ut and then with many parting threats of what she
would do, she started for home. Unc' Billy noticed that she limped a
little with the foot he had nipped so hard, and he couldn't help
feeling just a little bit sorry for her.

When she had gone, the others turned to Peter Rabbit to see how badly
he had been hurt. They looked him all over and found that he wasn't
much the worse for his rough experience. He was rather stiff and lame,
and the back of his neck was very sore where Granny Fox had seized
him, but he would be quite himself in a day or two.

"I must get home now," said he in a rather faint voice. "Mrs. Peter
will be sure that something has happened to me and will be worried
almost to death."

"No, you don't!" declared Jimmy Skunk. "You are going to stay right
here where we can take care of you. It wouldn't be safe for you to try
to go to the Old Briar-patch now, because if you should meet Old Man
Coyote or Reddy Fox or Whitetail the Marshhawk, you would not be able
to run fast enough to get away. I will go down and tell Mrs. Peter,
and you will make yourself comfortable in the old house behind that
stump where I was hiding."

Peter tried to insist on going home, but the others wouldn't hear of
it, and Jimmy Skunk settled the matter by starting for the dear Old
Briar-patch. He found little Mrs. Peter anxiously looking towards the
Green Forest for some sign of Peter.

"Oh!" she cried, "you have come to bring me bad news. Do tell me
quickly what has happened to Peter!"

"Nothing much has happened to Peter," replied Jimmy promptly. Then in
the drollest way he told all about the fright of Granny Fox when she
first saw the terrible creature rolling down the hill and all that
happened after, but he took great care to make light of Peter's
escape, and explained that he was just going to rest up there on
Prickly Porky's hill for that day and would be home the next night.
But little Mrs. Peter wasn't wholly satisfied.

"I've begged him and begged him to keep away from the Green Forest,"
said she, "but now if he is hurt so that he can't come home, he needs
me, and I'm going straight up there myself!"

Nothing that Jimmy could say had the least effect, and so at last he
agreed to take her to Peter. And so, hopping behind Jimmy Skunk, timid
little Mrs. Peter Rabbit actually went into the Green Forest of which
she was so much afraid, which shows how brave love can be sometimes.

XX

A PLOT TO FRIGHTEN OLD MA