though
I am always glad to see you."

"I thought perhaps you might be looking for your thimble," went on the
bunny uncle. "Nurse Jane has sent it back to you."

"Oh, thank you!" said the mother of the puppy dog boys. "I'm glad to
get my thimble back, but I was really looking for Peetie and Jackie."

"You don't mean to say they have run away, do you?" asked Uncle
Wiggily, in surprise.

"No, not exactly run away. But they have not come home from school,
though the lady mouse, who teaches in the hollow stump, must have let
the animal children out long ago."

"She did," Uncle Wiggily said. "I came past the hollow stump school on
my way here, and every one was gone."

"Then where can Jackie and Peetie be keeping themselves?" asked Mrs.
Bow Wow. "Oh, I'm so worried about them!"

"Don't be worried or frightened," said Uncle Wiggily, kindly. "I'll go
look for them for you."

"Oh, if you will I'll be so glad!" cried Mrs. Bow Wow. "And if you
find them please tell them to come home at once."

"I will," promised the bunny uncle.

Giving the dog lady her thimble, Uncle Wiggily set off through the
woods to look for Jackie and Peetie Bow Wow. On every side of the
woodland path he peered, under trees and bushes and around the corners
of moss-covered rocks and big stumps.

But no little puppy dog chaps could he find.

All at once, as Mr. Longears was going past an old log he heard a
rustling in the bushes, and a voice said:

"Well, we nearly caught them, didn't we?"

"We surely did," said another voice. "And I think if we race after
them once more we'll certainly have them. Let's rest here a bit, and
then chase those puppy dogs some more. That Jackie is a good runner."

"I think Peetie is better," said the other voice. "Anyhow, they both
got away from us."

"Ha! This must be Peetie and Jackie Bow Wow they are talking about,"
said Uncle Wiggily to himself. "This sounds like trouble. So the
puppy dogs were chased, were they? I must see by whom."

He peeked through the bushes, and there he saw two big, bad foxes,
whose tongues were hanging out over their white teeth, for the foxes
had run far and they were tired.

"I see how it is," Uncle Wiggily thought. "The foxes chased the little
puppy dogs as they were coming from school and Jackie and Peetie have
run somewhere and hidden. I must find them."

Just then one of the foxes cried:

"Come on. Now we'll chase after those puppies, and get them. C