“I guess the law that permits hunting Ducks is all right, but there ought to be a law against baiting them in.  That isn’t hunting.  No, Sir, that isn’t hunting.  If this land were my father’s, I would know what to do.  I would put up a sign saying that this was private property and no shooting was allowed.  But it isn’t my father’s land, and that hunter has a perfect right to shoot here.  He has just as much right here as I have.  I wish I could stop him, but I don’t see how I can.”

A frown puckered the freckled face of Farmer Brown’s boy.  You see, he was thinking very hard, and when he does that he is very apt to frown.

“I suppose,” he muttered, “I can tear down his blind.  He wouldn’t know who did it.  But that wouldn’t do much good; he would build another.  Besides, it wouldn’t be right.  He has a perfect right to make a blind here, and having made it, it is his and I haven’t any right to touch it.  I won’t do a thing I haven’t a right to do.  That wouldn’t be honest.  I’ve got to think of some other way of saving those Ducks.”

The frown on his freckled face grew deeper, and for a long time he sat without moving.  Suddenly his face cleared, and he jumped to his feet.  He began to chuckle.  “I have it!” he exclaimed.  “I’ll do a little shooting myself!” Then he chuckled again and started for home.  Presently he began to whistle, a way he has when he is in good spirits.

Blacky the Crow watched him go, and Blacky was well satisfied.  He didn’t know what Farmer Brown’s boy was planning to do, but he had a feeling that he was planning to do something, and that all would be well.  Perhaps Blacky wouldn’t have felt so sure could he have understood what Farmer Brown’s boy had said about doing a little shooting himself.

As it was, Blacky flew off about his own business, quite satisfied that now all would be well, and he need worry no more about those Ducks.  None of the little people of the Green Forest and the Green Meadows knew Farmer Brown’s boy better than did Blacky the Crow.  None knew better than he that Farmer Brown’s boy was their best friend.  “It is all right now,” chuckled Blacky.  “It is all right now.”  And as the cheery whistle of Farmer Brown’s boy floated back to him on the Merry Little Breezes, he repeated it:  “It is all right now.”

CHAPTER XXV:  Blacky Gets A Dreadful Shock

   When friends prove false, whom may we trust? 
   The springs of faith are turned to dust.
    — Blacky the Crow.

Blacky the Crow was in the top of his favorite tree over near the Big River early this afternoon.  He didn’t know what was going to happen, but he felt in his bones that something was, and he meant to be on hand to see.  For a long time he sat there, seeing nothing unusual.  At last he spied a tiny figure far away across the Green Meadows.  Even at that distance he knew who it was; it was Farmer Brown’s boy, and he was coming toward the Big River.