Showdown in Crittertown Read Online Free Page A

eat?”
    Grayson chuckled. “You’d break the branch if you tried to eat in a tree.”
    Nilla squeaked, “Suet is yummy! Seeds are good, too.”
    I concluded, “But nothing beats cheese!”
    The next morning, as always, Chitchat stopped by the post office on his way to school. Instead of my usual short note for the kids, I gave him a long scroll.
    Chitchat teased, “What’s this? The complete memoirs of a mouse?”
    I gave him two acorns. “An extra nut for the added weight.”
    But I knew what the nosy squirrel really wanted. So I told him, “It’s a list of fundraising ideas.”
    I started to tie the scroll around his neck. But Chitchat said, “Read it to me first.”
    I sighed. Human postal carriers are paid money to deliver mail. The Critter Post pays Chitchat in acorns—and gossip.
    After he heard the list, Chitchat said, “Get your pencil! You need to add squirrel feeders, peanut butter pinecones, and garden gnomes.”
    While I wrote, Chitchat asked, “Did I ever tell you about the time I escaped from a cat by posing like a garden gnome?”
    â€œOnly a few times. Why don’t you tell me again after you deliver this list to the kids?”
    I wish I could’ve been there when the third graders read my letter. Instead, Chitchat scurried back to tell me later that morning. The squirrel gushed, “The kids were so excited that they didn’t notice Mrs. Olson come into the room. So she took your letter right out of Tanya’s hands!”
    â€œOh no!” I squeaked.
    Chitchat laughed. “Oh yes! She’d never seen anything like your tiny paw-writing. But then she read it and asked the kids, ‘May I show this list to Principal Clark and Mrs. Brann? I think an arts and crafts sale is a great idea!’”
    I asked, “What’d the kids say?”
    â€œThey said, ‘Sure!’” Chitchat replied. “They were so relieved she hadn’t focused on the mystery of the tiny writing.”
    I was, too!
    Chitchat added, “Then Mrs. Olson went to Mr. Clark’s office to ‘make this thing happen in a big way!’”
    I decided to do the same thing. I wrote a letter inviting “all kindly critters” to help with the fair. The trouble, though, was figuring out how to make enough copies.
    Just then Charlton, one of the Critter Post recruits, came up to me and asked, “What’re you doing?”
    The recruits were too young to make deliveries, so they spent their time learning street names as well as odd and even numbers, and practicing their writing. I grinned and said, “Charlie, I hope your recruits are ready to get busy!”
    Soon, even the youngest were copying the invitation. Some of their letters looked more like scribbles than words. But I praised them for their efforts and hid the sloppy ones under my nest.
    When Grayson woke from his morning nap he asked, “What’s all this?”
    He looked at the letters. “At this rate, you’ll never have enough to send to every nest in town.” Then he grinned slyly. “But there is a way!”
    Grayson’s ideas scare me. I still shudder when I recall the time I helped him trip a trap. So with a dry mouth and a nervous stomach I asked, “What do you mean?”
    â€œThe copy machine!” Grayson squeaked. “I’ve seen Mike use it lots of times. You put what you want to copy on the glass, type a number, then push ‘copy.’”
    I said, “We’ll have to wait until Mike goes to lunch.”
    â€œOf course,” Grayson agreed.
    I taped twelve of the neatest invitations to a piece of paper to make one sheet as big as the glass plate. As soon as Mike left, Grayson and I slipped this page under the post office’s back door.
    Mike had turned off the radio. The office was very quiet as we crawled toward the copy machine. It took two of us to lift the lid. Grayson