When we left off yesterday...It was a springtime night in New England.
The air was sweet, and soft against your cheek.  Look up, and you could
see the lacy silhouette of maple flowers against a full moon.  In the
distance, you could hear those tiny frogs with the mighty voices, the
Spring Peepers, singing their songs of love in the gritty, cold mud.
 
Ping was He looked down from where he was holding onto the seat for dear
life, just as Miss Lily, with a huge grin, shoved the gearshift into
alignment with that shiny letter 'U' scratched into the green paint of
the tractor.  The mighty iron-hearted beast shuddered and groaned,
strange twangingings and ringing harmonics emanated from the badly
stressed engine, now madly chugging away!
 
Inky smoke poured from the stack, and did not rise into the sky.  Ping
coughed, and squinched his eyes shut.  This stuff was foul!  Why was it
pouring down on them?  He looked back over at Miss Lily, who was also
coughing and fanning one paw about in front of her face.  She did not
look the least bit concerned, just hugely amused.
 
That was REALLY starting to get on Ping's nerves, the amused part.
 
Suddenly, the tractor lurched badly to the left, and Ping was thrown
against France, who, predictably,let out an ever more colorful stream of
curses, and lifted every quill in a defensive maneuver.  Being thrown
against her was like trying to sit in a beanbag chair made from an
ill-tempered little cactus!  Ping YOWLED, France CURSED, and Miss Lily
merely chuckled, and made a corrective movement of the steering wheel.
 
The tractor seemed to slew a bit to the right, but it wasn't as bad a
movement as that lurch to the left had been.  In fact, the sound of the
engine suddenly seemed much better, much less stressed, as if something
difficult had been accomplished.  That was when Ping made the mistake of
looking *down*.  Down.  Waaaay down, to the cold ground of the lower
driveway, which appeared to be receding away from him at a goodly rate.
A quick look up revealed that the branches of the trees with their
clusters of sweet green maple flowers were no longer nearly so high above
him as they had been a few short moments ago.  In fact, the tractor was
nearly level with the roof of the house,and rising!
 
'U'.  Up.  It meant UP!!
 
France chose that moment to stick her little round face out of one of the
eyeholes of the dark blue skimask that she was cowering in.  Her black
shoebutton eyes darted down, darted up.  She spared a dismissive glance
for Ping, then without hesitation IMMEDIATELY reached over and BIT Miss
Lily's tail, hard.  Miss Lily's paws flew from the steering wheel, and
began to tug and pull at her tail, trying to dislodge it from the angry
little cactus beanbag's mouth.  The tractor began to slide toward the
house itself, closer and closer...
 
Ping is He reached out with one paw desperately for the unmanned steering
wheel,using the other to right himself in the seat as the tractor tipped
to the left, France was again thrown toward him, Miss Lily lost her
balance completely, and fell from the seat, to wind up dangling by her
tail from the enraged hedgehogs's mouth!  He reached...and...CAUGHT THE
WHEEL!  Then France, Skimask, and Miss Lily began to slide from the
seat...
 
Just imagine the three of them, and that tractor, in silhouette against
the full moon...
 
More Tomorrow
Alexandra in Ma
[Posted in FML issue 4863]