Free Squirrel World by Johanna Hurwitz Page A

too.”
    “Well, come along,” I said to the guinea pigs. “I’ve already found a couple of possible homes for you, but you’d better hurry before some other animal moves inside.”
    “Oh, Lexi, you are so good to us,” Plush called to me. “I’ve missed you during the winter.” She paused a moment, taking a deep breath. “And I’ve missed the fresh air and the sun.”
    “And the seeds,” said Pudge, his mouth full of food.
    “You don’t look as if you went hungry inside the rain forest,” I commented.
    “There was plenty for us to eat,” PeeWee said. “And the other creatures were willing to share with us, too.”
    “But not much variety,” grumbled Pudge, biting off a bud from a nearby bush.
    “Look,” called out Perky. “There’s one of your cousins, Lexi.”
    “And there’s another,” called out Pip.
    “And another,” called out Squeak.
    I didn’t even turn my head to look. The park is filled with my cousins—and brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles. Sometimes we stop to greet one another or to chase one another up and down a tree, but mostlywe’re busy looking for our next meal. There’s plenty to eat in the park, but until the food’s inside our mouths, it doesn’t count.
“Chew up your nut before you talk about it,”
my mother always used to say.
    I watched as the guinea pigs began their journey home. Poor creatures. Their legs are so short that the guinea pigs move very slowly. A distance that I can cover in a moment with a single flying leap takes them many minutes to travel. And of course, guinea pigs don’t have tails, and they can’t climb trees. So although I’m very fond of them, I’m truly grateful that I was born a squirrel and not a guinea pig. A pair of humans walked by, and I thought to myself, thank goodness I’m not one of those creatures, either.
    And then, because it was such a beautiful spring day and because I was feeling so especially pleased with life, I did one of my spectacular double somersaults from one tree branch to another.

CHAPTER TWO
Cousin Lenox

    As I’ve mentioned, I have hundreds and hundreds of relatives all through the park. I’ve never bothered to make a full count of all of us, although once a human did attempt to do that. What humans don’t know is that the best counters in the park are birds. They seem to be born with an ability to know numbers. It’s a skill they need in order to keep track of the eggs in their nests.
    The day that PeeWee and Plush left the rain forest, I arrived back at my tree home to discover an unexpected visitor. It was my cousin Lenox. I must confess he’s not my favorite relative. He tends to be gloomy and grumpy much of the time. He complains a lot. It’s as if every seed he ate were sour and every nut rotten. But as we had not seen each other in many, many months, I greeted him in the traditional friendly-squirrel manner: I chased him up and down my tree three times. We didn’t attempt to speak. The chase is just a show of our speed and stamina and good health. Then, when we had completed this rite, Lenox joined me on a limb outside my nest.
    “Well, Lenox,” I said to him. “How hasthe weather treated you? Did you enjoy the winter?”
    “Winter, summer, spring, fall—it’s all the same,” grumbled Lenox.
    “What do you mean?” I asked him. “Every day is different. Every day brings us something new: a nut, a seed, a flower, a friend.”
    Lenox scratched his right side with his left paw. Then he scratched his left side with his right paw. “I’m bored with nuts and seeds and flowers. And I haven’t made a new friend in ages.”
    “Well, stick around for a few hours,” I suggested. “My friends PeeWee and Plush and their children will be turning up later in the day. I think you’ll enjoy them.”
    “PeeWee? Is that the fat furry fellow I’ve heard about? The one without a tail?”
    “The very one,” I said, nodding. “He doesn’t have a tail, but he can read stories and poems to