Part 8 (1/2)

Nighthawk would be able to discover him amongst shrubbery of the same color.

Chirpy Cricket wished that Kiddie Katydid hadn't replied to Mr. Nighthawk at all. But how could Kiddie know that Chirpy had changed his mind? And now Mr. Nighthawk spoke to Chirpy.

”I can't see you very well, Mr. Cricket,” he said. ”Won't you leap into the air a few times, so I can get a good look at you? I've heard that you've been wanting to meet me. And I've come all the way from the woods just to please you.”

Luckily Chirpy Cricket did not forget Kiddie Katydid's advice. Kiddie had explained to him how Mr. Nighthawk caught his meals on the wing.

”You'll have to excuse me,” Chirpy told Mr. Nighthawk. ”I'd rather not do any jumping for you. That wasn't why I wanted to meet you.”

”Ha!” said Mr. Nighthawk. ”Then why--pray--did you wish to see me?”

”I thought”--Chirpy Cricket replied--”I thought that perhaps you'd like me to help you with your music. I've often heard your booming at a distance. And it has seemed to me that you have the making of a good musician, if you have a good teacher.”

Mr. Nighthawk sniffed. It must be remembered that he was not very gentlemanly.

”I've had plenty of training,” he said. ”I didn't come all the way from the woods to be told that I don't know my own business. I practice every night. And I flatter myself that I'm a perfect performer.”

”Then,” said Chirpy Cricket, ”perhaps you need a new fiddle. For there's no doubt that your booming would sound much better if it were shriller.”

Mr. Nighthawk gave a rude laugh.

”I don't make that sound with a fiddle,” he sneered. ”Don't you know a wind instrument when you hear it?”

XXI

MR. NIGHTHAWK EXPLAINS

Mr. Nighthawk appeared to think it a great joke on Chirpy Cricket, because Chirpy had thought he played the fiddle. He laughed in a most disagreeable fas.h.i.+on. And he kept repeating that people who didn't know a wind instrument when they heard it couldn't know much about music.

As for Chirpy, he didn't know just what to say. But at last he managed to stammer that he hoped he hadn't offended Mr. Nighthawk.

”Not at all!” Mr. Nighthawk told him. ”This is the funniest thing I've heard for a long time. It was worth coming all the way from the woods to enjoy a laugh over it.”

Of course it was very rude for Mr. Nighthawk to speak in such a way. But he was never polite to any of the smaller field-people, unless he happened to be coaxing them to jump, so that he might grab them when they were in the air. You may be sure he was as meek as he could be if he happened to meet Solomon Owl. But at that moment Solomon was far off in the hemlock woods. Only a short time before Mr. Nighthawk had heard his rolling call in the distance. So he felt quite safe in bullying so gentle a creature as Chirpy Cricket.

Thinking that he ought to be polite to his caller, rude as he was, Chirpy asked Mr. Nighthawk if he wouldn't kindly play something.

”I don't care if I do,” said Mr. Nighthawk--meaning that he _did_ care, and that he _would_ play something. But it was not because he wanted to oblige anybody. He was proud of his booming. And he was only too glad of a chance to show Chirpy Cricket how loud he could make it sound.

”Stay right there in that tree, if you will!” Chirpy said. ”I won't move.

I'll sit here and listen.”

”Ha, ha!” Mr. Nighthawk laughed. ”I _knew_ you didn't know anything about wind instruments. When I make that booming sound I'm always on the wing.

I'm going to take a flight now. And when I come back you'll hear a noise that is a noise--and not a squeaky chirp.”

Then Mr. Nighthawk left his perch and climbed up into the sky. And when he had risen high enough to suit him he dropped like a stone. It seemed to Chirpy Cricket that he had never heard anything so loud as the _boom_ that broke not far above his head soon afterward. At the very moment when it looked as if Mr. Nighthawk must dash himself to pieces upon the ground, right where Chirpy Cricket crouched and trembled, he had spread his wings and checked his fall. It was the air, rus.h.i.+ng through his wing-feathers with great force, that made the queer, hollow sound. That was why Mr. Nighthawk claimed that he made the booming on a wind instrument.