Chapter 2

Grunty Pig did not even thank the Muley Cow for warning him.

"I'd like to meet a bear," he declared stoutly. "I hope I'll meet one to-day."

Leaving the Muley Cow, he zigzagged up the hill through the pasture, stopping now and then to dig up many a juicy root.

Although Mrs. Pig missed her runaway son after a time, she was not greatly disturbed.

"He can't be far off," she thought. "He'll come back before dark." And when Grunty did at last come crawling into the little yard Mrs. Pig was merely vexed with him for having gone off without her consent. She was just about to give him a well deserved scolding. But before she could speak to him, Grunty greeted her with a loud squeal.

"I saw a bear in the pasture!" he cried.

Mrs. Pig promptly forgot her displeasure. Although her son was certainly unharmed, she couldn't help being startled. It gave her what she called "a turn" to learn that Grunty had met a bear.

"A bear!" Mrs. Pig gasped. "A bear is a terribly dangerous creature. It's a wonder that you ever got home.... What did you do when you saw him?" Mrs. Pig demanded.

"I walked away," said Grunty.

"He couldn't have noticed you," Mrs. Pig declared. "If you had squealed it would have been the end of you."

Grunty Pig felt that he was the most important member of the family. Not one of his brothers or sisters had ever seen a bear. At least they had never claimed to have enjoyed so fearsome a sight.

"It was nothing," he boasted. "I'd as soon meet a bear as the Muley Cow."

His mother, however, was of another mind. She kept looking about in an uneasy fashion.

"I wish Farmer Green would come and put us into our pen," she murmured. "It will soon be dark. And I shouldn't like to spend the night out here--not with a bear in the neighborhood."

IX

A GREAT ADVENTURE

The next outing that Farmer Green gave Mrs. Pig's family in the little yard proved to be anything but a picnic--for Mrs. Pig. That poor lady had a dreadful time. Grunty ran away again. And he hadn't been gone long before his mother heard a loud squealing in the nearest field. The sound rapidly grew louder. And as she stood still and listened, Mrs. Pig knew that it was Grunty's squeal and that he was drawing nearer every moment.

"Dear me!" she cried. "He must be in trouble."

Soon Grunty tumbled through the fence. And scrambling to his feet he ran to his mother, crying at the top of his voice, "A bear chased me!"

"Oh! Oh!" shrieked Mrs. Pig. "It's a mercy he didn't catch you. Oh! Oh! It's lucky you're no fatter, else you couldn't have run so fast." Being more than fat, herself, and greatly excited, Mrs. Pig had to stop talking for a time, because she gurgled and wheezed and panted in a most alarming fashion.

At last, when she had somewhat recovered from her flurry, she called to Grunty. And looking at him severely Mrs. Pig said to him, "Let this be a lesson to you. Never, never stray away from the farmyard again!"

"Yes, Mother!" was Grunty's glib reply. Then he sidled away. Somehow he felt uneasy under his mother's gaze.

"Perhaps it was a good thing, after all, that the bear chased him," Mrs. Pig muttered. "Maybe this fright will keep him at home."

She soon discovered that it would take more than a mere fright--more than a command--to stop Grunty from running away. For it wasn't long before she missed him again.

If Mrs. Pig hadn't been so upset she might have been vexed--and with good reason.

"Oh! that dear little Grunty!" she wailed. "The bear may have caught him already, in the cabbage patch."

Then piercing squeals fell once more on Mrs. Pig's ears.

"Dear! Dear!" she cried. "I ought to have watched him. I ought to have kept an eye on Grunty. After all, he's little more than a baby."

Again the squeals grew louder. Again Grunty Pig burst through the hole in the fence and romped up to his mother.

"He chased me another time!" he grunted. "The bear chased me almost as far as the fence."

"Sakes alive!" his mother shrieked. "Somebody ought to tell Farmer Green! This farm is not a safe place to live, with a bear prowling about it."

"Do you want me to go and tell Mr. Green?" Grunty inquired.

"_You?_" his mother exclaimed. "No, indeed! You stay right here with me! Don't you dare stir out of this yard!" And to Grunty's astonishment, Mrs. Pig bowled him right over, to show him that she meant what she said.

He jumped to his feet in a jiffy. And he was all ready to slink away into a corner of the yard; but his mother bade him wait.

"This bear--" she said--"what did he look like?"

X

A QUEER BEAR

Grunty Pig's little eyes fell away from his mother's when she asked him what the bear looked like--the bear that had chased him.

"Er--he was whitish, with brown spots, like Johnnie Green's dog," said Grunty; "and--er--he had a long tail like the old horse Ebenezer's; and he had six legs."

Mrs. Pig suddenly made a most peculiar sound. It couldn't be called a squeal, nor a grunt, nor a gurgle, nor a gasp. It was a little like all four. And springing clumsily upon her son, Mrs. Pig upset him before he could dodge her.

Grunty Pig began to whimper. "What have I done?" he whined.

"You've deceived me!" his mother cried. "You haven't seen a bear. You've never seen a bear in all your life."

"Ouch," Grunty howled, as his mother sent him sprawling once more. "I didn't mean any harm. I was only having fun with you."

"Well," said his mother. "Turn about is fair play. I'll have a little fun with _you_, now."

Mrs. Pig gave her wayward son such a punishing that he remembered it all the rest of that day. At least, he stayed at home. And Mrs. Pig dared hope that at last she had cured him of two bad habits--running away and telling fibs.

The next day, however, the fields called again to Grunty Pig. They called so plainly that he couldn't resist answering.

"I'll slip away for just a little while," he said to himself. "If I'm not gone long no one will miss me." So when his mother was taking a nap he stole through the hole in the fence. "I'll be back before she wakes up," he chuckled.

In the garden, up the lane, through the pasture he made his way. And he enjoyed his holiday to the full--until he remembered suddenly that he had been gone a long time--a much longer time than he had planned to spend away from the farmyard.

"Oh, dear!" he whined. "Mother must be awake now; and she'll punish me if I go back." The more he thought about returning, the less he liked the idea.

"I won't go home at all!" he cried at last. "I'll stay in the pasture the rest of my life. There's plenty to eat here; and plenty of fun, too."

It was afternoon when Grunty Pig made up his mind that he would never go home. When the Muley Cow warned him once more to beware of the bears he actually jeered at her.

"There are no bears in Pleasant Valley," he scoffed. "And you needn't trouble yourself to mention them again to me. I'm going to live in this pasture and there's no use of your trying to frighten me away."

The Muley Cow said nothing more to him. She merely looked at him and smiled wisely.

"He'll sing a different song," she thought, "when it begins to grow dark."

XI

LOCKED OUT

The Muley Cow was right. She had said to herself, with a smile, that Grunty Pig, the runaway, would be glad enough to go home when night came. He had decided to stay right there in the pasture for the rest of his life, where there was plenty to eat and plenty to do. He felt sure that he would have a much pleasanter time there than at home. For one thing, he knew well enough that there was a punishing waiting for him at the piggery--if he ever went back to get it.

Not until Johnnie Green and old dog Spot came to the pasture to drive the cows down the lane did Grunty Pig begin to feel the least twinge of homesickness. And even then he tried to forget it. He hid in a clump of brakes near the fence while Johnnie Green and Spot were in the pasture, for he didn't want them to spy him and take him home with them.

There was a delicious, damp, woodsy smell in the cool shade of his hiding place.

"How much nicer this is than our stuffy pen!" Grunty exclaimed under his breath.

Now and then he peeped out to watch the procession of cows moving slowly towards the barn to be milked. And when the last one had entered the lane, hurrying to catch up with the rest--and to avoid Spot's nips at her heels--Grunty crept out into the open.

Then, strange to say, he hurried towards the lane himself. All at once the pasture seemed a great, lonesome place. Who knew when a bear might rise out of a clump of bushes near him?

He was careful not to follow too closely after the herd as they meandered down the lane. At the same time, he was careful not to fall too far behind. And he took many a quick backward glance, to make sure no bear was creeping up on him.

Not far from the barn Grunty left the lane and hurried toward the little yard outside the piggery, where he had run away from his mother and his brothers and his sisters.

When he reached the fence through which he had crept while Mrs. Pig was enjoying a nap, he met with a great surprise. The hole in the fence was no more! Somebody had mended it. And there he was, outside the yard!

Grunty Pig squealed for his mother. But no one answered. The fence was too high for him to look over it. It was too tight for him to peep through.

"I want to get in!" Grunty cried. "Why doesn't somebody answer?"

The silence from the other side of the fence was dreadful. Grunty Pig would have been _glad_ to have his mother scold him then, just for the comfort of hearing her voice.

"Oh! Oh!" he wailed. "What shall I do? Whatever shall I do? Farmer Green must have put the family back in the pen. And I'll have to spend the night out here alone!"

XII

WOOF!

Night found Grunty Pig huddled close to the outside of the piggery. Many times he had walked around the low building, snuffing at the doors and trying in vain to find some opening through which he might crawl. To his dismay, all was snug and tight. There wasn't a hole big enough even for Miss Kitty Cat to creep through.

Though Grunty had called a good many times, nobody had answered him. Inside the piggery, in their pen, Mrs. Pig and her other children were sound asleep. Now and then Grunty could hear a throaty snore, which he knew to be his mother's.

"How can she sleep, when I'm missing?" he cried.

Now, Mrs. Pig had been much upset by Grunty's absence. And when Farmer Green came to put her family into the piggery for the night she had tried to explain to him that Grunty had run away. Unfortunately, it happened that Farmer Green was in a great hurry. He didn't stop to find out what was troubling Mrs. Pig, but hustled her and her children inside and closed all the doors.

Try as she would, Mrs. Pig hadn't been able to stay awake. Her eyes would close, in spite of all she could do. Though she slept, she dreamed about the truant Grunty. Now and then she cried aloud in the darkness, when some terrible creature seemed to be chasing him. But Mrs. Pig never quite waked up.

Once Grunty Pig thought he heard his mother speak his name. And he called out in as brave a voice as he could muster, "Here I am, just outside the piggery! Won't somebody please let me in?"

He called in vain. At last he fell asleep, for he was about as tired as any little pig could be.

In the middle of the night Grunty Pig awoke with a start. Somebody said "Woof!" And somebody came sniffing and snuffing around the corner of the piggery. Dimly Grunty could see a dark, burly form. And he was so frightened that he bawled right out, "It's a bear! It's a bear! It's a bear!"

Almost at the same instant old dog Spot ran out of his kennel, barking furiously. And like magic the prowler--whoever he was--vanished into the night.

"Keep still!" Grunty's mother called to him; for the noise had half roused her. "Don't you mention the word _bear_ again, or I'll attend to you in the morning."

Drowsy as she was, Mrs. Pig actually thought Grunty was right there in the pen with the rest of her children. And in no time at all she was snoring again.

Grunty Pig didn't dare open his mouth nor close his eyes the rest of the night. And when morning came, Farmer Green found him huddled against the door of the piggery.

It was a joyful meeting--for Grunty Pig.

XIII

HOME AT LAST

"What's this?" Farmer Green exclaimed, when he went to unlock the piggery in the morning and found Grunty Pig lying up against the door. "Did you get locked out last night? Was it you that old Spot was barking at?"

Grunty Pig didn't dare answer. When Farmer Green dropped him into the pen he said nothing to anybody--not even "Good morning!"

A little later Farmer Green found something more outside the piggery. In the loose dirt he discovered--bear tracks!

"Aha!" he cried to his son Johnnie. "Look here! We had a visitor last night. It was no wonder old Spot woke us all up. A bear called on us! And he'd certainly have had that pig if Spot hadn't scared him off."

Naturally the news soon spread all over the farmyard. And when Mrs. Pig heard it she began to tremble.

"To think," she quavered, "that my littlest child spent the night out of doors, with a bear prowling about the neighborhood! And I slept through it all!

"Tell me all about it, Grunty!" she commanded that young gentleman.

It is not surprising that Grunty Pig was puzzled. Hadn't his mother told him, during the night, not to mention the word _bear_ again? And now she was urging him to talk about that very animal.

"Squeak up!" said his mother sharply--which was the same as saying, "Speak up!"

So he told his story. And when he had finished Mrs. Pig fairly covered him with caresses.

"It seems to me--" she sniffed--for she was quite upset--"it seems to me that I remember your saying something about a bear last night. But I wasn't wide awake at the time. And I thought you were fibbing again.

"Perhaps," she added, "this will teach you a few things that you needed to learn.... _Always mind your mother!_" said Mrs. Pig. "And _always tell the truth_!"

Her children all repeated the words after her. And Grunty Pig's voice could have been heard plainly above all the rest.

His mother looked at him fondly. She had always claimed that she had no favorite among her children. But now she couldn't help thinking what a promising youngster Grunty was, even if he was the runt of the family.

"That's a good Grunty," said Mrs. Pig. "You won't forget this lesson, will you?"

"No, Mother!" Grunty answered.

Now, that very afternoon Mrs. Pig took it into her head to have her children say the morning's lesson again. So she called her youngsters together. And she asked Grunty the first of all to recite what she had taught him.

"I think it was something about a bear," he stammered, "but I can't remember exactly."

"Dear me!" said poor Mrs. Pig. "I don't know what I'll do with this lad."

Then she asked the other children, one by one, what they had learned that very morning.

There wasn't one of them that hadn't forgotten everything.

"Dear me!" said unhappy Mrs. Pig. "I don't know what I'll do with all of them. But I'll treat them all alike. I have no favorite. There isn't one of them that's stupider than another."

When Grunty Pig heard that he felt quite proud. It was something, anyhow, to be as stupid as the rest, even if he was smaller.

XIV

AN ODD THOUGHT

"Umph! Umph!"

Farmer Green had fenced off a piece of the old orchard. And into this new yard he turned Mrs. Pig's children.

"Umph! Umph!"

They had a fine time there, rooting down under the sod, rubbing their backs against the trunks of the old apple trees, and sprawling in the shade when they were sleepy.

"Umph! Umph!"

Sometimes an apple dropped from a tree. And then there was a mad scramble.

"Umph! Umph!"

"Dear me!" said Jolly Robin's wife as she sat in the apple tree where she and her husband had a nest every summer. "Don't Mrs. Pig's children make a dreadful noise? I never knew half-grown pigs to have such loud voices. Their grunts certainly are full-sized."

Jolly Robin, who had perched himself beside his wife, looked down at their new neighbors.

"They're having a good time," he observed cheerfully. "We ought not to complain. We may be thankful that they don't climb trees and try to sing."

Jolly Robin had a way of looking on the bright side of things. It was seldom that he couldn't act cheerful. Even when he felt quite downhearted, _inside_, he managed usually to appear happy, _outside_. And now his remark put his wife in a pleasanter frame of mind.

"Imagine a pig up a tree!" Mrs. Robin tittered.

"Umph! Umph! Are you talking about me?" a voice inquired right beneath them. It gave Mrs. Robin such a start that she almost tumbled off the limb.

"No! No! We're not talking about you--not exactly!" Jolly Robin answered.

It was Grunty Pig that had spoken.

"Pardon me!" he said. "I thought I heard you mention the name, 'Pig'."

"Er--yes! We did speak of your family, in a general way," Jolly Robin admitted.

"Ah!" said Grunty Pig. "And what was it you said about us? Weren't you and your wife laughing about our climbing trees?"

Somehow Jolly Robin thought that Grunty's little eyes had a spiteful gleam as he looked upward into the tree top. And Mrs. Robin couldn't help moving to a higher limb. Grunty's glare sent a most uncomfortable shiver over her.

Jolly Robin tried his best to act at his ease.

"It was just an odd thought that popped into my head," he assured Grunty Pig. "It made Mrs. Robin giggle when I mentioned it." He laughed merrily enough. And his wife managed to smile faintly. But Grunty Pig frowned.

"I thought so!" he cried. "You Robins were poking fun at me and my brothers and sisters. Yes! And no doubt at my mother, too!"

"Oh, no!" Jolly Robin assured him. "We weren't thinking of any one in particular."

"Aha!" Grunty snorted. "You were laughing at all of us, then." And Jolly Robin could say nothing to change his opinion. "You can't fool me," Grunty declared. "You have insulted my whole family. And it's time that you learned better manners. I see that I shall have to teach you a lesson."

Well, when they heard that speech Jolly Robin and his wife had to laugh. The idea of a lesson in manners from Grunty Pig was the funniest thing on the farm.

XV

GRUNTY MEANS MISCHIEF

Jolly Robin and his wife told all their friends that Grunty Pig was going to teach them a lesson. The birds had many a laugh over the matter. Not till old Mr. Crow visited the orchard one day did the Robin family cease chuckling over what they called "the joke of the season."

"Don't laugh too soon!" Mr. Crow croaked. "This Grunty Pig means mischief. He isn't going to teach you the sort of lesson you've been snickering about. What he intends to do is to harm you in some way."

Now, nobody in Pleasant Valley could look gloomier than old Mr. Crow. And when he hinted darkly, in his hoarse way, that there was trouble ahead for the Robin family, he threw Jolly Robin's wife into a flutter.

"Oh, what does Grunty Pig mean to do to us?" Mrs. Robin quavered.

"I'd rather not tell you," said old Mr. Crow. "I don't want you to worry."

Mr. Crow left them then. Of course he couldn't have chosen a better way to upset Mrs. Robin. Even Jolly himself had to admit after a while that he could think of nothing that seemed to cheer his wife in the least. "I'll speak to Mr. Crow again," he told his wife. "I'll ask him just what he meant."

Alas! Mr. Crow couldn't tell him. The truth was that Mr. Crow had already told all he knew.

"I'll ask Grunty Pig himself what he means to do to us," Jolly then declared to his wife. "I've noticed that he digs every day at the foot of our apple tree. The next time he comes here I'll have a talk with him." So that very day Jolly put his question to Grunty Pig.

"What is it," he asked, "that you intend to do to us?"

"You'll find out later," said Grunty Pig. "I expect to be in the top of your apple tree before fall. And then--"

Jolly Robin couldn't wait for him to finish. He had to laugh right out, on the spot. And his wife, who had been listening eagerly, burst into the first giggle that had passed her bill for days and days.

So Grunty Pig expected to climb a tree! Mr. and Mrs. Robin gave each other a merry look. It was all too funny for words.

"Umph!" said Grunty Pig. "You won't laugh when I'm in your tree top."

"How are you going to get up here?" Jolly Robin asked him, with a wink at Mrs. Robin. "Are you going to _fly_?"

"No!" Grunty Pig said. "No!"

"Then you're going to _climb_," cried Mrs. Robin. And both she and her husband choked, as they pictured fat Grunty Pig scrambling up the trunk of the old apple tree.

"No!" Grunty Pig said. "No!"

"Well, well!" Jolly Robin exclaimed. "Don't be so short with your answers! Explain how you expect to get up into the top of our apple tree."

"I never said I expected to get up there," Grunty Pig corrected him.

"What?" cried Jolly Robin. "What?" cried his wife.

"No!" said Grunty Pig. "I said I'd be in the tree top before fall. If I work here every day around the foot of the tree I'll have it uprooted at last. And when it topples over and falls on the ground I'll have no trouble getting into the top of it."

When they heard that, Jolly Robin and his wife stopped laughing.

XVI

DANGER AHEAD

Jolly Robin and his wife were terribly worried. Grunty Pig meant to uproot the apple tree where they had their nest. Every day he came and dug at the foot of the tree. Every day, just before he went away, he looked up at them and said, "I hope you'll sleep well to-night. You'd better enjoy your home while you have it, for the tree will be flat on the ground before fall."

Sleep! Mrs. Robin complained that she never had a good night's rest any more. She said that she had bad dreams. She dreamed that the tree was falling. And then she was sure to wake up with a start. And her husband wasn't there to calm her, because he was roosting in a thicket over in the pasture with their first brood of the season.

They both agreed--Jolly and his wife--that they must get their second brood of children out of the nest as soon as they could.

"The moment they're old enough, we must teach them to fly," Mrs. Robin told her husband.

"Yes!" he said. "And we'll have to be careful of them, too, with all these seven young porkers in the orchard."

"Suppose--" said Mrs. Robin--"suppose Grunty Pig should bring our tree toppling to the ground before the children leave the nest!"

"Oh! There's no danger of that," Jolly assured her. She was always looking on the dark side of things. But he didn't tell her so.

"I don't know how we're going to be sure the children are safe," Mrs. Robin continued. "How long do you think it will take Grunty Pig to uproot our tree?"

Jolly Robin had to confess that he couldn't answer his wife's question.

"Then ask somebody who knows something about such matters!" Mrs. Robin cried. And there was a tart note in her voice that made Jolly Robin say hastily, "Yes! Yes, my dear! I'll go right now and find an answer to your question."

Off he flew. And not knowing where else to go, he sat down on a bush in Farmer Green's garden, to ponder. Who could tell him how long it would take Grunty Pig to uproot the old apple tree? Although Jolly Robin thought and thought, he could think of no one whom he might ask. To be sure, there was Tommy Fox, who was known to be an able digger. But Jolly Robin didn't trust him. Tommy Fox was tricky. And there was Billy Woodchuck, who came from a famous family of burrowers. But everybody knew that old dog Spot had chased him into his hole that very afternoon, and was watching Billy's front door.

While Jolly Robin sat there in the garden he happened to look down at the ground. And right before his eyes a long snout suddenly rose out of the dirt, followed by the squat form of Grandfather Mole.