there--saw the Sun, too, and the Sun was asleep. He made up his mind
that he would steal the leggings so he crept through the door of the
lodge. There was no one at home but the Sun, for the Moon has work to
do at night just as the children, the Stars, do, so he thought he could
slip the leggings from under the sleeper's head and get away.

"He got down on his hands and knees to walk like the Bear-people and
crept into the lodge, but in the black darkness he put his knee upon a
dry stick near the Sun's bed. The stick snapped under his weight with
so great a noise that the Sun turned over and snorted, scaring OLD-man
so badly that he couldn't move for a minute. His heart was not
strong--wickedness makes every heart weaker--and after making sure that
the Sun had not seen him, he crept silently out of the lodge and ran
away.

"On the top of a hill OLD-man stopped to look and listen, but all was
still; so he sat down and thought.

"'I'll get them to-morrow night when he sleeps again'; he said to
himself. 'I need those leggings myself, and I'm going to get them,
because they will make me handsome as the Sun.'

"He watched the Moon come home to camp and saw the Sun go to work, but
he did not go very far away because he wanted to be near the lodge when
night came again.

"It was not long to wait, for all the OLD-man had to do was to make
mischief, and only those who have work to do measure time. He was
close to the lodge when the Moon came out, and there he waited until
the Sun went inside. From the bushes OLD-man saw the Sun take off his
leggings and his eyes glittered with greed as he saw their owner fold
them and put them under his head as he had always done. Then he waited
a while before creeping closer. Little by little the old rascal
crawled toward the lodge, till finally his head was inside the door.
Then he waited a long, long time, even after the Sun was snoring.

"The strange noises of the night bothered him, for he knew he was doing
wrong, and when a Loon cried on a lake near by, he shivered as with
cold, but finally crept to the sleeper's side. Cautiously his fingers
felt about the precious leggings until he knew just how they could best
be removed without waking the Sun. His breath was short and his heart
was beating as a war-drum beats, in the black dark of the lodge.
Sweat--cold sweat, that great fear always brings to the
weak-hearted--was dripping from his body, and once he thought that he
w