All of a sudden, pop! right out of the solid earth among the daisies and buttercups, just like a jack-in-the-box, came Johnny Chuck! He looked very warm and a little tired, but he was still chuckling as he scampered across to another hole of Grandfather Chuck's. By and by something else crawled out of the hole Johnny Chuck had made. Could it be Reddy Fox? Where were his white waistcoat and beautiful red coat? And was that thing dragging behind him his splendid tail? He crept out of the hole and then just lay down and panted for breath. He was almost too tired to move. Then he began to spit sand out of his mouth and blow it out of his nose and try to wipe it out of his eyes. The long hair of his fine coat was filled full of sand and no one would ever have guessed that this was Reddy Fox. "Haw! haw! haw!" shouted Blacky the Crow. Then everybody shouted "Haw! haw! haw!" and began to roll in the grass and hold on to their sides once more; everybody but Reddy Fox. When he could get his breath he didn't look this way or that way, but just sneaked off to his home under the big hickory. [Illustration: Then everybody shouted "Haw! haw! haw!"] And when Old Mother West Wind came with her big bag to take the Merry Little Breezes to their home behind the Purple Hills, Johnny Chuck waddled back up the Lone Little Path chuckling to himself, for that little feeling of discontent was all gone. He had found that after all he could do something better than anybody else on the Green Meadows, for in his heart he knew that none could dig so fast as he. VII JOHNNY CHUCK'S SECRET Johnny Chuck pushed up the last bit of gravel from the hole he had dug between the roots of the old apple tree in a corner of the Green Meadows. He smoothed it down on the big, yellow mound he had made in front of his door. Then he sat up very straight on top of the mound, brushed his coat, shook the sand from his trousers and carefully cleaned his hands. After he had rested a bit, he turned around and looked at his new home, for that is what it was, although he had not come there to live yet, and no one knew of it, no one but jolly, round, red Mr. Sun, who, peeping between the branches of the old apple tree, had caught Johnny Chuck at work. But _he_ wouldn't tell, not jolly Mr. Sun! Looking down from the blue sky every day he sees all sorts of queer things and he learns all kinds of secrets, does Mr. Sun, but he never, never tells. No, Sir! Mr. Sun never tells one of them, not even to Old Mother West Wind when at night they go down together behind the Purple Hills. So jolly, round, red Mr. Sun just smiled and smiled when he discovered Johnny Chuck's secret, for that is just what the new home under the apple tree was--a secret. Not even the Merry Little Breezes, who find out almost everything, had discovered it.