The Fox That Wanted Nine Golden Tails — Reading Companion

about the size of a cat, and lived in the Fertile Plain of Sweet Flags, one cool and dewy night his mother made a bed of leaves behind a log, and as she cuddled him close to her warm bosom she told him how to know if the dogs were anywhere around.

She said when the wind brought him a hot breath out of a cold nose, a breath that smelt like it had a bark in it, he must listen with both ears, and after that if he heard a sound that was neither hungry nor angry, but came full tilt out of a throat just bursting with joy, he would know that the dogs were on his trail, for they only chased animals for the fun of catching them, and because a fox was so cunning, it was great sport to run him down. And if he saw strange tracks, in which had lodged a caterpillar’s hair or an ant’s egg, the dogs had passed the day before, but if the tracks were bare, the feet that made them were not far away.

And she added if he were smart enough to never, never let the dogs get after him, when he was a thousand years old a dragon would give him nine golden tails. It was true no one had ever seen a fox with more than one tail, but in the Kojiri, or Tails of Ancient Things, which was written on the bark of the oldest trees, it had always been told that there would be one fox who would in this way become the hero of his race, and perhaps he would be that very one if he learned to be clever and careful. And as his mother was the wisest fox on earth, he knew that she knew what she was talking about, and he was glad now to hear there was a dragon handy.

In fact, Napatantutu was exactly the kind of a home the fox was looking for, dragon and all, and he was quite sure he could pass a thousand quiet years here without ever hearing the bark of a dog. He no longer jumped at the sound of every crackling twig or put his ear to the ground before he sat down to rest, and often he would lie for hours on some cool knoll licking his paws and thinking up some prank to play on his neighbors. And he grew fat and saucy and lazy, and whisked his one insignificant tail proudly as he walked.

But, alas! there came an end to these delightful days. Late in the afternoon of his hundredth birthday, as he stood watching two ants wage a fierce battle over a grain of rice, close behind him he heard a sound that made his very blood run cold. He raised his head and sniffed the air, then stood trembling.

“The dogs!” he groaned, as a second time, and nearer now, came the awful noise, and he darted like an arrow through the forest.

Now Nio Kuro, a Prince and the most famous hunter in the kingdom, had come in his boat down the river that ran through the haunted wood. With him he had brought many servants and his pack of trained leopards, with which he hunted, and which were swifter and had keener scent than any dogs. Possibly Nio Kuro had never heard of this forest, or it may have been that he became so excited when the leopards started on their wild chase that he forgot to be afraid of goblins. At any rate, he dashed headlong into the wood, encouraging his leopards with loud shouts, and his servants, after a moment’s hesitation, followed him.

The fox was crashing through the underbrush just ahead of his pursuers, now tearing his way through hanging vines and again leaping over rocks and streams. The leopards came closer and closer behind him. On they flew through swamps and thickets, into thorn bushes and bramble patches and across deep ravines, and not even the wind could keep up with them. At last the poor fox was tired out. His legs were torn and bleeding, he had left bunches of his fur on many a bush and thorn, his feet were bruised and lame and his breath almost gone.