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As sure as
you're alive now, Peter Rabbit, some day I will catch you," snarled
Reddy Fox, as he poked his black nose in the hole between the
roots of the Big Hickory-tree which grows close to the Smiling
Pool. "It is lucky for you that you were not one jump farther
away from this hole."
Peter, safe
inside that hole, didn't have a word to say, or, if he did, he
didn't have breath enough to say it. It was quite true that if
he had been one jump farther from that hole, Reddy Fox would have
caught him. As it was, the hairs on Peter's funny white tail actually
had tickled Reddy's back as Peter plunged frantically through
the root-bound entrance to that hole. It had been the narrowest
escape Peter had had for a long, long time. You see, Reddy Fox
had surprised Peter nibbling sweet clover on the bank of the Smiling
Pond, and it had been a lucky thing for Peter that that hole,
dug long ago by Johnny Chuck's grandfather, had been right where
it was. Also, it was a lucky thing that old Mr. Chuck had been
wise enough to make the entrance between the roots of that tree
in such a way that it could not be dug any larger.
Reddy Fox
was too shrewd to waste any time trying to dig it larger. He knew
there wasn't room enough for him to get between those roots. So,
after trying to make Peter as uncomfortable as possible by telling
him what he, Reddy, would do to him when he did catch him, Reddy
trotted off across the Green Meadows. Peter remained where he
was for a long time. When he was quite sure that it was safe to
do so, he crept out and hurried, lipperty-lipperty-lip, up to
the Old Orchard. He felt that that would be the safest place for
him, because there were ever so many hiding places in the old
stone wall along the edge of it.
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