The Tale of Daddy Longlegs | Page 6

to help with the harvesting--without saying anything more to anybody.
"Farmer Green can't help but be pleased," he thought, as he started off across the farmyard in the same direction in which Johnnie Green's father had gone when he called to the hired man to hurry.
Daddy had not gone far before he met Buster Bumblebee. "How far is it to the oat field?" Daddy asked him.
"Oh! It's not ten minutes' journey," said Buster. "I've just come from the clover-patch myself; and that's twice as far."
Daddy Longlegs thanked him. And then he turned and tottered on again. For a long time he walked as fast as he could. It seemed to him that he must have been travelling at least half an hour. But he saw not the slightest sign of the oat field, though he climbed a fence and peered across the rolling meadow.
Then he happened to catch sight of Chirpy Cricket hopping through the grass. And Daddy called to him and asked him how far it was to the oat field.
"It's a good half-day's journey from here," said Chirpy Cricket cheerfully. But Daddy Longlegs did not feel the least bit cheerful when he heard that.
"For the land's sake!" he exclaimed. "Are you sure you're not mistaken? Buster Bumblebee told me a long time ago that it was only a ten-minute trip."
"Ah! So it is--for him!" said Chirpy Cricket. "You must remember that he flies very fast. But I have to hop along much more slowly. And as for you, at the pace you were travelling before you stopped to speak to me you wouldn't reach the oat field before to-morrow morning! No--not even if you walked all night!"

VIII
IN NEED OF NEW SHOES
DADDY LONGLEGS couldn't help feeling discouraged when Chirpy Cricket told him that he wouldn't be able to reach the oat field before the next morning.
"I declare," he said, "if I had known it was such a long journey I wouldn't have tried to go there to help Farmer Green with his harvesting. I've already walked so far that my shoes are all worn out. And I can neither go on nor go back until I get some new ones." He looked very doleful--for he didn't know what to do. But Chirpy Cricket laughed merrily--as was his custom.
"Cheer up!" he cried. "You're in luck! Jimmy Rabbit has a shoe shop in this very meadow. Just follow me and I'll show you where it is!"
So off they went. And soon they arrived at the shoe shop, in front of which they found Jimmy Rabbit all smiles and bows.
"Here's a friend of mine who needs some new shoes," Chirpy Cricket announced.
"Come right in!" cried Jimmy Rabbit. "Any friend of Chirpy Cricket's is a friend of mine too. And if I can't fit your feet with shoes it won't be my fault. Only yesterday I sold a pair of shoes to old Mr. Crow. And his feet are enormous, as every one knows."
"Well, I want more than just one pair," Daddy Longlegs piped up. "I want four--making eight shoes in all. And I flatter myself that my feet are very small," he added.
Jimmy Rabbit looked a bit surprised at that remark. He was not accustomed to seeing eight-legged people in his shop. But he made no comment, though he couldn't help staring at his new customer.
Meanwhile Chirpy Cricket had hopped away, after telling Daddy that he was leaving him in good hands. And then Jimmy Rabbit went to work briskly. He began setting shoes of all sorts and sizes before Daddy Longlegs. And soon he was not only placing them in front of Daddy, but on both sides of him--and behind him as well.
Jimmy Rabbit was so spry, and most of the shoes were so big, that in no time at all Daddy Longlegs was completely surrounded by a wall of shoes, which rapidly grew higher and higher.
"Stop! stop!" cried Daddy Longlegs. But Jimmy Rabbit was so busy that he didn't hear him. And he kept piling more and more shoes around his tiny visitor, until Daddy Longlegs was lost in a small mountain of big, little, and medium-sized shoes of many different colors.
Not till then did Jimmy Rabbit pause for breath. And when he saw that his customer had disappeared he was more than surprised.
"Where can he have gone?" Jimmy exclaimed. "I didn't see him go out. He was sitting right here only a moment ago. And now he's certainly not in my shop."
Even at that very moment Daddy Longlegs was frantically crying "Help! help!" But his thin, weak voice was quite muffled by the great heap of shoes that buried him.
After waiting for a few minutes Jimmy Rabbit closed--and locked--his door, and went skipping off to Farmer Green's garden, where the cabbages grew.

IX
LOCKED IN!
POOR Daddy Longlegs! Buried as he was under