Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4 "How's he going to study for his test without his book?" Pearl worried. "Too late now." Merle hopped up on the desk and tried to lift the book. "There's no way we can bring this to his school— it's way too heavy!" Suddenly, Pearl had an idea. "What if I work on figuring out how to help Michael with his test while you work on a plan for where we're going to live?" she asked Merle.

Merle knew that his job was going to be much more adventurous. "Sounds good to me! You explore the book, and I'll explore the trees!" he responded. As Pearl cracked open Math Is Your Friend: 5th Grade Edition, Merle scurried up a branch of the walnut tree outside Michael's bedroom. When it comes to house hunting, the first thing a squirrel will look for is a nice hole in a tree, preferably somewhere up high. "High and dry!" as Merle liked to say. Squirrels aren't hole makers, just hole finders. The two best bets are a knot that has fallen out or a decomposed area between branches. If a squirrel has no luck finding space inside a tree, they will resort to making space on the tree in the form of a nest. However, nests are rarely as dry and cozy as a knothole. "If it's not a knot— not!" Merle also liked to say. The good news about most of the trees near Michael's house was that they had plenty of knotholes. The bad news, as Merle found time after time, was that they were all occupied. "AHHHHH!" screamed one squirrel. "Sorry, miss!" Merle apologized. "Who are you?!" demanded another. "Beg your pardon, sir," Merle said. "Get off my limb!" ordered a third.

After a number of other awkward moments, and having grown tired and embarrassed of surprising other rodents in their homes, Merle headed back to Michael's bedroom. "Sorry, Pearl, there's no room in the inns," he reported. "I figured as much," Pearl mumbled as she studied an explanation of long division. "Where there's a lot of nuts, there's bound to be a lot of squirrels." "Those trees are definitely full of nuts," Merle agreed. No sooner had the words left his mouth than he noticed something interesting on the floor of Michael's room. "What's that?" he asked. Pearl looked down and spotted what you or I would call an air vent. However, neither Merle nor Pearl had ever seen one. She shrugged and continued with her reading.

"It looks like a little jail in the ground." Merle approached the vent, noting the little metal bars that stretched across it. "I wonder what they keep in it?" Not being a ground squirrel, Merle would normally have had no interest in exploring a damp, dirty hole in the ground as a potential home, especially one housing a potential prisoner. But this particular hole was dry and

relatively clean. He grabbed the grate and easily lifted it off the floor. "If it is a jail, it's not a very good one," Merle remarked. "Pearl, I'm gonna check this out." "That's nice, dear," Pearl answered softly, concentrating on her reading.