Kentucky Tails. Betsy Byrne

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СКАЧАТЬ eye contact with Amee and said ‘I mean it Amee, if you hear our warning call you better jump off that thing and come over here right away, promise? ‘O.K, I promise.’

      With her bright eyes flashing, she dashed to the contraption. At first, she cautiously made her way around the entire device, which was very clever for such a young chipmunk to do. She jumped up onto the platform, and started the course. After sliding down the clear plastic tube, she tumbled onto the little platform that stood just before the flat tent dais, and the grin on her face was beaming! She dove through the flattened tent part, and her body flew through that tunnel. At the end, she got to eat the food that was on the very last plank, her reward for being so brave and adventurous.

      She jumped off of the plank, and ran back over to where the others were watching. She had a corn cob in one hand, and some seed mixed with bark in the other. Her cheeks were bulging with more seed too. ‘That was fun; I wanna go again, can I, can I?’ ‘Wait, my sister wants to go too, and after her, I do too,’ said Raney very eagerly. ‘Go ahead Priss, you’re next.’ Prissy was already jumping up and down, and impatiently waiting for her turn to come. Chet turned to Avery, with his paw covering his mouth so no one else could hear. ‘Good, maybe now she’ll stop that whining.’ Avery leaned back into Chet, ‘Sure, that’s when it’s Raney’s turn to whine!’ Both boys quietly snickered. Raney overheard only what Avery said about him, and he turned towards him, and threw his body into him.

      They both tumbled down the hill, growling with a mix between snarls and pants. Prissy was already on her way to the course, and turned back to smile at the others. She saw Raney and Avery tumbling down the hill, fighting and scratching. She started running back to where all the commotion was. ‘Oh no, Raney please, someone’s gonna get hurt.’

      Right at that moment, one of the Red Tail Hawks swooped down and with his mighty claws, and snatched her. ‘Prissy, Prissy, come back.’ Amee started to dart towards the open area calling for Prissy as Chet grabbed her. ‘What are you doing, do you want another one to come and swallow you up in the sky as well?’ They hugged each other, as they ran back to the safety of the bushes. Both Chet and Amee ran down the hill after the other two, tears streaming down Amee’s little cheeks.

      ‘Now you’ve done it, because you can’t control yourself Raney, your sister came back and was running to try to help you.’ ‘A hawk snatched and carried her away. Now what do we do?’ Raney’s face was scraped by rolling down the hill, but also looked so stunned from what Chet just told him. ‘My sister, my sister’, and he buried his head in his paws. Even though he had been trying to hurt Avery, Avery felt sorry for him –but only for a moment. His head started throbbing, after hitting it on a large jagged rock that he tumbled into. Blood ran down the side of his face. Raney’s Mama came skipping over, ‘What gorgeous weather and everyone’s having so much fun. Where’s your sister, Raney?’ It all happened so fast, there wasn’t much time for thinking, but Raney was always so quick to come up with a lie if he needed to. He twisted his face around, sweat covered his brow, and tears filled his little eyes, ‘Oh, Mama, everything happened so fast, I feel sick.’ Emily, (Raney’s Mama), Sensed something was very wrong. Her face got pale, and her eyes looked up to the sky. Amee ran over, and guided her by the shoulders to a stump that was nearby. ‘It’s Prissy, I know. What happened Raney, tell me’ she was so stunned, that no matter what Raney told, she wouldn’t penetrate right now anyway. Chet looked over at Raney, ‘tell her Raney, she deserves the truth. She already knows something’s terribly wrong because she’s listening with her heart.’ Raney cleared his throat, ‘Mama it’s Priss, it’s my entire fault. He started babbling, and crying at the same time. ‘Raney, this isn’t about you’, as Emily stood up too fast, she looked as if she’d faint. Avery was standing behind the stump she was sitting on, and ran over to behind where she was wobbling. He caught her, pulling her back to the stump. Raney put a gentle hand up to brush the fur away from her eyes, and kindly asked everyone to leave.This was so unlike Raney, he was usually such a little bully and always ready to blame anyone for whatever may have gone wrong. Maybe in an odd way, he learned something from this whole situation and Prissy’s capture had some meaning, enough to possibly change his ways? Could that even be possible? Since Emily was still stunned anyway, Chet guided her in the other direction, with Avery following. As Chet turned back to steal a glance at what was going on, Raney and his Mom were hugging, and crying. He heard only the last sentence that Raney spoke to his Mom, before they hugged, and it was ‘Mama, I’ll never fight again, I promise you. . .’

      CHAPTER FIVE

      PETER’S BRIGADE RECRUITS

      Since there was such a ruckus going on, everyone came running. Even the crusaders of Peter who had just gotten to the area heard the wails of Emily and her son came running. All the critters were trying to comfort Emily, and find out what happened to make her so upset. Neither Raney nor his Mom would talk to the crowd, which led everyone to flood over to where Chet, Avery, and Amee stood. Chet explained to the mass of critters what had happened, and that it would be best to just leave Raney and his Mom alone.

      One of the work forces nudged Peter and pulled him to the side. It was Hunter, a very large and intelligent seeming rabbit. ‘Tis a shame, mate, that the little chipmunk was picked off. Is there some kind of organizing we could do, to try to find where she’s been taken, if it’s not too late to get her back?’ Another recruiter joined in the conversation, ‘I think if we stay between the ditches, we may very well find where she went. I’ve lived here all my life and I know a few critters that are always game for a good ‘look see.’

      One of Ferns boys, chimed in, ‘What about Lester and Fester? They could fly over the region and overlook the area to see if they could spot her.’ That was the Vulture brothers. Not a bad idea’ said Peter. ‘It would also be a good practice run for us before we have to deal with Dexter and his gang.

      Let’s not say anything to anyone, as to what we’re trying to do, so no one can be disappointed. I don’t want another heart break for Miss Emily.’

      Dutch hopped over to where Squinty, the ground hog was. He whispered the plan in his ear, and Squinty shook his head as if to say ‘yes.’ There was a gathering at the first of the two Hickory trees that stood tall near the house on the hill. All the volunteers that were there to help rid of Dexter and his team were swiftly making plans for the search. Lester and Fester were both there, and anxious to do their part to find the little squirrel.

      Lester didn’t like to do things unless there was something in it for him. Fester wasn’t that bad, and told Lester, ‘Just think, if we find the pint-sized squirrel unharmed, we will be hero’s, or if we find the squirrel already dead, well . . .we just found our dinner for tonight!’ Lester’s mouth watered just to the thought, and greedily decided to do the task of looking.

      They were to fly immediately from the area that Prissy was taken, down the borders and up to the Eastern area. The first task was to stop at Barren Lake, the National Park that was only maybe 10 minutes from our hill. The sights were awe-inspiring, but not one sign of dear Prissy was found. The birds flew toward Lake Cumberland. It was so gorgeous way up in the sky.

      Luckily, it was still early enough in the day, that they had quite some time left to search, before they couldn’t see, for lack of light. The air was crisp, and fresh. Flying over Cumberland Falls, was just mesmerizing, it was hard to focus on anything else. The sight of a rainbow, arcing over the falls as if it were framing nature’s beauty, was exquisite. An acorn could have been munched on, and the whole den would have echoed from the sound.

      Emily was sitting on her favorite fork of a root, and staring at the floor ahead of her. Raney sat by her side, not saying a word. The quiet was painfully uncomfortable. As the sun went down, and the fireflies started their dance of light, Raney went outside, and started walking anywhere, just to try to still his mind. He walked to the out skirts, near СКАЧАТЬ