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Show Children's Bedtime Story By THORNTON W. BURGESS PETEK RABBIT TEARS HIS CLOTHES 'Hags end tatters. Ragi and tatteri. Save your life: that'a all that matten " IF PETER RABBIT believes any-' any-' thing he believes that. Perhaps that is why he is so careless about h.pw he looks doesn't mind a little dirt on his trousers or appear to notice no-tice that the fit of his coat is rather too ample for trimness. You see the one great problem before Peter all the time is to save his life. That is something you don't have to do very often. But sometimes you have to as when you cross the street crowded with automobiles and electric elec-tric cars and teams. Then you have to use your eyes and your ears for all they are worth to keep safe and out of harm's way. That is what Peter has to do just about all the time excepting when he is in the dear Old Brier Patch. So his clothes seem a very unimportant matter to him, and he seldom thinks of them. Now as he crouched in the bramble-tangle on the edge of the Green Forest looking straight into the grinning grin-ning face of Reddy Fox you may be sure that he had no room in his thoughts for anything so unimportant unimpor-tant as clothes. He knew by the look in Reddy's eyes that Reddy was going to risk a few scratches and was coming in after him. He knew Now, Peter was frightened. Of course he was. that Reddy knew that the path he had started to cut through the bramble-tangle ended right where he was then sitting, and that there were no other paths. Now, Peter was frightened. Of course he was. But he wasn't as frightened as he might have been if he hadn't known that he could crawl through that bramble-tangle even if there was no path, and, because he was so much smaller, he could do it faster than Reddy possibly could. Reddy thrust his sharp face in at the opening and began to crawl in. Peter turned and began to wriggle and squeeze through where the brambles and vines grew thickest. The thorns clutched at him and tore his coat. Little tufts of fur were left on them. Peter knew that he was tearing his clothes. Those sharp thorns hurt. But he shut his mouth tightly and kept right on. If they hurt him they would hurt Reddy Fox a great deal more, and he didn't believe be-lieve that Reddy would stand it. Already Al-ready Reddy was giving little angry an-gry yelps at the scratches he was getting, and he had not yet reached the really bad places. Every little yelp of pain from Reddy made Peter Pe-ter smile in spite of his own troubles. "Thinks he'll have a rabbit dinner, din-ner, does he? Well, it won't be this rabbit, I can tell him that," muttered mut-tered Peter as he worked his way to the very middle of the old bramble-tangle. Then he ventured to stop and look behind him. Reddy Fox was already al-ready backing out the way he had come in and he was making a great fuss about it, too. Peter knew then that he was safe for just as long as he stayed in the bramble-tangle and he meant that that should be for just as long as Reddy Fox and Red-tail Red-tail the Hawk kept watch outside And now that his fright was less, he had more time to think of other things, and the very first thing was a path out. He didn't propose to tear his clothes and scratch himself him-self any more. He would cut a path straight from where he was to the other side of the bramble-tangle Probably by the time he had it done I Reddy Fox would have become tired I of watching and gone away It would take a good while, working every minute to do it. He would begin at once. No time for dream-jng dream-jng now. Peter settled right down to work, real work (Associated Newspapers-WNU Service. |