Then she got to the kernel; she was enchanted.

Annerle looked at her, laughing. “Does it taste good?”

Perri merely nodded. She wasted no time talking.

Her mother ate more calmly. “There’ll be lots of these later,” she whispered to Perri.

Perri twitched. “Where?”

“Everywhere—on the bushes. Later, when you’re grown up.”

Everything good is going to happen when I’m grown up, thought Perri. Too bad that time passes so slowly.

She tapped Annerle’s knee gently, and received the second hazelnut. She looked up, and saw the magpie sitting beside Annerle. Perri held out the nut. “How can this be here already?”

The magpie replied shrewdly, “He always has what He wants. Remember that.”

Mother was racking her brains—if I only knew where all my hazelnuts and acorns were! I just can’t think where I put them! But she said not a word.

The pheasant raised his gleaming head. “I’m going now. Maybe I’ll come back soon, when you’re alone.” He pointed at the magpie. “I don’t like her.” He stalked proudly off.

“Come as often as you like!” Annerle called. Turning to the magpie, she asked, “Why doesn’t he like you?”

“Oh,” chattered the magpie, looking innocent, “he thinks I nibble his wife’s eggs. As a matter of fact it’s the crows.”

“You too! You too!” yelled the jay, who had perched close by.

“Oh, only very seldom,” the magpie defended herself, “really very seldom indeed.”

The woodpecker laughed loudly. “The pheasant is always insulted anyway. He won’t speak to me, and so far as I’m concerned his wife can cover the earth with eggs.”

Perri, absorbed in eating, had scarcely listened. Now she nudged Annerle’s knee again; but when she cracked the third hazelnut, there was nothing but black fibers inside.

She turned sadly to Annerle. “You knew it all the time. Why did you give me that nasty stuff?”

“I didn’t know it. How can you think such a thing?” Annerle defended herself.

“Don’t you know everything?” Perri was surprised.

“No—I don’t even know as much as any of you here.” Annerle pointed to Mother, the magpie, the jay. “But wait, I’ll bring you another nut.”

She got up to go back to the house.

“Bring me something too,” begged the magpie.

Bang! came the thunderclap. Annerle stood still.

The jay flew up, screeching loudly: “He!”

The magpie said, “I’ll go see what happened.” She flew off.

“Careful!” warned the woodpecker, mounting a tree.

Mother said hurriedly, “When He thunders, it’s beyond a joke!” The two squirrels raced for the treetops. Annerle was left alone.

Images

Chapter Six

EARLY IN THE EVENING PERRI was still gamboling in the branches of her oak. Shadows spread; the warm breeze was scented. Perri sprang from trunk to trunk; she was never still for a moment, yet nothing escaped her.

Something rustled in the grass. She kept looking down; finally she saw a tiny creature whisking about.

The shrewmouse was delicate, quick, graceful; his clever face seemed jolly and full of fun.

Perri jumped a couple of branches lower, keeping her eye on the mouse. Now he was here, now he was there, vanishing, reappearing, vanishing.

I’d like to play with the dear little thing, thought Perri.

“Whom are you looking for?” asked the finch, who had perched beside her. He was surprised to see Perri so quiet.

“There—no, wait—there! Isn’t he cunning?”

The finch said nothing.

“Shall I call him to come up? Wait, I’ll go down.” Perri started to jump.

“None of that!” cried the finch decidedly.

“Why?”

“Look out for that robber!”

Perri laughed: “Robber? That nice little fellow? What can he do to me?”

“That nice little fellow would make an end of you like that! He’s brave, and he’s bloodthirsty and determined.”

“I’m five times as big and ten times as strong as he.”

“But he’s a hundred times more bloodthirsty than you.”

“Bloodthirsty? What’s that?”

Before the finch could answer there was a short cry of horror.

It was Perri’s mother, flashing across the bushes toward the oak.