Chapter 13

THE FEATHERS FLY

"I'm glad to see you," Solomon Owl told his cousin Simon Screecher, while Dickie Deer Mouse stood stock still on the ground beneath the tree where the two cousins were sitting. "I'm glad to see you. And I hope you're enjoying good health."

"I'm well enough," Simon Screecher grunted.

"Do you find plenty to eat nowadays?" Solomon asked him.

Simon Screecher admitted that he was not starving.

"Ah!" Solomon exclaimed. "Then you can have no objection to sharing a specially nice tidbit with your own cousin."

Dickie Deer Mouse shivered. But he did not dare move, with one of Simon Screecher's great, glassy eyes staring straight at him. And there was something else that did not help to put him at his ease: Solomon Owl seemed to be watching him likewise!

"Haven't you dined to-night?" Simon Screecher inquired in a testy tone.

"Yes!" Solomon admitted. "But I haven't had my dessert yet.... What are you looking at so closely, Cousin Simon, down there on the ground?"

An angry light came into Simon Screecher's eyes.

"Can't I look where I please?" he snapped.

And he changed his seat again, so that he might get a better view of Dickie and Solomon at the same time.

Solomon Owl promptly moved to another limb behind Simon, and slightly higher.

And Dickie Deer Mouse took heart when Simon Screecher began to make a queer sound by opening his beak and shutting it with a snap, as if he would like to nip somebody.

Dickie knew that Simon Screecher was in a terrible rage. And unless his threatening actions scared Solomon Owl away, Dickie thought there was likely to be a cousinly fight.

He was pleased to notice that Solomon Owl showed no sign of dismay. There was really no reason why he should. He was much bigger than his peppery cousin. And he looked at Simon in a calm and unruffled fashion that seemed to make that quarrelsome fellow angrier than ever.

"What's the matter?" Solomon Owl asked Simon Screecher. "If you had any teeth I'd think they were chattering.... Are you having a chill?"

Simon made no answer.

"Maybe you're afraid of something," Solomon Owl suggested. "Can it be that young Deer Mouse down there on the ground?" And he laughed loudly at what he thought was a joke.

"That's my Deer Mouse!" Simon Screecher squalled, suddenly finding his voice. "I saw him first. And he's my prize."

"He looks to me like the one I lost a few nights ago," Solomon Owl announced solemnly. "In that case, of course I saw him first. So you'd better fly home to your old apple tree in the orchard."

"I'll do nothing of the sort!" Simon Screecher declared; and his