op!" he begged Benny. "Please don't do that!"

Benny Badger paused and stared at him in amazement.

"What is it?" he asked. "What's the matter?"

The deer mouse was all a-flutter.

"Goodness me!" he exclaimed. "You'll have the whole neighborhood dug up
if you're not careful!"

XXII

A BREAKFAST INVITATION

For a moment or two Benny Badger looked at the deer mouse without saying
a word. He told himself that here was a country person who couldn't ever
have travelled much, or he would have known better than to make such a
remark. . . . Spoil the whole neighborhood indeed! . . . Benny's lip
twisted up in something like a sneer.

"Don't you worry!" he snorted. "I don't believe you ever saw a
first-class digger before. I'm not going to spoil the neighborhood. I'm
_improving_ it. I'm making a fine house here--probably the finest there
is for miles around."

The deer mouse appeared ashamed. Of course he didn't like to seem
stupid.

"But why do you dig in so many places?" he faltered.

"That's my way," Benny Badger told him. "As soon as I get one den well
started I think I'd rather live somewhere else. But I don't mind
beginning again because there's no better exercise than digging."

"No doubt!" the deer mouse agreed. "But I'm sure it would be much too
violent for me."

He said no more, but looked on with a puzzled air until at last Benny
Badger had actually dug in one place long enough to make a deep den.

When it was quite finished Benny Badger brushed the dirt off himself and
turned to Mr. Deer Mouse.

"Come inside and see if my new house isn't the finest one you ever
saw!" he said.

For some reason Mr. Deer Mouse did not seem eager to enter. To be sure,
he thanked Benny for the invitation, but he backed away a few steps and
said that he thought he'd better not look at the new house that morning.
"I--I haven't the time to spare," he mumbled.

Benny Badger couldn't understand that remark. The white-footed gentleman
had had plenty of time to spend while watching him dig the den. And
Benny said as much, too.

"That's exactly the point," said the deer mouse. "I've spent so much
time already that I've used it all up."

Well, Benny Badger couldn't understand that either.

"Used up all the time!" he cried scornfully. "Isn't there plenty more
where the other time came from?"

"Oh, to be sure--to be sure!" said the deer mouse, who seemed ready to
agree to anything--except to Benny's invitation. "Bu