young and just starting out. I wonder if your mother knows where you are.”

“It is none of your business whether my mother knows or not,” retorted Boxer more rudely than before, for he was growing more and more angry.

“Certainly not. I haven’t said it was,” replied the stranger, still speaking politely. “I am not in the least interested. Besides, I know anyway. I know that she doesn’t know. I know that you have run away, and I know that you have some bitter lessons to learn before you will be fitted to live by yourself in the Great World. If you will just step aside, I will be much obliged. There is a big piece of bark just back of you under which there may be some fat beetles.”

XXXII Boxer Wishes He Hadn’t

This is, you’ll find, the law of fate:
Regrets are always just too late.

Mother Bear

Sammy Jay had followed Boxer, for he felt sure that things were bound to happen wherever that little Bear was. So Sammy saw his meeting with Jimmy Skunk. He saw how polite Jimmy was and how very impolite the little Bear was.

Sammy understood perfectly. He knew that probably Boxer knew nothing at all about Jimmy Skunk and never had heard of that little bag of scent carried by Jimmy and dreaded by all of Jimmy’s neighbors. He knew that the little Bear was rude, simply because he was so much bigger than Jimmy Skunk that he could see no reason for being polite, especially as Jimmy had asked him to do something he didn’t want to do.

When Jimmy Skunk began to lose patience, Sammy Jay thought it was time for him to give Boxer a little advice. “Don’t be silly! Do as Jimmy Skunk tells you to, or you will be the sorriest little Bear that ever lived!” screamed Sammy, as he saw Jimmy’s great plume of a tail begin to go up, which is Jimmy’s signal of danger.

But Boxer, foolish little Bear that he was, couldn’t see anything to fear from one so much smaller than he. So he paid no attention to Jimmy’s request that he step aside. Instead he laughed in the most impudent way.

“Run! Run!” screamed Sammy Jay.

Boxer didn’t move. Jimmy Skunk stamped angrily with his front feet. Then something happened. Yes, sir, something happened. It was so sudden and so unexpected that Boxer didn’t know exactly what had happened, but he was very much aware that it had happened. Something was in his eyes and made them smart and for a few minutes blinded him. Something was choking him; it seemed to him he could hardly breathe. And there was the most awful odor he ever had smelled.

Boxer rolled over and over and over on the ground. He was trying to get away from that awful odor. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t, for the very good reason that he carried it along with him. You see, Jimmy Skunk had punished that silly little Bear by throwing on him a little of that powerful scent he always carries with him to use in time of danger or when provoked.

“What did I tell you? What did I tell you?” screamed Sammy Jay. “I guess you won’t interfere with Jimmy Skunk again in a hurry. It serves you right. It serves you just right. But it is hard on the people who live about here. Yes, sir, it is hard on them to have all the sweetness of the Green Forest spoiled by that scent of Jimmy Skunk’s. I can’t stand it myself, so I’ll be moving along. It serves you right, you silly little Bear. It serves you right.” With this Sammy Jay flew away.

Boxer knew then that Jimmy Skunk had been the cause of this new and dreadful trouble he was in, and great respect mingled with fear took possession of him. And oh, how Boxer wished that he hadn’t been impolite! How he wished he hadn’t refused to do as Jimmy Skunk had politely asked him to!

“I wish I hadn’t! I wish I hadn’t! I wish I hadn’t!” sobbed Boxer over and over, as he tried to get away from that dreadful smell and couldn’t.

XXXIII Woof-Woof Turns Up Her Nose

I pray you be not one of those
Who boast the scornful turned-up nose.

Mother Bear

Now all the time that Boxer had been losing himself more and more and getting into more and more trouble, Mother Bear had been worrying about him, and she and his twin sister, Woof-Woof, had been everywhere but the right place looking for him.

You remember that Mother Bear and Woof-Woof had been away from home when Boxer decided to run away. When they returned, Boxer had been gone so long that Mother Bear’s nose failed to find enough of his scent to follow. So when she started to look for him, she