just
as hard on her own "beat" as he had been on his--their hunting-grounds
were separate, though they joined--and would soon be back.

Blackie did not wait. He managed again the miracle of getting away
from his nest without appearing to do so, and next turned up on the
summer-house roof. Fatherlike, he thought he had done enough for a
bit, and would enjoy a "sunning reaction" on the summerhouse roof. It
was rather a good place, a look-out tower from which he could slip over
the side into the hedges, which met at the corner where it was, if
trouble turned up.

Trouble did turn up, but not quite what he had expected. He had been
sitting there, wing-stretching, leg-stretching, and "preening" his
feathers, and had finally left off just to sit and do nothing,
when--lo! his wife popped up over the side without warning, and right
upon him.

She was very dark brown, not black, and had a paler throat than the
palish throat of most hen blackbirds--nearly white, in fact. She said
nothing. Nor did Blackie, but he looked very uncomfortable. She did
more than say nothing. She went for him, beak first, and very angrily
indeed; and he, not waiting to receive her, fled down to the lawn, and
began worm-hunting for dear life. A whole lecture could not have said
more.

Mrs. Blackie remained on the roof for about a minute, looking round,
and then flew off to her own hunting-ground. She was wilder and less
trusting of the world than Blackie, and did not care for his lawn in
full view of the house windows. And Blackie did not even stop his work
to watch her go. Apparently they had, previously in their married
life, arrived at a perfect understanding.

This time, too, Blackie got a big and a small worm. The small he
coiled like a rope, and held up towards the base of his beak; the big
he carved up into sections, which he held more towards the tip. The
large ones, it seemed, were too awkward and lively simply to carry off
rolled up whole.

The journey that followed was a fearful one in Blackie's life, for he
met half-way the very last foe in the world he was expecting--namely,
an owl. Truly, it was a very small owl, scarce bigger than himself;
but it was an owl, and, like all its tribe, armed to the teeth. Men
called it a little owl. That was its name--little owl. Blackie didn't
care what men called it; he knew it only as one of the hundred or so
shapes that death assumed for his benefit.

Just at that time it happ