Rusty Wren looked quite crestfallen as he listened to his wife's wail. He wished that he had heeded her warning, when she declared that his hiring a boy would certainly lead to trouble.

"What's the matter with you?" Rusty asked his helper, Chippy, Jr.

"When you first came to work for us you could slip through our doorway easily enough. But now you're altogether too big."

Chippy, Jr., said that the entrance to their house must have shrunk.

"How could it?" Rusty demanded impatiently.

"It rained last night," the youngster reminded him.

But Rusty Wren said, "Nonsense! The doorway's made of tin--not wood. _You_ have grown--that's the whole trouble! And you've got us into a pretty fix."

"I begin to think that it was all planned this way by his father,"

Mrs. Rusty told her husband, "so Mr. Chippy wouldn't have to take care of his son. But I don't intend to adopt a big, overgrown boy like him--not when I have six small children of my own!"

Chippy, Jr., couldn't help feeling both uncomfortable and unhappy.

"I want to go home!" he blubbered. "It's almost my bedtime. And my father and my mother won't like it at all if I stay here all night."

"Well," said Rusty Wren, "I don't know how you're going to leave our house if you can't squeeze through the door. So I'll hurry over and tell your father about this trouble, and he can break the news gently to your mother."

Then Rusty went off, flying directly to the stone wall where the Chippy family lived. And soon he was explaining to Mr. Chippy how his son was inside their house and couldn't leave.

Now, Mr. Chippy was unusually mild mannered. But he became greatly excited as soon as he heard Rusty's story.

"It's just like being caught in a trap!" he exclaimed. "And I can't help feeling that you've played a trick on my son--probably to please Johnnie Green.... If you don't set my boy free to-morrow morning at daybreak, I shall certainly make trouble for you."

Mr. Chippy's warning amazed Rusty Wren. But he couldn't help laughing at the idea of anybody causing him any _trouble_.

"I'm so deep in trouble now," he told Mr. Chippy, "there's nothing you can do to make matters any worse for me. I've six growing children to bring up; and now I have your son to take care of; and my wife thinks everything is my fault, because I wanted to hire a boy to help me catch insects.

"So you can't scare me by your threats. I only wish you would come to my house and take your son away with you--if you can."

"I'll come--and I'll tear your house down!" Mr. Chippy cried fiercely. And he began screaming, "_Chip, chip, chip, chip_," in a very shrill voice which was most annoying to hear.

Rusty Wren did not like to listen to him. So he flew back home and went to bed. He only wished that it were possible for Mr. Chippy to break into his house and rescue Chippy, Jr. But since the house was made of tin, Rusty knew that Mr. Chippy was helpless.

"I'll never settle in a tin house again so long as I live!" he groaned.

XIX

A FRIEND, INDEED

The next morning Rusty Wren awakened with a start. Somebody was pounding at his door--and shouting his name, as well. He jumped out of bed to see what was the matter. And, looking outside, he beheld Mr. Chippy, with sixteen of his cousins, all very much excited--if one might judge by their actions.

They were flying back and forth past Rusty's doorway and _chipping_ in shrill and piercing tones.

"I've come for my son," Mr. Chippy informed Rusty Wren. "Send him out here at once or it will be the worse for you."

"I'd be glad to get rid of him if I could," Rusty answered. "But, as I explained to you last night, he has grown so big that he can no longer pa.s.s through my doorway."

"I don't care to argue with you?" Mr. Chippy replied. "Just let me have Chippy, Jr., or we'll come inside your house and get him.

We'll make trouble for you, too. Perhaps you didn't know that kidnapping a child is a very serious act. I've already asked Solomon Owl's opinion about this matter; and he advises me to take my child away from you by force, if necessary."

"There's no sense in waiting any longer," one of Mr. Chippy's cousins interrupted. "Let's go right in and seize the lad!"

At that the mob crowded round Rusty Wren's door. And the pert gentleman who had just spoken thrust his head through the opening.

That, however, was as far as he was able to go. His shoulders were altogether too broad for the small, round pa.s.sage. And though his relations attempted to push him into the house, they soon saw that they would never succeed in their undertaking.

"Let me try!" another of Mr. Chippy's cousins cried. But he had no better luck than the first.

Then each of the fourteen remaining cousins--and then Mr. Chippy himself--had his turn at the door. But every one of them found that he was about two sizes too big to squeeze through it.

Rusty Wren, watching then from inside his house, couldn't help laughing, although it was really no joke.

Though he was usually very mild, Mr. Chippy grew terribly angry the moment he heard Rusty's laughter. His sixteen cousins began to scold, too. Again they tried to crowd through Rusty Wren's door.

And they made such an uproar that when Johnnie Green stepped out of the farmhouse before breakfast he couldn't help noticing them.

"What's going on here?" he cried. And he hurried to his "wren house," as he called Rusty's home, and drove away the noisy visitors.

Then he shinned up the old cherry tree, to peep inside it. And as soon as he reached the tin can which was Rusty's home Johnnie Green thought he heard an unusual cry within it.

"That doesn't sound like a wren!" he exclaimed. "It sounds exactly like a chipping sparrow!" Then, as he looked, he saw Chippy, Jr.'s, head, with its bright bay cap, peer through the mouth of the syrup can.

"There's a chippy inside my wren house!" Johnnie Green shouted to his father, who had come to a window to see what was going on. "How can I get him out?"

"Wait a moment!" said Farmer Green. And soon he came and handed Johnnie a can-opener.

"Cut out the end of the can!" he directed. "Then you'll be able to reach in and get the little beggar."

Naturally, Chippy, Jr., did not like to be called a "beggar." But he couldn't very well prevent Farmer Green from saying whatever he pleased. So he kept still, while Johnnie Green quickly opened a great hole in Rusty's house. Then Johnnie carefully lifted Chippy, Jr., out of his prison and gave him a toss into the air.

That frightened young gentleman wasted no time. He stopped to touch his cap to n.o.body, but flew away to his home in the wild grapevine, on the stone wall, as fast as he could go.

Though he had kept quiet, the whole Wren family had made a great uproar. Glad as they were to get rid of their troublesome guest, they objected to having the whole front of their house torn out.

Indeed, Mrs. Rusty began to get ready to move out at once. And everybody knows that moving is no joke--especially if one has six children.

But Johnnie Green bent the tin into place again, so that it was almost the same as new. In fact, the house was even better than ever, because it was more airy.

And Rusty and his wife were so glad to see the last of Chippy, Jr., that afterward they never objected in the least when Johnnie Green called them "my wrens." They had discovered that he was a good friend to have.