ep out of their way, and during this time I used to eat very little
wild food, living almost altogether on the things that I picked up in
the town. And during all these days and nights I never saw my father or
my mother.

Then one evening an eventful thing happened. The door of Kahwa's pen
closed with a latch from the outside--a large piece of iron which lifted
and fell, and was then kept in place by a block of wood. I had spent a
great deal of time at that latch, lifting it with my nose, and biting
and worrying it, in the hopes of breaking it off or opening the door;
but when I did that I was always standing on my hind-legs, so as to
reach up to it, with my fore-feet on the door, and, of course, my weight
kept the door shut. But that never occurred to me. One evening, however,
I happened to be standing up and sniffing at the latch, with my
fore-feet not on the door itself, but on the wall beside the door. It
happened that, just as I lifted the latch with my nose, Kahwa put her
fore-feet against the door on the inside. To my astonishment, the door
swung open into my face, and Kahwa came rolling out. If we had only
thought it out, we could just as well have done that on the first night,
instead of trying to reach each other for nearly two weeks through a
narrow crack in the wall until nearly all the skin was rubbed off our
noses.

However, it was done at last, and we were so glad that we thought of
nothing else. Now we were free to go back into the woods and take up our
old life again with father and mother. Would it not be glorious, I
asked? Yes, she said, it would be glorious. To go off into the woods,
and never, never, never, I said, see or think of man again.

Yes--yes, she said, but--Of course it would be very glorious, but--Well,
there was the white stuff--the sugar--she could come back once in a
while--just once in a while--couldn't she, to see the man and get a lump
or two?

I am afraid I lost my temper. Here was what ought to have been a moment
of complete happiness spoiled by her greediness. Of course she could not
come back, I told her. If she did she would never get away a second
time. We would go to father and mother and persuade them to move just as
far away from man as they could. Instead of being delighted, the
prospect only made her gloomy and thoughtful. Of course she wanted to
see father and mother, but--but--but--There was always that "but"--and
the thought of the man and the sugar.

While we we