The Happy Valley Mystery

knew what was happening, she was having so much fun she forgot all about the sheep thieves.
    The air was sharp with the chill of coming rain, just sharp enough to release pent-up energy. Dancing and shouting, singing at the top of their voices, the Bob-Whites, the twins, and Ned raced up the pasture slope. In the clumps of bushes that dotted the field and in the light woods that edged the land, Ben had told them, they might startle some jackrabbits.
    The sheep were grazing in the far meadow, but when they heard the shouting, they retired to the outer edge by the fence.
    “Guess it’s just as well,” Ned said when he saw them scattering. “Ben warned us not to frighten them. Hey— that bunch of brush over there—here, Tag! Here, Tip!”
    The collies, seasoned rabbit chasers, didn’t have to be told what to do. They crouched low, dragging themselves cautiously along as they approached the ring of brush.
    “Get over there, Jim,” Bob Hubbell called. “Over there on the side. I’ll beat the brush on this side with this stick. When he hops out, you grab him. Hey, Tag! Stop that!”
    At the first stirring of the brush, Tag’s ears went back. He barked. A rabbit—a big one—jumped out, close enough for Jim to touch his whiskers. But before Tag could make a move, the jackrabbit bunched his back legs, bounded high into the air, stretched himself full length to soar, and came down about eighteen feet away. He was off, flopping across the grass like an old hat in a high wind, three jumps ahead of the yipping dogs.
    The dogs had sense enough to abandon the chase, and they came back, panting, to look for the next victim.
    “Jeepers, I almost had that one by the leg; did you see me?” Jim called, his face glowing.
    Trixie picked herself up, laughing, from where Tag had knocked her down when he saw the rabbit. “You didn’t have a chance, Jim,” she said. “Did you see the size of that jackrabbit?”
    “Jackrabbits,” Mart announced m a professorial tone, “are two feet long when full-grown and weigh six to eight pounds.”
    “That one’s ears alone were a foot long!” Trixie insisted.
    “Keep to the truth,” Brian warned. “I think jackrabbits belong to the rat family.”
    “That is a fallacy,” Mart said. “They used to be called rodents.”
    “I like the little cottontails best,” Diana said as she brushed herself off after her dash after the rabbit. “Are jackrabbits just grown-up cottontails?”
    “Oh, Di!” Mart said disgustedly. “Are rats grownup mice? I’m a Scout,” he went on proudly. “And Jim and Brian should know about rabbits, too, if they’ve studied their manuals. A jackrabbit is entirely different from Peter Rabbit. The western kind is called Lepustownsendii.”
    “I suppose the Lepus part comes from the big jumps they make,” Diana said. “I wish I could remember things the way you do, Mart.”
    Mart made a deep bow to her. “My public!” he said. “I wish Trixie would take advantage of my superior brain and learn a few things from me.”
    “I want to choose the things I want to learn,” Trixie said, “and not have them spouted at me all the time.”
    “Call a truce, you two,” Jim said. “We have to keep quieter around the next clump. Down, Tag... Tipi” The dogs, at his command, slunk close to the ground
    and inched along toward the big brush pile ahead.
    “Nothing stirring there, I guess,” Bob said in a whisper. “I’ll stay on this side... there... nothing, see?” Bob kicked the dense bushes and out hopped three jackrabbits!
    Two of them got away, with Tip and Tag after them like arrows. The third one, the biggest, started to straighten for a long leap, moved toward Mart’s side of the bushes, tacked, turned to Ned’s side, and tacked again, bewildered.
    “Get him!” Mart called. “There!”
    “Where?” Brian called, hooting with laughter. “Look at him now, Mart! Watch out!”
    The rabbit, desperate, threw himself forward, kicking like a mule with his powerful hind legs, and then, catching Mart off guard, sent him sprawling.
    Tip and Tag came back, fuming with frustration, ready for a real fight. Mart, too, his appetite whetted by the near catch, ran at full speed toward a huge clump of dried grass. About twenty-five feet away, the dogs crouched to the ground, then slid along on their bellies. The Bob-Whites and others stood back to watch the dogs’ strategy.
    Slowly they worked their way through the stubble to the tufts of grass, then