“Now you creep along after Beckie. She won’t be afraid of you, and if you can keep her there by the grape vine for a while, by talking to her, it will give me a chance to sneak up behind the bushes and grab her before she knows what is happening. Will you do it?”
“I will,” said Mr. Fuzzytail, for he was afraid of the big bad bear. So that’s how it was the fox kept on talking to Beckie as she picked the grapes. He wanted to keep her attention so she would not notice the bear sneaking up on her.
“Well, I must be going now. Good-by, Mr. Fuzzytail.”
“Oh, good-by,” said the sly fox, and out of the corner of his eye he saw the bad bear behind the grape vine. The bear had sneaked up without Beckie hearing him, because she was so busy in being polite to the fox. “Good-by, Beckie,” went on Mr. Fuzzytail. And then to himself he said: “I guess you won’t go very far.”
Well, Beckie leaned over to pick up the box of ice cream that she had bought for Neddie and just then, with a loud roar, out from behind the grape vine sprang the bad bear:
“Ha! This is the time I have you!” he cried to Beckie.
Beckie jumped so that the box of ice cream slipped out of her paw and fell to the ground. The paper box hit a sharp stone, burst open and out ran the ice cream all over, for it had melted when Beckie stopped to pick the grapes.
“Wow!” cried the bad bear, as he made a jump for Beckie.
But he never reached her. Beckie leaped back just in time, and the bear came down with his paws in the puddle of the slippery ice cream.
“Bang!” he went. His feet slid out from under him, just as if he were coasting down hill backward, and he got so tangled up with himself that by the time he was untangled Beckie had run away and gotten safely home. Oh, how she ran! No bad bear could catch her.
The bad creature who had gone to all this trouble to catch Beckie got up out of the ice cream. He was a funny looking sight, all splattered up and plastered with dried leaves.
“This was all your fault!” he cried to the fox. “Be off before I bite you!” And the sly fox was glad enough to go.
So that’s how Beckie got away from the bear by means of the slippery ice cream. She told her mamma what had happened, and Mrs. Stubtail sent Uncle Wigwag to the store for more ice cream for Neddie. So the little bear, who was stung by the bees, had some, after all, and everybody was happy except the bad bear.