“What shall we do?” asked Curly.

“Let’s build a fort and play soldier,” suggested Floppy.  “Pinky can be a prisoner and we’ll make believe capture her, and then we’ll rescue her, and shoot off make-believe guns, and—­”

“No—­No!” cried Baby Pinky, as she tried to stand up on the end of her twisty tail, but she couldn’t, for it was too slimpsy and not stiff enough.  She fell down, but her brothers picked her up, and then the curl came back in her tail.

You see, after the bear had tied Curly to the fence and made his tail all frizzy-like, all the other pigs, including Pinky and Floppy wanted their tails to curl also, and their mamma had to do it for them, twisting them around the rolling-pin.  And she even curled her own, and her husband’s, that that’s why all pigs have curly tails now, because it’s stylish, you see.

“Why don’t you want to play soldier?” asked Floppy of his little sister.

“Oh, it’s too scary!” she said.  “And the guns make so much noise.  If you won’t shoot off any guns I’ll play.”

“Pooh!” exclaimed Curly, “all soldiers have to shoot guns!  You couldn’t be a soldier with a gun that didn’t make any noise.”

“Then I’m not going to play,” said Pinky, who was just the color of the inside of a shiny sea shell.  “I’ll bounce my rubber ball,” she went on, “and you boys can play soldier.”

So she bounced her ball that Grandfather Squealer had given her, while Curly and Floppy as I’ll call him for short, made a fort out of cobs from which they had gnawed all the corn, and they had a fine time.  They were off playing in the woods, while Pinky stayed near the house.

She was hoping her mamma would soon have the apple pie baked and would call her in and give her a piece, when, all of a sudden, as Pinky bounced her ball, it went high in the air, but it didn’t come down again right away.

“My!  What can have happened?” thought little Pinky, and she looked around, and there she saw a great big fuzzy fox, standing behind her.  And the fox cried out, as he rubbed his nose: 

“Did you hit me with that rubber ball?”

“Yes—­yes—­perhaps I did,” said poor Baby Pinky, trembling so that she nearly shook the curl out of her tail.  “I tossed my ball up in the air, but I’m sure I didn’t mean to hit you with it.  Please forgive me.”

“No, indeed, I will not!” exclaimed the fox.  “Your rubber ball hit me right on the nose when it came down, and I caught it.  And, just for that, I am going to carry you away with me and make a pork pie of you!”

“Oh, please don’t!” begged Pinky, shaking more than ever, and she squealed as loudly as she could, but her mamma did not hear her, for she was beating up some eggs to make a cake, and the egg beater made so much noise that she couldn’t hear her own little girl.  And Curly and Floppy were shooting off their make-believe guns, and making so much noise in the woods that they couldn’t hear, and there was the fox about to carry off the poor little piggie girl to his den.  Oh, wasn’t it terrible?