Miki, too, had learned to eat the currants; so to the coulee they went this afternoon, for such currants as these one can eat even when one is already full.

Besides, the coulee was fruitful for Miki in other ways.

There were many young partridges and rabbits in it--"fool hens" of tender flesh and delicious flavour which he caught quite easily, and any number of gophers and squirrels.
To-day they had scarcely taken their first mouthful of the big juicy currants when an unmistakable sound came to them.

Unmistakable because each recognized instantly what it meant.

It was the tearing down of currant bushes twenty or thirty yards higher up the coulee.