Chapter 2

He was pondering over his difficulty, which bothered him not a little, when a terrific croaking from the direction of the swamp reached his ears. It was the final chorus of the Frog family's nightly singing party. And it promptly put an idea into Freddie Firefly's head.

"I'll hurry right over there and speak to Mr. Frog, the well-known tailor," he said to himself. "He knows old Mr. Crow. He sees him almost every day. And he'll be glad to give the old gentleman a message."

VIII

SPREADING THE NEWS

When Freddie Firefly reached the swamp he found that the singing party had already broken up. But luckily, Mr. Frog the tailor was the last one to leave. He was still poised on the bank of the sluggish stream, ready to plunge into the water and swim away, when Freddie Firefly dropped down upon a cat-tail and called him by name, flashing his light frantically so that Mr. Frog would be sure to notice him.

"Wait a moment!" cried Freddie. "I've something to say to you!"

"Out with it, then!" said Mr. Frog. "My time is valuable, you know. I ought to be back in my shop this moment; for I promised Paddy Muskrat I'd make him a policeman's uniform by to-morrow morning. And I haven't begun it yet."

"Why not?" asked Freddie, forgetting--for the moment--his own errand.

"He wants brass buttons," explained the tailor. "And I couldn't get any until to-night."

"But couldn't you go ahead without them?" Freddie Firefly inquired.

"Certainly not!" replied Mr. Frog. "I see you don't know much about making a policeman's suit. You start by laying the buttons in a row on the ground; and then you sew the cloth onto them.... That's my own invention--that method," he added with an air of pride. "And now, what was it you wanted to say to me?"

"I don't believe there's any use of my telling you, after all," Freddie Firefly replied. "You're going to be so busy that you won't have time to do an errand for me. I wanted you to give Mr. Crow a message."

"Yes--I'll be altogether too rushed to bother with it," said Mr. Frog. "I expect to be on the jump all night--and most of to-morrow, too."

"This message," Freddie Firefly went on, "was something about Kiddie Katydid. I found out his secret to-night. And I thought Mr. Crow ought to know about it."

Now, Mr. Frog was all ready to leap into the water. But when Freddie said that, the tailor promptly changed his mind.

"Kiddie Katydid's secret!" he repeated in a tone of amazement. "You don't mean to say you've discovered what it was that Katy did?"

"Never mind!" said Freddie. "I don't want to trouble you, Mr. Frog. I know you're too busy to bother your head with such things."

"Tut, tut, young man!" Mr. Frog cried. "I see you have something important to tell me. And since that is the case, I'll manage somehow to deliver your message to Mr. Crow, even if I have to disappoint a customer. _Always oblige a friend!_ That's my motto!" said Mr. Frog.

"Very well, then!" Freddie Firefly replied. "I'll say what I was going to; but it doesn't concern that Katy person you just mentioned."

"Oh, it doesn't," the tailor echoed. "Then I don't know that I care to listen to you, after all. I thought you were going to explain about that mysterious lady that Kiddie's always singing about." He was sadly disappointed. And once more he turned toward the creek.

IX

MR. FROG IS PLEASED

"Kiddie Katydid doesn't sing!" Freddie Firefly told Mr. Frog hurriedly.

And Mr. Frog was so surprised that he almost sat right down in the mud.

"What do you mean?" he cried. "You must be crazy! For there isn't a single person in all Pleasant Valley that hasn't heard Kiddie Katydid singing his tiresome song on a fine midsummer night."

"That--" replied Freddie Firefly--"that is just where you're mistaken, Mr. Frog. And that's where everybody else is mistaken, too. To-night I was lucky enough to learn that Kiddie Katydid has been fooling us all this time."

"You don't say so!" said Mr. Frog. "Then who is it that sings that everlasting chorus?"

"Nobody!"

"Nonsense!" Mr. Frog scoffed. "I can be fooled once, maybe. But I'm not to be fooled twice. And you needn't think for a moment that you can make me believe any such thing."

"I don't care whether you believe it or not," Freddie Firefly declared. "All I ask you to do is to tell the story to Mr. Crow."

"He won't believe it, either," the tailor retorted.

"Perhaps he will when he hears the rest of the message," Freddie answered. "I was just going to explain that Kiddie Katydid has a trick of rubbing his wing covers together to make that _Katy did_ sound."

"For the land's sake!" cried Mr. Frog, as he leaped into the water, convinced at last of the truth of Freddie Firefly's claim. "I must hurry home at once, for dawn's already breaking. And Mr. Crow may come sailing over my place at any moment." He landed with a splash in the creek and started to swim rapidly away. But after a few strokes he paused and turned around. "You might almost say that Kiddie Katydid is a fiddler, mightn't you?" he called.

"Something like that!" Freddie Firefly agreed a bit doubtfully.

"I'll tell Mr. Crow that, anyhow," said the tailor. "It will make the story more interesting, at least. And so far as I can see, it can't do any harm."

And then he hastened away, leaving Freddie Firefly to get home as best he could in the gray of the early morning.

"You may as well put out your light!" Mr. Frog shouted back, as he disappeared among the reeds. But he didn't wait to see whether Freddie took his advice. He was too much excited over the strange news. And as he swam easily along with practiced strokes he kept talking to himself.

"I'm a pretty clever chap, I am!" he chuckled. "I've discovered a great secret this night. And old Mr. Crow will be glad to hear all about it. Perhaps he'll want me to help him with his newspaper after this.

"And for all I know I'll have so much to do that I won't be able to make any more clothes for my customers."

He hadn't swum far before he had entirely forgotten that it was really Freddie Firefly who had discovered the secret and told it to him.

No doubt if anybody had reminded Mr. Frog of that fact he would have been very indignant.

X

A PAIR OF RASCALS

Mr. Frog reached home just as the sun peeped over the hills. He slipped hastily out of the water, sprang up the bank of the creek, and in three jumps landed on the roof of his tailor's shop. There he squatted, while his queer, bulging eyes scanned the sky in every direction. He was watching for Mr. Crow, and all but bursting with the news that he had for the old gentleman.

Mr. Frog had not sat there long before he heard a hoarse _Caw, caw!_ in the distance.

"There he is!" cried the tailor aloud. "There's the old boy! He'll be in sight in a moment."

And sure enough! soon Mr. Crow flapped out of the woods and came sailing over the meadows.

Thereupon Mr. Frog set up a great croaking. And to his delight his elderly friend heard him calling and dropped down at once.

"I've some news for you," Mr. Frog announced, as soon as the old black scamp alighted near him.

"It'll have to keep," Mr. Crow replied. "I'm on my way to the cornfield. I haven't had my breakfast yet. And a person of my age has to eat his meals regularly."

The sprightly tailor looked slightly disappointed.

"I don't know whether the news will keep or not," he replied slyly. "It's very important. And I may have to tell it to someone else first if you don't care to hear it now."

"What's your news about?" Mr. Crow asked him gruffly. "I suppose you've made another suit for somebody. And you remember I told you I couldn't put that news in my newspaper any more unless you paid me something. It's advertising. And nobody gets free advertising."

"This news is something entirely different from anything you've ever heard," Mr. Frog insisted. "It's about Kiddie Katydid. He's a----"

"Wait till I come back from the cornfield!" Mr. Crow pleaded.

"I can't! I simply _must_ tell it now!" Mr. Frog cried.

"Very well! But please talk fast; for I'm terribly hungry."

"Kiddie Katydid is a fiddler," Mr. Frog announced. "He fiddles every night. And that's the way he makes that ditty of his--_Katy did, Katy_----"

"Don't!" Mr. Crow begged. "Please don't! It's bad enough to have to hear that silly chorus every time I happen to wake up during the night--bad enough, I say, without being obliged to listen to it in broad daylight."

"Very well!" the tailor yielded. "But he fiddles it, all the same. And when you tell my tale to Brownie Beaver I guess he'll be surprised."

"I shan't tell him," Mr. Crow declared, thereby astonishing Mr. Frog.

"Why not?" the tailor demanded.

"We've had a slight disagreement," said Mr. Crow with a hoarse laugh. "I'm not his newspaper any longer."

"Well, there's nothing to prevent your telling this story to other people, is there? And you certainly will be willing to mention me at the same time, won't you?" Mr. Frog inquired with an anxious pucker between his strange eyes.

"Where do _you_ come in, pray tell?" Mr. Crow inquired coldly.

"Why, I discovered the secret!"

"Perhaps you did--and perhaps you didn't," Mr. Crow observed. Being very, very old, he was very, very wise. And he had long since learned that Mr. Frog was a somewhat slippery person. "If I spread any such news as this about Pleasant Valley I shall do it in my own way," he remarked. And thereupon the old gentleman rose quickly and disappeared in the direction of the cornfield, without so much as a "Thank you!"

Mr. Frog gazed after him mournfully.

"If that isn't just my luck!" he lamented. "I ought to have kept the secret till after the old boy had his breakfast. Then perhaps he'd have been better natured."

XI

A CHANGE IN THE WEATHER

Well, the day was not half gone before all the wild creatures in Pleasant Valley had heard all about Kiddie Katydid and his fiddling. At least twenty-seven people came to Mr. Frog at different times and told him the news. And he was furious.

"Old Mr. Crow has deceived me!" he complained. "I found out this secret myself. And now that black rascal's taking all the credit for it."

"Mr. Crow has suggested that Kiddie Katydid be invited to join the Pleasant Valley orchestra," Long Bill Wren informed Mr. Frog. "They have no fiddlers, you know. And Kiddie will be a great help to them. Mr. Crow has appointed a committee to call on Kiddie to-night and ask him to come to the next concert."

That was the last straw, so far as Mr. Frog was concerned.

"Mr. Crow might at least have put me on the committee," he spluttered. "But he has left me out in the cold."

"Why, it's not cold to-day!" Long Bill exclaimed. "Quite warm--I call it!"

"It'll be good and cold by night," said Mr. Frog. "I look for a sudden change in the weather. Nobody ought to venture out to-night without his heaviest overcoat on."

After flinging that remark over his shoulder, Mr. Frog flung himself inside his tailor's shop and slammed the door behind him. And then, sitting down cross-legged upon his table, he began to think, wrinkling his low brow until you might have supposed he would need to smooth it out again with one of his flat-irons.

At last the tailor suddenly quit thinking and smiled very widely from ear to ear. And carefully selecting some soft, warm, green cloth he began to fashion a small garment, which was tiny enough to fit--well, to fit a person as little as Kiddie Katydid.

Being a spry worker, Mr. Frog finished his task by nightfall. And then, taking his handiwork with him, he left his shop--after locking the door behind him--and hid himself beneath a shelving rock on the bank of the creek.

He was in a very happy mood; for his ideas about the weather had proved to be good. It was already turning cold.

"If it wasn't midsummer I should think we were going to have a frost!" Mr. Frog exclaimed, buttoning the long coat which he had donned before going out of doors. "I wish they'd hurry up!" he added mysteriously. He kept a close watch upon his shop door. It was evident that he expected callers.

Not long afterward a crowd began to gather in front of Mr. Frog's door. "Back Soon" said the sign upon it. And the thinly clad, shivering knot of field folk sat themselves down unhappily and waited for the tailor to appear. Every one of them wanted a warm new overcoat, for each expected to be out late that night.

Meanwhile Mr. Frog watched them--and giggled as loud as he dared. It was Mr. Crow's committee that thronged about his door--the people who were expecting to call upon Kiddie Katydid that very night to invite him to join the Pleasant Valley orchestra.

XII

A PRESENT FOR KIDDIE

Mr. Frog had a delightful time listening to the remarks of his callers, who had no idea that he was so near at hand. And as the weather grew colder, they began to shiver and their voices began to shake. And by the time it was almost dark all the waiting company were quite discouraged.

"I'll never be able to stay out to-night!" Chirpy Cricket declared. "I'm so cold now that I can scarcely move."

And it was the same with everybody else. Even Freddie Firefly complained that his light didn't warm him in the least. And he said he would have to go home at once.

"Mr. Crow will be very angry with us to-morrow when he learns we haven't called on Kiddie Katydid," somebody remarked. And a hush fell upon the company. But Chirpy Cricket had a happy thought, which made them all feel better.

"Kiddie Katydid won't stay out of doors on a night like this!" he suddenly exclaimed. "He'll find some snug place to creep into. And we wouldn't be able to find him in Farmer Green's dooryard even if we tried to."

"That's so!" Chirpy's companions shouted.

"Then there's no need of our freezing here any longer, waiting for that wretched tailor, Mr. Frog!" said Freddie Firefly.

And somehow, Mr. Frog did not smile quite so widely over that speech.

Nevertheless, he was pleased, on the whole. And not waiting to watch the shivering party leave the neighborhood, he set off at once toward Farmer Green's house, making first for the river, which ran near the farm buildings, because Mr. Frog did not like to travel by land.

Because the air was cool, the water felt all the warmer. And by the time Mr. Frog had reached his journey's end he was almost overheated. Besides, as he noticed, it was not so cold in Farmer Green's dooryard as it had been by the creek.

He stopped, for a few moments, to cool himself in the watering-trough. And then he hopped briskly on to the front yard.

To his great delight he had scarcely reached the clump of maple trees when right above him he heard Kiddie Katydid's famous refrain.

"Good evening!" Mr. Frog called. "I've brought a little present for you, all the way from the creek."

"How-dy do!" said Kiddie Katydid. "It's a cool night, isn't it?"

"You won't mind the weather when you put this on," Mr. Frog replied, holding up the small garment he had made that afternoon.

"What's that?" Kiddie Katydid asked.

"An overcoat, fashioned expressly for you by the finest tailor in Pleasant Valley!" said Mr. Frog very proudly.

"You're exceedingly kind, I'm sure," said Kiddie. And he was about to jump down and slip into the coat when he noticed that Mr. Frog had an extremely wide mouth.... Suppose, after slipping into the coat, he should find himself slipping down the tailor's throat?

"Just hang the coat on a twig and I'll get into it a little later," Kiddie Katydid suggested.

"I see!" Mr. Frog cried. "That's your way of accepting a gift. And I wouldn't dream of quarreling with you about that. So I'll hang the coat right here and go back to the watering-trough to wet my feet. While I'm gone you can try the coat on, and tell me how you like it when I come back."

"I hope it's a green one!" said Kiddie Katydid somewhat anxiously. "For if it isn't green, I couldn't wear it, you know. I always wear green. It's my favorite color."

"Ah! Trust me not to make a mistake!" Mr. Frog chuckled happily. And then he withdrew. But he could not help pausing for a moment, to look back and watch, while Kiddie sprang down from his tree and took his new coat from the twig on which the tailor had hung it.

XIII

KIDDIE KATYDID IS SHY

"Now--" said Mr. Frog, when he had returned from the watering-trough--"now tell me, how do you like the overcoat I made for you?"

And Kiddie Katydid, safe in his tree once more, and snugly buttoned in Mr. Frog's gift, replied that it was the finest garment he had ever owned in all his life.

"Good!" said Mr. Frog. "And I dare say you've had many overcoats in your time, too."

Kiddie Katydid did not correct Mr. Frog's mistake. To tell the truth, he had never before had an overcoat on his back.

"I've come here to-night to deliver an important message to you," Mr. Frog went on. "And thinking the weather might be cooler than you liked, I made you that fine coat so you could stay out here in your tree and listen to what I have to tell you.... I hear--" he said--"I hear that you're a musician."

"Yes!" said Kiddie Katydid--for he knew well enough that Freddie Firefly could not have kept the secret.

"I hear that you're a fiddler," Mr. Frog added.

"Why, no! I've never played the fiddle!" Kiddie Katydid exclaimed. "I don't know how to do that."

"Well, how do you know that you can't, if you've never tried?" Mr. Frog retorted. "If you can play _Katy did, Katy did; she did, she did_, by rubbing your wing covers together, there's no knowing what you could do with a real fiddle and bow."

"That's true," Kiddie admitted. "I never thought of that."

"Well," said Mr. Frog, who appeared greatly pleased with himself, "anyhow, I want you to join our singing society. Perhaps you've heard me and my friends over in the swamp. Almost every night we have a singing party there. And if you'll only agree to fiddle for us, while we sing, I venture to say that we'll have Farmer Green getting up out of his bed to listen to us."

Naturally, the invitation pleased Kiddie Katydid. But for all that, he shook his head slowly.

"I'm afraid I'm too shy," he told Mr. Frog. "I like to stay hidden among the leaves, where people can't see me."

"That'll be all right!" Mr. Frog assured him. "You can hide in some bush near-by, where we can't look at you."

But still Kiddie Katydid wouldn't accept the invitation. Although Mr. Frog teased and teased, all he would say was that he would think the matter over.

"Promise me this, at least--" Mr. Frog finally said--"promise me that you won't agree to make music for anybody else! Now that people know you're musical, they'll be asking you to play in an orchestra, or a band, or a fife-and-drum corps, or something. But I've invited you first, and if you oblige anybody it ought to be me--especially after I've given you that beautiful warm overcoat." The tailor looked upwards into the tree so beseechingly that Kiddie Katydid hadn't the heart to refuse his request.

"I'll promise that," he said.

"Hurrah!" cried Mr. Frog, opening his mouth so widely that Kiddie Katydid couldn't help shuddering at the sight.

And then Mr. Frog leaped into the air three times. And each time that he leaped, he struck his heels together three times, just to show how happy he was.

Then, with a hearty "Good night!" he turned away and went skipping off.

And Kiddie Katydid, making his curious music in the top of the maple tree, kept thinking that the tailor was one of the oddest chaps he had ever seen.

He did wish, too, that Mr. Frog had a smaller mouth.

XIV

KIDDIE KEEPS HIS PROMISE

Old Mr. Crow flew into a terrible rage when he found, the next morning, that his committee had not called on Kiddie Katydid during the night. And when Chirpy Cricket told him that the weather was too cold for anybody to stay out late, Mr. Crow said "Nonsense! What about Mr. Frog?"

That was a hard question to answer. And Chirpy Cricket was so afraid of angry Mr. Crow that he promptly hid himself among the roots of a clump of grass.

Now, the fact that Mr. Frog had been away from his shop the night before set Mr. Crow to worrying.

"That slippery tailor has been up to some mischief," Mr. Crow declared. "And if he has played a trick on me I'll never hear the last of it."

The old gentleman was so disturbed that he quite lost his appetite during the rest of the day. And he moped and groaned about, hoping for the best, but fearing the worst. One thing that made him especially uneasy was the fact that when he called on Mr. Frog he found the tailor in a gayer mood than he had ever known him to be in.

Mr. Frog bounded about his shop like a rubber ball. And the worst of it was, he _would_ sing, although Mr. Crow begged him, with tears in his eyes, to stop.

"What's the matter?" Mr. Frog asked him. "Don't you like my voice? Or is it the songs I sing? I've a new one that I'd like to sing for you. It's about one of the Katydid family; and I'm sure you'll enjoy hearing it."

But Mr. Crow wouldn't stay there any longer. With a loud squawk of rage he scurried away. He was sure, then, that Mr. Frog had tricked him.

That night Mr. Crow's committee called on Kiddie Katydid. It was a fine, warm, moonlight night. And as they drew near Farmer Green's place they could hear Kiddie's shrill music, even while they were still a quarter of a mile away.

"He plays better than ever," said Freddie Firefly. "I wish Mr. Crow could hear him." And they hurried on, believing that everything was going to turn out all right, in the end.

"Mr. Crow will be sorry, to-morrow, that he scolded us," said Chirpy Cricket.

But the committee met with a sad disappointment. When they invited Kiddie Katydid to join the Pleasant Valley orchestra he told them that he couldn't.

"Why not?" Freddie Firefly asked.

"I've promised somebody that I wouldn't," Kiddie said.

And though they pressed him for an explanation, he wouldn't give them any. He wouldn't say another word.

It was a downcast company that left Farmer Green's front yard. And they quarreled among themselves, too, before they parted. For there wasn't one of them that was willing to tell Mr. Crow that Kiddie had declined his invitation.

But they finally hit upon a plan that suited everybody. They agreed to get Mr. Crow's cousin, Jasper Jay, to break the news gently to the old gentleman.

It turned out that Jasper was delighted to undertake the task. He hoped that Mr. Crow would fly into a passion when he heard the sad tale. And Jasper was not disappointed. For old Mr. Crow was furious.

"It's the work of that sly rascal, Mr. Frog!" he squalled. "He must have called on Kiddie Katydid and hoodwinked him somehow.... I'd like to know what he said."

But Mr. Crow never found that out. So Kiddie Katydid had another secret, which was known only to himself and Mr. Frog.

And Mr. Frog wouldn't tell anybody, because he preferred to tease Mr. Crow.

And Kiddie Katydid wouldn't tell anybody, because he liked secrets. So when people tried to pry into the affair, he just folded his wings tightly over himself--and said nothing.

XV

BENJAMIN BAT'S PLAN

Of course, Kiddie Katydid was not always to be found in his favorite nook among the trees in Farmer Green's front yard. Quite often he went skipping about from tree to tree or from bush to bush, sometimes flying and sometimes leaping. It really made little difference to him which mode of travel he used. And he never stopped to think how lucky he was to be able to move so spryly with the help of either his legs or his wings. He took his good fortune as a matter of course.

There was Mr. Frog! He was a famous jumper; but he couldn't fly. And there was Mr. Nighthawk! He was a skillful flier; but he couldn't jump.