Mappo, the Merry Monkey | Page 8

a second. And there's no use asking a favor of him. He seems to be mad at me. I wonder how I can get away from him!"
Once more Mappo looked at the empty cocoanut shell in his paw--the shell with which he was going to play a trick on Jacko or Bumpo.
Nearer and nearer to Mappo crept the tiger, lashing his tail from side to side. Tigers always do that, just as cats do when they are trying to catch a bird in the garden. Tigers are only big cats, you know, very much bigger and stronger than your pussy. And they always creep slowly, slowly up toward anything they are going to catch, until they are near enough to give one jump and grab it in their claws. That is what the tiger was trying to do to Mappo.
All of a sudden Mappo raised the paw that held the cocoanut shell. The little monkey chap made up his mind to be brave and save himself if he could.
"Take that, Mr. Tiger!" called Mappo, all at once.
With all his might he threw the empty cocoanut shell right at the tiger's head. Monkeys are very good throwers. They are almost as good as are baseball boys at that sort of thing.
"Bang!" went the cocoanut on the tiger's head. It cracked open--I mean the cocoanut cracked open--where Mappo had stuck it together. It made quite a noise.
"Oh my!" cried the tiger, jumping up suddenly, for he did not know what to make of the cocoanut shell in his face. Mappo had thrown it so suddenly.
Then, as the tiger heard the cracking of the cocoanut shell, he thought it was his own head. Tigers are sometimes silly that way, no matter if they are strong, and have sharp claws.
"Oh my head! My head!" cried the tiger. "It is broken!"
You see he really thought it was. The crack of the cocoanut shell made him think that it was his own silly, bad head.
Up in the air reared the tiger on his hind legs. This was just the chance Mappo wanted.
"Here I go!" thought the little monkey chap. "Here's where I get away."
As fast as Mappo could go he scrambled over the ground toward the tree where his house was built. By this time the tiger had seen the empty cocoanut shell fall to the ground, and the striped creature knew what had happened.
"Ha! That monkey boy! He did that!" growled the tiger. "He can't fool me that way! I'll get him! I'll fix him for playing tricks on me!"
Finding that his head was all right, and not cracked as he had feared it was, the tiger gave a big jump, and ran after Mappo. But Mappo was not waiting for him. The little monkey boy was now far across the open place on the ground, and was climbing up into a tree as fast as he could go.
"Come back here!" growled the tiger, making a spring for Mappo. But Mappo was safely out of the way. The tiger's claws stuck in the trunk of the tree, tearing loose some bits of bark, but Mappo was not hurt. He got safely away.
Then, sitting up in the tree on a high limb, Mappo, as he looked down at the tiger, chattered:
"Ha! You didn't get me after all! You didn't catch me! I fooled you! Chatter-chatter-chat! Bur-r-r-r! Wuzzzzzzz! Whir-r-r-r-r-r!"
That's the way Mappo chattered, not so much to make fun of the bad tiger, as to warn the other monkeys in the woods that the bad striped animal was near, and that there was danger in the jungle.
"Chatter-chatter-chat! Bur-r-r-r-r! Whe-e-e-e-e! Zir-r-r-r!" chattered the other monkeys, far off in the jungle, as they heard Mappo's warning. The woods were filled with the sound they made.
"Well, I might as well go away," thought the tiger. "They will all be on the lookout for me now. I'll have to wait until after dark to catch a monkey, or something else to eat. Bur-r-r-r-r-r! But I'm hungry!"
So the tiger slunk away, and I guess no one else in the woods felt sorry that he had not caught Mappo. They were all glad the monkey boy had gotten away, and Mappo was especially glad, on his own account.
"Ha! That was a good trick of yours--to throw the empty cocoanut shell at the tiger, Mappo," said an old grandfather monkey, high in a tree. Mappo had told his friends, the other monkeys, what had happened.
"Yes, indeed it was," said an uncle monkey. "Mappo is a smart boy to think of such a trick."
This made Mappo feel pretty proud of himself.
"Do you know where my papa and mamma are?" he asked.
"They went off over toward the banana grove," said the grandfather monkey. "Be careful of the tiger if you follow them."
"I will," promised Mappo. But