STORY XVI

CRACKIE FLAT-TAIL'S SECRET

"Don't tell Toodle and Noodle; will you, mamma?" asked Crackie Flat-tail, the little beaver girl, as her two brothers popped into the kitchen where she was talking to Mrs. Flat-tail one morning. "Don't you let them know anything about it; will you?"

"No, indeed!" exclaimed the beaver lady with a smile at her little girl, and then one for each of the boys. "I'll not whisper a word, Crackie!"

"Huh! A secret!" exclaimed Toodle. "Secrets are only for girls, anyhow. And they always tell 'em, so they aren't secrets any more; I don't care!"

"You can tell me and I won't tell. Honest I won't! Cross my tail!" exclaimed Noodle. "Do you want to tell me, Crackie?" and he sidled up to his sister as he asked her.

"Nope! I'm not going to tell—at least not now," answered Crackie.

"I—I know where there's a nice sweet piece of aspen bark, Crackie," went on Noodle. "If you want to tell me the secret I'll show you where the bark is, Crackie."

"Nope!" said the little beaver girl, laughing. "I can't tell you until it's ready, anyhow, and now I must go to the store to get some—"

"Look out, Crackie!" exclaimed Mrs. Flat-tail, "or you'll tell your secret before you know it."

"Oh, then I'm going to hurry right away," said Crackie, "and you boys had better go to school, or you'll be late, won't they, mamma?"

"I guess so," answered Mrs. Flat-tail. "Run along Toodle and Noodle."

The two beaver boys looked at their little sister, who was named Crackie because she so often dropped things and cracked them—such things as cups and saucers and once in a while she'd drop her doll. But then this was a rubber baby, and it did not so much matter, for they can't crack until they get very old, and Crackie's rubber doll was quite young.

"I wonder what it was Crackie didn't want mamma to tell us?" spoke Toodle as he got his books ready to go to school.

"I don't know," answered his brother Noodle, "but we'll find out when we come home from our lessons."

"That's what we will," answered Toodle. "But come on now. We don't want to be late the way we were the other day when we helped Billie Bushytail move."

"No indeed!" said Noodle.

So off the beaver boys swam to school. They swam instead of walking, you know, because they lived in a house that was in the middle of a pond of water, and the only way they could get to shore was by swimming.

And the school was in an old boat, as I have told you before, and Professor Rat was the teacher. Sometimes the old boat would float away, and none of the school children could find it. Then there would be no lessons that day. And oh, how sorry those animal children were that they could not go to school! Oh, dear me, yes indeed! I guess so!

But this didn't happen to be one of the days when the school was lost, and soon Toodle and Noodle had reached the place, meeting a number of their friends and having a good time.

But, all the while, Toodle and Noodle were wondering what their mamma and sister Crackie had been talking about in the kitchen, and why it was they weren't let into the secret. In fact, Toodle and Noodle thought so much about it that they didn't study as they should have done.

And when Professor Rat asked Noodle: "How much are two apples and one apple?"

Noodle answered: "It's a secret."

"What!" exclaimed the teacher, surprised like. "A secret! Why every one knows what the answer is. And what every one knows is no secret. Susie Littletail, you may tell us how much one apple and two apples are."

"Three," said Susie.

"Exactly," went on Professor Rat. "So you see it was no secret, Noodle Flat-tail."

"Oh, I guess I was thinking of something else," replied the little beaver boy.

"Well, in school you must think only about your lessons," said Mr. Rat. And that is very true. I only tell you that about Noodle to show how much he was thinking of what Crackie had said. How he did wish he knew the secret!

But now I must tell you about Crackie herself. The little beaver girl did not go to school, being too small, but she was big enough to go to the store, and that is where she swam after Toodle and Noodle had left. And Crackie bought sugar and spice, and everything nice, just as it tells about in the story book, and home she went with them.

"Now, mamma," she said, "you show me how and I'll make it, and when Toodle and Noodle come home they'll be so surprised! Won't they, mamma?"

"Indeed they will, Crackie," said the beaver lady.

So she and Crackie began to make it. What's that? You want to know what it was? Oh, I'm not allowed to tell, for it's still a secret, you know. But in a little while you shall find out. Anyhow, I'm allowed to tell you this much. When it was all done Mrs. Flat-tail put IT in the oven, and—Well, I'll give you three guesses, not another one.

Anyhow, when it was in the oven Crackie said:

"Well, I guess I'll go out and play a little bit, mamma. I'll go see Jennie Chipmunk. She is ill today and didn't go to school. I'll be back when it's done."

Off swam Crackie, and soon she and Jennie were having a fine time playing under the trees; for beavers play out on dry land as well as in the water. Jennie felt better after school was out. I've often heard of real boys and girls who were just like that.

By and by Crackie went back home, and when her mamma opened the oven door there came out the loveliest smell you can imagine.

"Oh, goodie!" cried Crackie. "It's all done, and how nice and brown it is. Now I'm going to fool the boys."

So what did she do but take the secret out of the oven, her mamma helping her, of course, and then Crackie wrapped it all up in a nice clean paper and a clean cloth—the secret, you know—not the oven.

And when the secret was all wrapped up, Crackie took it outside in the yard and she made a big mud pie—a pie out of nice clean mud, such as the beaver animals use to plaster their houses. Inside the mud pie Crackie put her secret, and then she waited for Toodle and Noodle to come home from school.

The beaver boys were not long in coming, either. They did not stop much to play on the way, for they were very anxious to find out the secret. Soon they were at their house. Out in front was Crackie, making believe stuff sugar plums in her mud pie. The sugar plums were only stones, but it was easy enough to pretend with them. I've often done it.

"Where's the secret?" cried Toodle.

"Oh, Crackie, are you going to tell us?" said Noodle.

"There it is," said Crackie, and she pointed to the mud pie she had made.

"That!" cried Noodle.

"Pooh! What a secret!" exclaimed Toodle.

"Wouldn't you like a piece?" asked Crackie, and she looked over at her mother and smiled. Mrs. Flat-tail laughed. Toodle and Noodle looked disappointed-like.

"Only a mud pie," said Noodle.

"Come on, let's play ball," suggested Toodle.

"You'd better wait until I cut my mud pie," said Crackie, and then, while her brothers watched she broke open the mud pie, which she had baked hard and dry in the sun, and there, inside it, covered over with clean, green grape leaves, was a lovely apple pie, all brown and sugary, with birch bark frosting in one place, and watercress candy in another, and inside—oh, my! I can't write any more about it, for it makes me too hungry.

"That's my secret!" said Crackie. "I baked the real pie all by myself, only mamma helped me, of course. And I put it inside the mud pie just for fun. I wrapped it up so it wouldn't get soiled. Will you have some, boys?"

"Will we!" cried Toodle, quickly.

"I guess we will!" shouted Noodle, and they both together kissed little Crackie. And then they ate a piece of her secret pie. Wasn't that nice? I think so, even if I did write this story myself. And on the next page, if the coffee strainer doesn't take the piano out to a moving picture show and leave it there for the banana man, I'll tell you about Toodle and the big log.