od. At last the
badger said:

"I have thought of a plan. I will pretend to be dead. You must change
yourself into a man, and take me into the town and sell me. With the
money you get for me, you must buy food and bring it into the forest.
When I get a chance I will run away, and come back to you, and we will
eat our dinner together. Mind you wait for me, and don't eat any of it
until I come. Next week it will be your turn to be dead, and my turn to
sell--do you see?"

The fox thought this plan would do very well; so, as soon as the badger
had lain down and pretended to be dead, she said to her little Cub:

"Be sure not to come out of the hole until I come back. Be very good and
quiet, and I will soon bring you some nice dinner."

She then changed herself into a wood-cutter, took the badger by the
heels and swung him over her shoulders, and trudged off into the town.
There she sold the badger for a fair price, and with the money bought
some fish, some _tofu_,[M] and some vegetables. She then ran back to the
forest as fast as she could, changed herself into a fox again, and crept
into her hole to see if little Cub was all right. Little Cub was there,
safe enough, but very hungry, and wanted to begin upon the _tofu_ at
once.

[M] Curd made from white beans.

"No, no," said the mother fox. "Fair play's a jewel. We must wait for
the badger."

Soon the badger arrived, quite out of breath with running so fast.

"I hope you haven't been eating any of the dinner," he panted. "I could
not get away sooner. The man you sold me to brought his wife to look at
me, and boasted how cheap he had bought me. You should have asked twice
as much. At last they left me alone, and then I jumped up and ran away
as fast as I could."

The badger, the fox, and the Cub now sat down to dinner, and had a fine
feast, the badger taking care to get the best bits for himself.

Some days after, when all the food was finished, and they had begun to
get hungry again, the badger said to the fox:

"Now it's your turn to die." So the fox pretended to be dead, and the
badger changed himself into a hunter, shouldered the fox, and went off
to the town, where he made a good bargain, and sold her for a nice
little sum of money.

You have seen, already that the badger was greedy and selfish. What do
you think he did now? He wished to have all the money, and all the food
it would buy for himself, so he whispered to the man who had bought the
fox:

"