Chapter 3 - Page 2

Old Briar-patch. But he couldn't get Yap-Yap out of his mind, and he resolved that the first chance he got he would ask Old Man Coyote about him. The chance came that very night. Old Man Coyote came along by the dear Old Briar-patch and stopped to peer in and grin at Peter. Peter grinned back, for he knew that under those friendly brambles he was quite safe.

"I heard what you said to Johnny Chuck about his cousin, Yap-Yap," said Peter.

Old Man Coyote looked as surprised as he felt. "Where were you?" he demanded gruffly.

"Lying flat in the grass close by Johnny Chuck's house," replied Peter, and grinned more broadly than ever.

"And to think I didn't know it!" sighed Old Man Coyote. "When I failed to catch Johnny Chuck, I thought I had missed only one dinner, but it seems I missed two. Next time I shall look around a little more sharply. Do you know, the sight of Johnny Chuck always makes me homesick, he reminds me so much of his cousin, Yap-Yap, and the days when I was young."

"I didn't know that Johnny Chuck had a cousin until you mentioned it," said Peter. "Does he look like Johnny? Won't you tell me about him, Mr. Coyote?"

"Seeing that I haven't anything in particular to do, I don't know but I will," replied Old Man Coyote, who happened to be feeling very good-natured. "Many and many a time I have chased Yap-Yap into his house. Seems as if I can hear the rascal scolding me and calling me names right this minute. He used to get me so provoked that it was all I could do to keep from trying to dig him out."

"Why didn't you?" asked Peter.

"Because it would have meant a waste of time, sore feet, and nothing to show for my trouble," retorted Old Man Coyote. "Yap-Yap never has forgotten what his great-great-ever-so-great-grandfather learned when he first took to living on the open prairie."

"What did he learn? Tell me about it, Mr. Coyote," begged Peter.

"He learned to use his wits," replied Old Man Coyote, with a provoking grin. "He learned to use his wits, that's all."

"Please tell me about it, Mr. Coyote. Please," begged Peter.

"Once upon a time," began Old Man Coyote, "so my grandfather told me, and he got it from his grandfather, who got it from his grandfather, who--"

"I know," interrupted Peter. "It happened in the days when the world was young."

Old Man Coyote looked at Peter very hard as if he had half a mind not to tell the story, but Peter looked so innocent and so eager that he began again. "Once upon a time lived the great-great-ever-so-great-grandfather of Yap-Yap, the very first of all the Prairie Dogs, and his name was Yap-Yap too. He was own cousin to old Mr. Woodchuck, who of