Chapter 16 - Page 2

good time at all.

"I don't care if some one did catch this turtle first," Johnnie said at last. "I'm going to carve my mark on him just the same."

So he began to cut "J. G." in the exact center of the back of Timothy Turtle, much to that old fellow's rage.

And when Johnnie Green had finished the letters he cut the date below them.

"What you goin' to do with him now?" Red asked Johnnie then.

"Turn him loose!" Johnnie replied.

"Aw--don't do that! Lemme have him!" Red coaxed.

Johnnie Green said that he was sorry--but he intended to set his captive free, just as he had planned.

He soon found that turning Mr. Turtle loose was no easy matter. Strange to say, Timothy Turtle did nothing to help. On the contrary, he made the task as hard as he could for Johnnie Green, trying his best to bite that young man.

In the end Johnnie had to cut the rope that held Timothy's head. And when that furious old fellow at last found himself in Black Creek once more he still wore a noose of rope, like a collar, around his neck.

* * * * * * *

When Johnnie Green told his father about his adventure with Timothy Turtle, he had a great surprise. Farmer Green said that when he was just about Johnnie's age he had cut his initials on a turtle, down by the creek.

Now, since Johnnie was named for his father, their initials had to be alike. So the J. G.--and the old date--that Johnnie had found must have been carved by Farmer Green when he was a youngster.

Somehow, Johnnie found it very hard to imagine that his father had ever been a boy like himself and had spent his time playing near the creek, and carving his initials on the back of a turtle.

"How old do you suppose that turtle is?" he asked his father.

"Oh, he must be a regular old settler," Farmer Green declared. "He may have been around here when your grandfather was a boy, for all I know."

"Do you really believe that?" Johnnie exclaimed.

"Well," his father answered, "there's only one way to find out."

"What's that?" Johnnie inquired eagerly.

"Ask Mr. Turtle himself," Farmer Green replied with a smile.