Buster knew of an old tune called "The b.u.mblebee in the Pumpkin," and he cried with some heat that he could think of no reason why there shouldn't be "A Ladybug in a Pumpkin."

"I told you my house was big--the biggest one on the farm," Mrs. Ladybug reminded him.

"Ah!" Chirpy Cricket exclaimed. "Now I know! You're going to live in the haystack. A haystack is cozy and warm; it's wind-proof; it sheds water; and there's nothing bigger anywhere."

It really seemed as if Chirpy Cricket had solved the great mystery.

"He's guessed the riddle!" people said. "You might as well admit now, Mrs. Ladybug, that you're going to spend the winter in Farmer Green's haystack."

But Mrs. Ladybug dashed their hopes.

"You're wrong," she told her friends. "And if to-night's as nippy as last night was, perhaps you'll find out to-morrow where I'm going. For I don't care to freeze my toes here in the orchard."

That night it was colder than ever. And the next day Mrs. Ladybug went all around the orchard and the garden bidding people good-by.

Still she wouldn't tell where she was going. And if Daddy Longlegs hadn't happened to stroll around the cherry tree outside Farmer Green's chamber window that afternoon, n.o.body would have known where Mrs.

Ladybug went. But Daddy Longlegs saw her. And he hastened to spread the news.

"Mrs. Ladybug has gone to spend the winter in the farmhouse!"

XXIII

BACK AGAIN

SOMEHOW Mrs. Ladybug's friends missed her. The orchard seemed quite a different place after she vanished inside the farmhouse to stay there all winter long. In spite of her sharp tongue and her prying ways people discovered--now that she was gone--that they had liked Mrs. Ladybug more than they knew.

While she was with them in the orchard they had often wished she wouldn't ask so many questions. But now the days seemed very long without Mrs. Ladybug to inquire _how_ and _why_ and _when_ and _where_.

And then--then a rumor flashed from lip to lip all the way across the garden and the orchard and the meadow: "Mrs. Ladybug is back again! She didn't stay in the farmhouse a week."

And sure enough! the rumor proved to be true. Mrs. Ladybug, looking rather foolish, appeared in her old haunts among the apple trees. She acted as if something had occurred to upset her. And though she seemed glad to be greeted by all her old companions, she didn't want them to ask her a single question as to why she hadn't spent the whole winter, instead of only a few days of early fall, in Farmer Green's house.

If she thought her neighbors weren't going to question her she was sadly mistaken.

Only a little while before they had asked her a thousand and one questions about _where_ she was going to live during the winter. And now they were all just as curious to know why she had returned. But this time they asked her a thousand and two questions.

You couldn't say that her answers weren't satisfying, because she didn't make any answers at all.

Of course, things couldn't go on like that forever. People _had_ to know what had changed Mrs. Ladybug's plans. And in order to persuade the stubborn lady to explain matters, a few of her friends hinted that they expected they would have to go to Farmer Green himself and learn the truth.

"You may ask him if you wish," Mrs. Ladybug told them. "But it won't do you any good. He can't tell you what happened because he doesn't know himself."

"Maybe the farmhouse was cold," Chirpy Cricket suggested.

Mrs. Ladybug made no comment on that remark.

"Perhaps the roof leaked," said Daddy Longlegs.

Still no sign from Mrs. Ladybug.

"She found that the farmhouse wasn't wind-proof," said Daddy Longlegs'

wife.

And Mrs. Ladybug didn't deny it; nor did she say that that was so.

Then Buster b.u.mblebee made one of his blundering speeches.

"It was a short winter, anyhow," he said.

Mrs. Ladybug's neighbors couldn't help t.i.ttering. And somehow their amus.e.m.e.nt stung her into telling the truth about the whole affair, right then and there.

"Mrs. Green and I didn't get on well together," she confessed.

XXIV

MRS. GREEN'S MISTAKE

MRS. LADYBUG spoke at last. Her listeners crowded close about her, jostling one another in their eagerness to hear every word she said. For Mrs. Ladybug was recounting her adventures at the farmhouse.

"I flew in through an open window," Mrs. Ladybug began. And she heaved a deep sigh, as if the telling of the tale was costing her much pain.

"I said nothing to anybody," she explained, "because I didn't wish to trouble the family. I knew I could find my way about the house after a little. And it wasn't long before I had discovered the stairway.

"I didn't walk on the stairs for fear there might be mud on my feet,"

said Mrs. Ladybug. "I didn't walk, but flew up to the second floor and went into the first chamber I saw. There was a fine, big closet off that room. The door leading into it was ajar; so I had no trouble slipping inside it. And there, high up on a broad shelf, I picked out the very spot where I could have spent the winter with every comfort in the world."

At this point Mrs. Ladybug was overcome by her feelings for a few moments. But the company waited politely until she could go on with her story.

She soon continued.

"All went well--" said Mrs. Ladybug--"all went well until one day--this morning, to be exact--Mrs. Green opened the closet door and began to brush and sweep and wipe and dust. I heard her say that she was doing her fall cleaning. And of course that pleased me; for I was glad to learn that she was a neat housekeeper.

"And then--" here Mrs. Ladybug's voice broke slightly--"and then, the first thing I knew she spied me and cried 'Ah, ha! A Carpet Bug!'

"The next instant she whisked me off the shelf with a brush. Of course I played dead the moment she touched me. And I fell into the dustpan and never so much as wriggled a toe.

"Soon afterward Mrs. Green set the dustpan beside the window which she had already opened. That was my chance. I seized it. I flew out of the window. And here I am."

Mrs. Ladybug's listeners shook their heads in sympathy.

"You had a narrow escape," they told her. "It's a wonder you got away."