Tum Tum, the Jolly Elephant | Page 4

in their trunks and sprayed it over their backs, to drive away the flies and gnats that bit them. Then they swam out into deep water, and rolled and tumbled about, having great fun. They splashed each other, squirted water all over, and soon were as cool as cucumbers on ice.
All at once, through the jungle, there sounded a loud trumpeting.
"Hark!" cried Whoo-ee, as he stopped squirting water on Thorny. "What's that?"
"It's Mr. Boom signaling that there's danger!" cried Tum Tum.
CHAPTER II
TUM TUM IS CAUGHT
Tum Tum, and the other elephants who were in swimming, made no more noise than a fly walking up the window. They all kept quiet and listened.
Through the jungle again sounded the trumpet call:
"Umph! Umph! Boom! Boom! Toom!"
"That sure means danger!" cried Tum Tum. "Come on! We had better go back to where our fathers and mothers are."
"Indeed we had!" said Thorny, as she and Zunga waded to the shore, water dripping from them.
"That's always the way!" complained Gumble-umble. "Just as we are having fun, something has to happen."
"Look here!" exclaimed Whoo-ee, "you don't want to be caught in a trap, do you?"
"Of course not," said Gumble-umble.
"And you don't want a hunter to shoot you, or to carry you away far off somewhere, do you?"
"You know I don't," and Gumble-umble did not speak quite so crossly this time.
"Well, then," said Whoo-ee, "let's do as Tum Tum is doing, and start for home. There must be some danger, or Mr. Boom wouldn't have called to us that way."
"Indeed he wouldn't," said Tum Tum, and he did not laugh in his jolly way now. "My mother told me to be sure and listen for a call from Mr. Boom. She said he would be looking for danger, and when he called, I was to hurry home."
Tum Tum was out on the bank of the river now. Gumble-umble was the last one of the elephants to come from the swimming pool.
"Let's hurry," said Tum Tum.
"That's what I say!" cried Thorny. "I don't want to be caught by some hunter."
The elephant children knew what hunters were, for their fathers and mothers had often told them about the natives who tried to catch elephants. Indeed, some of the older elephants had more than once been caught in traps, but they had gotten out.
Without stopping to put on any clothes, for of course elephants do not wear any, Tum Tum and the others hurried off through the jungle toward where the rest of the herd was feeding. Several times as they hastened along, they could hear Mr. Boom trumpeting, and it sounded as though he said:
"Hurry along! Hurry along! There's danger! Danger!"
And Tum Tum and the others did hurry, you may be sure of that.
Before the elephant children reached the place where they had left the herd feeding, Tum Tum saw something pushing through the jungle toward them.
"Look out!" he warned his playmates. "Something is coming!"
The five elephants stopped short, and were beginning to get afraid when, all at once, Tum Tum's mother burst through the bushes and came up to him.
"Oh, I was so frightened!" she said, speaking through her trunk. "I thought you were never coming!"
"Oh, we heard Mr. Boom," said Tum Tum, "and we came on as soon as we could. But what's the matter, mamma?"
"Plenty is the matter, or, rather, is going to be, unless we can get away," said the mamma elephant. "A big band of hunters is in the jungle, and they are coming this way."
"Did you see them?" asked Whoo-ee.
"No, indeed! If we waited until they were close enough for us elephants to see them, they would be so close, that we could not get away. Some monkeys brought word that the hunters were on the march. So we are going to start at once and go afar off, into a deep, dark part of the jungle, where they cannot find us."
"Well, we had a swim, anyhow," said Tum Tum. "I'm hungry, mamma. Have we time to eat?"
"No, indeed," said the lady elephant. "We'll just have to eat as we go along. You children had better go to your fathers and mothers," she said to Whoo-ee, Gumble-umble, Thorny and Zunga. "They are, very likely, looking for you."
So the four friends of Tum Tum started off, and soon the whole herd of elephants was moving off through the jungle, led by Mr. Boom, who had heard of the danger from a monkey friend.
All that day the herd of elephants kept on, crashing their way through the jungle. They did not follow any path, but made one for themselves. Through the thick, strong vines they pushed their way, breaking down trees, or pulling them up by their roots. Nothing could stop the elephants when they were running away from danger.
"Oh, dear! This is no fun! I'm tired!