"I don't know why I wasn't strutting," he retorted. "I was raising my feet just as high as I could lift them."

"Ah, yes?" said Turkey Proudfoot. "But you forgot one thing."

"What was that?"

"You didn't spread your tail," Turkey Proudfoot explained. "And that's half of strutting."

"I--I didn't know it," Master Meadow Mouse stammered. And then he darted away, to hide in the gra.s.s beyond the fence.

He felt much ashamed to have made such a mistake.

VIII

HARD TO PLEASE

It was very hard to please Turkey Proudfoot. To be sure, he always pleased himself. But nothing anyone else did seemed to suit him. And there was one thing that always made him peevish. That was the gobbling of the younger turkey c.o.c.ks.

To anybody that wasn't a turkey, their voices sounded just as sweet as Turkey Proudfoot's. But he claimed that there was something wrong with all gobbles except his own. Either they were too loud or too soft, too high or too low, too long or too short. And whenever a young c.o.c.k gobbled in his hearing Turkey Proudfoot was sure to rush up to him and order him to keep still, for pity's sake!

They usually obeyed him. Not only was Turkey Proudfoot the biggest gobbler on the farm, but he had a fierce and lordly look about him. It was a bold young turkey c.o.c.k that dared defy him. Once in a while one of them foolishly ventured to tell Turkey Proudfoot to mind his own affairs. And then there was sure to be a fight--a quick, short, noisy fray which ended always in the same fashion, with Turkey Proudfoot chasing the young c.o.c.k out of the farmyard.

Luckily for the youngsters, they could run faster than he could, for they were not nearly as heavy.

Although Turkey Proudfoot didn't like to hear others gobble, nevertheless he enjoyed the excuse for a fight that their gobbling gave him. And when he had nothing more important to do he often stood still and listened in the hope of hearing some upstart gobbler testing his voice in a neighboring field. Newly grown c.o.c.ks had to go a long way off to be safe from Turkey Proudfoot's attacks.

One day in the middle of the summer the lord of the turkey flock was feeding behind the barn when a loud gobble brought his head up with a jerk.

"Ha!" Turkey Proudfoot cried. "That's somebody in the yard, around the barn. He thinks I'm further away than this, or he'd never dare bawl like that."

Turkey Proudfoot dashed around the barn at a swift trot. He was surprised to see not a turkey c.o.c.k in the farmyard. The rooster was there, however. And Turkey Proudfoot eyed him sternly.

"You weren't trying to gobble a moment ago, were you?" he inquired.

"No, indeed!" said the rooster.

Turkey Proudfoot looked puzzled.

"Somebody gobbled," he declared. "I'm sure the noise came from this yard. I was behind the barn when I heard it. And I hurried around the corner at once."

"Maybe the person that gobbled ran around the other end of the barn, to dodge you," the rooster suggested.

"I'll go and see," said Turkey Proudfoot. And he went back where he came from.

He found n.o.body there. But that annoying gobble sounded again and brought him back into the yard even faster than before. "Who did that?"

he squalled.

And somebody mocked him. Somebody repeated his question after him. It was the same voice that had gobbled.

Turkey Proudfoot's rage was terrible to see.

IX

A STRANGE GOBBLE

"Gobble, _gobble, gobble, gobble!_"

Turkey Proudfoot stood in the farmyard and craned his neck in every direction. That sound certainly was close at hand. Yet there wasn't a turkey c.o.c.k anywhere in sight, either on the ground or in the trees.

Just for a moment Turkey Proudfoot was worried.

"That wasn't _my_ gobble, was it?" he asked the rooster. "If I gobbled, I didn't know it."

"No! You didn't gobble," said the rooster, "though I must say that gobbling sounded a good deal like yours."

"_Gobble, gobble, gobble, gobble!_"

"There it goes again!" cried Turkey Proudfoot. He was almost frantic.

"How can I fight that fellow if I can't see him?" he cried. He looked up at the roof of the barn; but there was no one there except the gilded rooster that told which way the wind blew. He looked up at the roof of the farmhouse.

"You don't suppose that fellow's hiding in the chimney, do you?" he asked.

"No doubt he is," said the rooster. "If I were you I'd fly up there and catch him."

"The roof's high for one of my weight to fly to," Turkey Proudfoot remarked.

"Still, I could flap up to the top of the woodshed and get to the roof of the house from there.... I'll take a look and see how high the house seems when I'm near it."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Polly Imitates Turkey Proudfoot's Gobble. (_Page_ 42)]

To the rooster's delight, Turkey Proudfoot started towards the house.

The rooster promptly called to all the hens to "come quick," because Turkey Proudfoot was going to fly to the roof of the farmhouse. "I hope he won't get into trouble," said the rooster with a chuckle. "It would be a pity if he fell down the chimney."

In spite of his words, the rooster didn't look at all uneasy. Indeed, the only thing that worried him was the fear that Turkey Proudfoot _wouldn't_ get himself into a sc.r.a.pe. But he thought it more polite not to say exactly what he hoped.

Turkey Proudfoot stalked up to the farmhouse and stopped near the piazza. He was gazing upwards and measuring the height of the roof with his eye when all at once a loud "_Gobble, gobble, gobble, gobble!_"

almost tipped him over backward.

The outcry came from the farmhouse. There was no doubt of that. But it didn't come from the roof, nor the chimney.

Turkey Proudfoot stared at the windows and the doors and saw no one except Miss Kitty Cat, dozing on a window sill. Then something moved beneath the piazza ceiling. It was a cage, which swayed as a green figure clung to the wires on one side of it.