CHAPTER XI
AN EXCITING DAY FOR BILLY
AS Billy stood watching the antics of the boys, a bumble bee began buzzing around his head, bothering him by darting in and out of his ears. He shook his head and tried also to paw it away, but it still persisted in humming around and darting at him.
“Say, you old buzzer, if you don’t keep away from me, I’ll swallow you alive,” threatened Billy.
Just then the bee made a dive for his nose, but Billy opened his mouth and swallowed it. But not before the bee had stung his tongue. The pain was terrific, and Billy jumped about as if he had suddenly gone crazy. He stood on his head, rolled in the grass, wheeled round and round on his hind legs and pawed the air with his fore feet, all the while bleating pitifully.
Seeing the goat carrying on in this way, the boys thought he was trying to mimic them, which made them laugh so they could not stand up, for of course they did not know he had been stung. Alas for them! Billy thought they were making sport of his pain, and with a single bound he was upon them, glad of a chance to hurt something as he was being hurt. He kicked, butted and pawed them until he had sent one boy over the fence into the alley, and another was doubled up with his hands over his stomach. Two boys escaped, but the fifth ran toward the kitchen door, Billy in hot pursuit.
The boy had slammed the door in Billy’s face and was running through the house when Billy butted a big hole straight through the screen door. This brought the goat up behind a big, fat cook who had her hands in bread dough. Before she knew what had happened, she felt herself falling backward. To save herself, she grabbed at the bread pan. Of course it slid off the table and she fell on the floor. The bread pan turned upside down over Billy’s horns, and the sticky mass of dough went trickling down over one eye and on down over his nose.
The cook’s screams brought the master of the house from his study to the kitchen, but on arriving at the doorway he was met by an infuriated goat who lowered his head to butt him. On seeing such an adversary, the master made haste to retreat and quickly put the dining table between them. But he was not quite nimble enough for Billy was close on his heels and the chase was on.
Round and round that table they ran, with Billy gaining at every step, Mr. Robinson calling loudly for help. Bridget had collected her wits by this time and came to his rescue with a broom and every time Billy passed her on his way around the table after Mr. Robinson, she gave him a whack with it. Billy paid not the slightest attention to her, as he was much too intent on overtaking Mr. Robinson and giving him one mighty butt. In an ill-fated moment Mr. Robinson’s foot slipped as he rounded one end of the table. He grabbed the table runner to save himself, but that did no good. He fell on one knee, and the table runner carried with it vase, flowers and all, which came tumbling to the floor just in time to fall on Billy’s head. It hurt him not at all, but really did him a good turn as it washed the sticky dough from his horns and eyes, for which he was truly thankful.
This little delay gave Mr. Robinson time to pick himself up and escape through the hall and up the front stairs, which he took two at a time. He rushed to his wife’s room, expecting to find the door unlocked, but alas, it was bolted and he heard his wife calling, “Help! Help! Burglars!” out of the window.
“Mary, Mary!” he shouted. “Let me in! Unbolt the door! It is I, your husband!”
But she was too frightened to recognize his voice, and would not leave the window through which she was leaning to call for help.
Now the door to her room had an extra large transom over it, plenty large enough for a person to climb through, and Mr. Robinson grabbed a stool in the hallway, pushed it under the transom and succeeded in raising himself up on the ledge of the door where he hung balancing himself on his stomach when he heard Billy come clattering up the stairs.
“Mary, Mary, open the door quickly! Stop that calling! Don’t you hear me? It is I, your husband!” he shouted at her again.
But his wife only saw a man climbing through her transom and thought it was one of the burglars she had heard downstairs, and leaned still further out of the window in an attempt to see someone coming along the street. She lost her balance and fell head first out of the window, but as luck would have it, she landed in a soft flower bed, and the window not being so very far from the ground, the fall did not injure her in the least.
At the moment she fell, Billy reached the head of the stairs. Seeing Mr. Robinson dangling there, half in and half out, he jumped on the stool and gave him a mighty butt that shoved him all the way through, and he landed on the floor of his wife’s room all in a heap. In a moment he was on his feet and rushed to the window to see if his wife had been killed by her fall, forgetting all about Billy in his anxiety about his wife.
Billy’s prey having thus escaped him, and hearing footsteps on the stairs, he knew somebody was answering Mrs. Robinson’s cries for help. He ran down the long hall, hoping to find a back stairway, for he well knew if he was caught by the police or whoever it was coming to the rescue, they would club him. He was in luck, for he came to a pair of stairs leading straight down to an outside back porch. And in a jiffy he was out in the alley, running for dear life, trying to put as much distance between himself and the Robinson house as he could.
All this time his tongue was half killing him with pain, and it was now so swollen he could not close his mouth. He was wild for a drink of water. He remembered he had seen a lovely sparkling fountain, and he was increasing his speed so he would reach it quickly when he heard a noise behind him that sounded like a patrol wagon coming lickety-split down the street. However, it proved to be just a truck full of men, and Billy thought, “I have no fear of them,” when suddenly the truck stopped as it was about to pass him, and one of the men exclaimed, “There he is now! The very goat we are looking for!” and two fellows leaped out after him.
“Oh, no, you don’t!” said Billy to himself, and he kicked up his heels and sped down the street and around the corner of the alley. The men ran after him as fast as ever they could and the truck followed but when they reached the corner, no goat was in sight.
“Drat that old rascal! He is hiding somewhere! But where I can’t imagine as all I see are high back yard walls and fences, with not an open gate any place,” said one of the men.
Just then three shrill screams rent the air about half way down the alley. The men knew immediately that Billy must have run into a yard and frightened some woman.
They were right in this surmise. Being a good jumper, Billy had leaped over a wall and landed in a beautiful garden where a hammock was swung between two trees. A lovely young lady lay in it, reading a book and eating fruit. On seeing a big, white goat leap over the fence and come straight towards her, she tried to get out of the hammock. But you know what a hammock is when you try to get out of one in a hurry? It simply turned upside down and she was in a heap on the grass, with fruit, pillows and book all about her, and she began to scream and call for help.
Billy grabbed a pear and trotted on through the yard. At that second a big touring car was backed out of the garage by a chauffeur, and being fond of riding in any kind of an automobile, Billy ran across the lawn and with one bound was in the tonneau. This so surprised the chauffeur that instead of stopping the car, he stepped on the accelerator and the car shot out to the street at forty miles an hour. The moment they were leaving in this manner, three men climbed over the back wall, one ran after the car and the goat and the other two went to the aid of the young woman who was still pleading for aid at the top of her voice. She had rolled around in trying to regain her feet so that instead of freeing herself, she had wound herself up in hammock and pillows until she was helpless. The men quickly had her on her feet and then they all ran to the front yard to discover what had become of the car and Billy.
Far down the street they could see a large crowd had gathered and they hurried along, sure it must be caused by a wreck of the car in which Billy rode.
“Wait until I tell our truck driver to come around on the street and pick us up,” said one of the men as they ran. “We’ll get there that way quicker than by foot.”
What really had happened was this:
When the chauffeur came to his senses, he tried to slow down but he did not do so quickly enough and at a cross street he collided with a milk wagon, upsetting it and spilling out all the milk cans. The impact threw the chauffeur out of his car and stunned him for a minute. The truck carrying the men came up just then, they picked him up and put him in the truck, while one of them drove the auto back to the garage. No harm was done the car with the exception of scraping off a little paint, and, forgetting the loss of milk, the milk wagon suffered not at all. And now where was the cause of all this commotion, Mr. Billy Whiskers?
He was quietly drinking water from a crystal fountain in some private grounds, and I am glad to say that the swelling of his tongue was fast going down.
“Mercy! I believe I am tired! Guess I’ll just go over under those bushes and take a nap,” he thought.
This he did, but he slept much longer than he had intended, for when he awoke the sun was going down, and he decided to try to find Ruthie once more. He had just stepped out into the street, when who should he see driving down his way but Mr. Watson with Ruthie on his lap. They had hunted and hunted for Billy with no success at all and had finally decided to go home without the goat, getting the cart some other day. They were as glad to see Billy as Billy was to see them. Mr. Watson stepped out of his buggy and tied Billy under it, then driving slowly, they went home to the farm.
Thus ended a very exciting day for Billy.