Now Sammy knew perfectly well that Chatterer wouldn't sleep a wink that night for worrying. Already he had made up his mind not to tell Shadow, for like all the other little meadow and forest people he hated Shadow. But of course Chatterer couldn't know that he had so made up his mind, and a great fear that Sammy might tell clutched his heart.
"If you'll promise not to tell Shadow where I am, you--you are welcome to all the corn you want at Farmer Brown's corn-crib," said Chatterer, in a very meek voice.
"Indeed!" replied Sammy. "How very generous of you, seeing that it doesn't belong to you, anyway, and I have just as much right to it as you have."
"And--and--well, I'll help you get it," continued Chatterer, his sharp wits working their hardest to think of some way to get Sammy to make that promise.
"Why, when you can't get it between the cracks, I'll bring some out for you and hide it in the stone wall where you can find it," replied Chatterer. But in his heart he said that he would hide it so that Sammy would have to hunt a long time to find it. It seemed almost as if Sammy read that thought, for cocking his head on one side, he said:
"I'll promise not to tell Shadow, if you'll promise to get me corn whenever I want it and put it just where I tell you to."
Chatterer didn't like that idea at all, but what could he do? He thought it over so long that Sammy Jay spread his wings as if to start that very instant for the Green Forest.
And so these two scamps of the Green Forest made up and planned how they would live all winter on Farmer Brown's corn.
Chatterer wished now that he hadn't been quite so greedy. If he had been content to let Sammy Jay get what corn he could from Farmer Brown's corn-crib, instead of playing that sharp trick to frighten him away, Chatterer wouldn't have had to make that promise to get the corn for Sammy and put it wherever Sammy wanted it put. It wasn't much to do. Chatterer really didn't mind doing the thing itself; it was the thought that Sammy could make him do it.
Now Chatterer has sharp wits, and Sammy Jay has sharp wits. Chatterer had always thought his the sharpest, and it hurt his pride to feel that Sammy had got the best of him. He couldn't think of anything else as he curled up for the night in his snug bed in the old home of Drummer the Woodpecker up in the Old Orchard. He thought and thought and thought and thought, trying to find some way to wriggle out of his promise, and just before he fell asleep, an idea came to him. He would go over to the corn-crib before Sammy Jay was awake, eat his fill, and then hide from Sammy.