ile his big, bright, bulging,
black eyes took in everything that happened in his dooryard.

Dickie Deer Mouse knew that one needed sharp eyes to spy him when he was
peeping from his house in that fashion. And often when somebody of whom
he was really afraid came wandering through the woods, Dickie would
keep quite still, while he watched the newcomer without being seen.

But with some of the wood folk he took no chances. Whenever he heard
Solomon Owl's rolling call, or his cousin Simon Screecher's quavering
whistle, Dickie Deer Mouse always pulled his head inside his house in a
hurry.

For they were usually on the lookout for him. And he knew it.

Of course, if they had been aware that Dickie Deer Mouse was hidden
inside his rebuilt, last year's bird's nest, either of them, with his
sharp claws, could easily have torn the moss roof off Dickie's home. But
luckily for Dickie, there were some things that they didn't know.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

VI

A WARNING

If old Mr. Crow had minded his own affairs everything would have gone
well with Dickie Deer Mouse, after he moved into his new home. But Mr.
Crow could not forget the time when Dickie had awakened him out of a
sound sleep and frightened him almost out of his mind.

So whenever he caught sight of Dickie the old gentleman was sure to drop
down upon the ground and ask him in a loud voice whose house he had
prowled into lately.

"Nobody's!" Dickie Deer Mouse always told him. And then he would assure
Mr. Crow that he was very sorry to have disturbed his rest.

It was quite like Mr. Crow, on such occasions, to act grumpy.

"I haven't had a good night's sleep since you broke into my house," he
declared to Dickie one day.

"Perhaps you're over-eating," Dickie suggested politely.

Old Mr. Crow did not appear to like that remark.

"Nothing of the sort!" he bawled. "I don't eat enough to keep a mosquito
alive."

"I often see you in the cornfield," Dickie Deer Mouse told him.

"Ha!" Mr. Crow exclaimed. "What are you doing in the cornfield, I should
like to know?"

"Sometimes I go there to get a few kernels of corn," Dickie explained.

"Ha!" Mr. Crow cried once more. "That's where the corn's going! Farmer
Green thinks I'm taking it. And so you're getting me into a peck of
trouble, young man."

Dickie Deer Mouse couldn't help being worried when Mr. Crow said that.
And he looked puzzled, too.

"I don't see," he said, "how I could have g