iends. When he met Dodger the Deer, Nimble called to him: "See
what I've got! Antlers! Two points!"

"Ho!" said Dodger. "So have I got antlers. And they have two points,
too."

Nimble had been so interested in his own horns that he hadn't looked at
Dodger's. And now when he gazed at them he saw that they were like his.

"What about the rest of the Spike Horns?" Nimble asked Dodger. "Have
they----"

"Yes, they have!" Dodger interrupted. "I tell you, 'two-pointers' are
common this season."

"So there aren't any more Spike Horns!" said Nimble somewhat sadly.

"Oh, yes! Plenty!" Dodger answered. "But they're an entirely new crop.
They were fawns last year."

When he heard that bit of news Nimble felt happier. And as soon as he
parted from Dodger the Deer he went and found some of the new Spike
Horns and showed them his wonderful two-point antlers.

But somehow they didn't seem at all impressed. They were too much taken
up with their own spikes to pay any attention to Nimble.

"Anyhow," he said to himself, "we 'two-pointers' can have some good mock
battles together."

And they did. They had mock battles that became famous all around Blue
Mountain. And of all the "two-pointers" that lived in that neighborhood,
Nimble and his friend Dodger the Deer were known as the best
sham-fighters. They could look fiercer and act angrier than any of their
young friends. And the way they tore into each other was almost enough
to frighten you, if you had seen them.

Old Mr. Crow said it was worth flying a mile to watch one of their
set-tos.

XV

A MOCK BATTLE

When Nimble had three-points on each of his antlers, in his fourth
summer, he felt that he was at last grown up. He was now a
"three-pointer." Some of the older bucks had no more points than he.
Many of them were but "four-pointers." His own father had been a
"five-pointer." So Nimble hoped, secretly, that he would have five-point
antlers in another two years.

As soon as his new horns were ready Nimble and his friend Dodger the
Deer began their mock battles again. And Nimble found them greater fun
than ever.

Dodger was a spry fellow. He was quick as a flash at dodging. When
Nimble ran at him with head lowered and horns aimed straight at him
Dodger could wait until Nimble all but struck him, before leaping aside.
And then Nimble would go rushing past him.

But Dodger did not always dodge when attacked. Sometimes he stood his
ground, with his own head lo