And who do you think the stranger, who acted so very much like a seal, was? It was Omnok, the hunter, with his terrible gun sliding right along beside him! He had learned how Little Brown Seal took his "cat" naps, and he was going to slip right up to him and kill him. He kept creeping up closer, closer, closer. But Little Brown Seal had made up his mind that it was one of his cousins, and so he didn't ask himself any more questions about it. He just kept on taking his little "cat" naps and waking up to look all around, this way and that way, but never paying any attention to this stranger who was coming nearer all the time.

"My," Little White Fox thought to himself, "he will surely be killed.

Yes, sir! I am very, very sure Little Brown Seal is going to be killed!"

But just when Omnok was getting very close, and just before he was going to raise his terrible gun and kill Little Brown Seal, a strange thing happened. I don't know how it happened. Perhaps Little White Fox was sorry the sun was going down so soon that day, or perhaps he was lonesome for his mother. Perhaps he was sorry for Little Brown Seal, because he was going to get killed in just another minute; but whatever it was, Little White Fox began to feel bad all at once. He wanted to cry, and he _did_ cry! He lifted his pink little nose into the air and cried, "Ah! Ah! Ah! Yak! Yak! Yak!"

Now Little Brown Seal may not have very good eyes, but he has very good ears, and he had just wakened from a "cat" nap when he heard that lonesome wail from Little White Fox. And he didn't wait one minute, nor one second! He tumbled down into his house in the ocean as quick as a wink, just as Omnok the hunter was getting ready to shoot him!

Perhaps you think Omnok wasn't angry! But he had heard Little White Fox cry. He would get Little White Fox's coat. Then he would be even. But Little White Fox was nowhere about when Omnok climbed the hill. No, you may be sure he wasn't! He was way under the great rock in his own little home, where Omnok couldn't get near him. So all Omnok could do was to put his terrible gun over his shoulder and go back home.

CHAPTER XVII

A STRANGE JOURNEY

Little White Fox went on a strange journey one day, and when he arrived at its end, he didn't know where he was! You see, he had been living for a long time with his mother off the bounty of Big White Bear. Now the snow had almost all gone from the mountains and the tundra. Little Mrs.

White Fox had gone over to the land and told Little White Fox to watch sharp and see if Big White Bear came up out of his kitchen and left anything for them to eat. She was going over to see if she could find any perfectly good blueberries which had been hidden all winter under the snow.

Little White Fox loitered about on the roof to the ocean and dreamed, as little folks will in the springtime. The weather was fine, and the sun was shining now, all day and all night. A great deal of the roof to the ocean had floated mysteriously away, one night, but there was a great deal of it left, and Little White Fox felt very safe. But all of a sudden, Scratch! Scratch! he heard Big White Bear come up out of his kitchen. Then he knew that there was going to be a feast, just as there had been so many times before. He waited and waited until Swish, Swish he heard Big White Bear tumble back into the water and swim away. Then such a feast as he did have! Well, Little White Fox ate so much and the sun shone so brightly, that he began to feel very, very sleepy, and almost before he knew anything about it, he was curled up on the roof to the ocean fast asleep, dreaming as hard as ever a white fox dreamed.

I don't know how long Little White Fox slept; hours and hours I imagine.

But when he awoke and looked about him, all he could see was the dark, deep ocean everywhere. He jumped to his feet and peered this side of him and that side, but it was all the same dark, deep water. There was nothing but ocean everywhere. The big waves had come along and carried off the part of the roof to the ocean that Little White Fox was sleeping on!

What was Little White Fox to do? He could not swim very far, and it was a long way to land; in fact, he could not see any land at all. Besides, the water was very, very cold. He couldn't think of a thing to do. He just curled up in a heap and shivered and shivered and shivered, he was so lonesome and frightened.

"h.e.l.lo!" shouted Tusks the Walrus, sticking his head out of the water.

He looked and looked. "That's strange," he said to himself. "I thought I saw Little White Fox over here on a piece of the ocean's roof. Guess not, though. I don't see him now." And away he swam for a frolic with one of his cousins.

"h.e.l.lo!" cried Little Brown Seal, turning a somersault in the water.

When he turned the somersault, he looked at the piece of the ocean's roof. "My! My!" he sighed. "These eyes of mine must be getting very bad indeed! I thought I saw Little White Fox on that piece of roof." And he too went paddling away to play.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Big White Bear popped right up out of the ocean!

_Page 119_]

And all the time Little White Fox was hiding his nose in a little snow bank, and closing his pink eyes because he was so very much afraid of every one, even his best friends, out here on the silent, lonesome sea.

Very soon he was nearly frightened to death. Big White Bear popped right up out of the ocean! He climbed up on one end of the piece of roof and tipped it up so Little White Fox thought he would surely be tipped into the sea. But he dug in his toes and hid his nose, and closed his eyes very tight. Pretty soon Big White Bear thought of something he wanted to do and tumbled back into the sea.

Little White Fox floated on and on, for hours and hours and hours, over the silent sea. But by and by when he was very, very hungry and very sure that he would never see his dear home and his dear mother again, there came a dreadful storm. Little White Fox had to dig his toe nails in tight, again, and once the piece of the roof broke right in two and nearly threw him into the sea! But finally he felt a b.u.mp. His piece of roof had struck something hard. b.u.mp! b.u.mp! He nearly stood on his head, and in a minute the piece of roof was perfectly still. Little White Fox looked up, and right by the piece of roof was the finest sandy beach you ever saw. He gave one big run and jumped on the beach, and scampered away, as fast as ever he could, just before a big wave came and carried the piece of roof back to sea.

It wasn't any time at all until he was up on the edge of the finest hill, eating the richest, juiciest blueberries that had ever been kept under a snow bank all the long winter through. And pretty soon he was all dry, and feeling fine and not hungry at all.

"But where in the world am I?" thought Little White Fox, scratching his head. "I'll have to see if I can find some of my friends who can tell me how to go home. It must be a long, long way."

CHAPTER XVIII

LITTLE WHITE FOX COMES HOME

When Little White Fox looked all around him very carefully, this way and that, and didn't see a thing he had ever seen before and not a person who knew him in all this new tundra and all these new hills, he felt very blue, you may be sure. But he didn't cry about it. He was too happy at being off that bit of roof to the great ocean for that. So he looked as far as he could see in every direction, and at last he spied some little lakes way down on the tundra. "I'll just go over there and see if there is any one I know," he said to himself, and went trotting away as fast as ever he could. He came right down by the lakes and at last he saw some one he had met in his own home land. It was Mr. Widgeon Junior, a son of Old Mrs. Widgeon Duck, who was killed by Omnok the hunter.

"h.e.l.lo," said Little White Fox.

Widgeon Junior looked up quick, in a frightened sort of way, but he never said a word. He just stretched out his long neck and flapped his strong wings and began to fly. And all the time he pointed with his bill straight ahead and with his feet straight behind, as if to say, "Follow me; this is the way home."

"I just believe that _is_ the way home!" said Little White Fox. "His mother had her nest right down on our tundra last summer, and I believe he is going there right now!" So he picked up his feet lively and ran along behind Widgeon Junior but he couldn't near keep up! It wasn't any time at all before he was so far behind that he couldn't see Widgeon Junior at all! And before long he was just as badly lost as before. But he trotted on cheerfully, "For," he said to himself, "I'll see some one else I know very soon."

And sure enough, all of a sudden there was a clap, clap of wings, and some one that looked just like Who-Who, the big white owl, went soaring over his head. But when Little White Fox shouted "h.e.l.lo" in his very best voice, the great white owl never answered a word, but went flapping on till he lit on the top of a whalebone which one of Omnok's relatives had put up to mark a grave.

"Well," said Little White Fox to himself, "I guess that isn't Who-Who, but anyway, it is one of his cousins, and he is very wise. All the Owl folks are. He will tell me the way home."

So he hurried over to the foot of the whalebone and said, "Please, Mr.

White Owl, won't you tell me the way home?"

The big white owl never answered a word, but he winked his eye very cunningly, as much as to say, "Look, I'll show you." Then he flapped his great, white wings, and away he flew, and away after him, as fast as ever he could trot, came Little White Fox, never once looking this way or that to see where he was going, so proud was he to be able almost to keep up with this new friend. He ran and ran and ran until he was out of breath, when he saw the big, white owl spread his wings out straight and light on a whalebone sticking right out of the ground and looking for all the world like the one he had flown away from just a little while before. Little White Fox ran up to the whalebone and looked up at the big white owl.

The big white owl closed one eye and winked very knowingly as if to say, "Am I not a very wise old owl?"

Little White Fox looked all around at the tundra and the hills, and sure enough, that was the very same whalebone, sticking up out of the ground!

The big white owl had led him a long way, all around in a circle! You may be sure Little White Fox was disgusted. He would never ask another thing of a big white owl again, if he lived a thousand years! But away he trotted toward some other little ponds he had seen some time before.

He was slipping along as quietly as he could in the gra.s.s when he heard a splash, splash in the water, and there was Mrs. Swan. Of all the people in all the world, besides his own dear mother, Little White Fox liked Mrs. Swan best! Her white gown was always so smooth and tidy, her neck so graceful, and she seemed so kind, that Little White Fox thought she was just the most perfect lady that ever was! To be sure he had been tempted once to steal one of the big eggs out of her great nest, on the beach the summer before, but he hadn't done it, and now, you may be very sure, he was glad he hadn't, for perhaps she would tell him the way home.

"Please, Mrs. Swan," he said, making a very graceful bow, "will you tell me the way home?" Mrs. Swan looked at him very kindly but never said a word. Very soon she flapped her great, white wings, and putting her bill right out before her and her feet straight behind, out she went flapping away to the northward. Then Little White Fox knew that was the way home, for she was going back to his own dear beach to make a new nest and to hatch out some more little Swanfolks.

[Ill.u.s.tration: She was going back to his own dear beach. _Page 128_]

I wish I had time to tell you of all the adventures that befell Little White Fox on his way home, but I haven't. Perhaps some other time we will hear all about that. But one day, when the sun was shining brightly and the flowers were beginning to bloom, who should little Mrs. White Fox see come trotting up the path by the big rock but her own long-lost son, Little White Fox. And you may well believe that she was glad to see him! She had thought she would never see him again. And the things he had to tell her! How she did listen, and how the other little Foxes, Violet Blue Fox and Little Cross Fox and the Silver Fox twins and all the rest, how they listened! Oh, Little White Fox was quite a person in his family that evening! But when he had been given a good dinner with a piece of blueberry pie such as only Little Mrs. White Fox can make, and had curled himself up on the moss cot by the side of the great rock, he went to sleep thinking that after all there was no place in all the world like his own home under the big rock, and no one in all the world quite so good as his own mother; and he felt very, very sure that he would be careful in the future and not let anything carry him away from her.