Far up on the dark mountainside, in the driving snow, Nimble waited in front of the cave where Cuffy Bear had vanished. And all the time Nimble was growing more uneasy. He feared that Cuffy Bear might be in some sort of trouble.  
Nimble looked all about for help. But there wasn't a sign of anybody stirring, anywhere. All the mountain people seemed to have sought shelter from the storm.
 
At last, however, Peter Mink¹ came sneaking² up from the spring. He had set out to follow Broad Brook³ all the way[Pg 66] up to its beginning, on a hunt for meadow mice. And when he set out to do a thing he always finished it, no matter what the weather might be.
 
"You're just the person I want to see!" Nimble cried. "Will you do me a favor?"
 
Now, Peter Mink never did anybody a favor if he could help it. So he promptly⁴ said, "No!"
 
"Won't you go inside this cave for me and see what's happened to Cuffy Bear?" Nimble implored⁵ him. "He went inside the cave. I promised to wait for him here. And he has been gone for hours."
 
"I won't go into that cave for anybody," Peter Mink declared. "How do I know you're not trying to play a trick on me? I don't see any Bear tracks in the snow."
 
"Of course you don't!" Nimble agreed. "All this snow has fallen since Cuffy crawled into the cave."
 
"Why don't you go inside yourself?" Peter Mink inquired with something very like a sneer⁶.
 
"I'm too tall," said Nimble. "Besides, I don't like caves. I keep out of them."
 
"So do I!" Peter Mink declared—though everybody knew that he went everywhere—even under the ice along Broad Brook and Swift River.
 
Poor Nimble didn't know what to do. He felt that he ought to go for help, somewhere. But he had promised Cuffy Bear to wait for him.
 
Then all at once an idea came to him. Why no............