.... Wouldn't you like to see it?"

Nimble told Cuffy that he would be delighted. So they started up the
mountain, after Nimble had had his drink.

Cuffy Bear led the way. And in a short time he stopped in front of a
cave. A tangle of bushes hid the mouth of it. You'd have passed right
by it without ever guessing that there was any cave there.

"This is it," Cuffy Bear told Nimble. "Come right in!"

"No, thank you. I'd rather not," said Nimble. "I don't care for caves,
myself, though this seems to be a good one."

"It's worth seeing," Cuffy Bear urged.

"No, thank you!" Nimble repeated.

"You don't mind if I take a look at it?" Cuffy Bear inquired. "Maybe I
can make up my mind--about living here--if I look at the cave once
more."

"Go inside, by all means!" Nimble cried.

"Will you wait here till I come out?" Cuffy asked him.

And Nimble promised that he would wait.

Cuffy Bear yawned as he turned away. And Nimble thought it strange that
he didn't take the trouble to beg pardon, nor to cover the yawn with a
paw. Only a very careless--or a very sleepy--person would forget those
things, Nimble knew.

Well, Cuffy crept inside the cave. And outside Nimble waited. He waited
and waited, until at last the afternoon light began to fade.

"I wish he'd hurry," Nimble muttered. "We're going to have a storm and I
don't want to stay up here in it, all night."

Snowflakes were already falling. And Nimble wished he hadn't promised
that he would wait till Cuffy Bear came out of the cave.

He went to the entrance and called. But he got no answer.

"I hope nothing has happened to him," Nimble said.

But something had.

XII

CUFFY IS MISSING

Far up on the dark mountainside, in the driving snow, Nimble waited in
front of the cave where Cuffy Bear had vanished. And all the time Nimble
was growing more uneasy. He feared that Cuffy Bear might be in some sort
of trouble.

Nimble looked all about for help. But there wasn't a sign of anybody
stirring, anywhere. All the mountain people seemed to have sought
shelter from the storm.

At last, however, Peter Mink came sneaking up from the spring. He had
set out to follow Broad Brook all the way up to its beginning, on a
hunt for meadow mice. And when he set out to do a thing he always
finished it, no matter what the weather might be.

"You're just the person I want to see!" Nimble cried. "Will you do me a
favor?"

Now, Peter Mink never did anybody a favor if