Page:Bambi A Life in the Woods (1928).pdf/66

His mother said, “They don’t speak to us now; only at times. We have to wait till they come to us. And we have to wait for them to speak to us. They do it whenever they like.”

With a troubled heart, Bambi asked, “Will my father speak to me?”

“Of course he will,” his mother promised. “When you’re grown up he’ll speak to you, and you’ll have to stay with him sometimes.”

Bambi walked silently beside his mother, his whole mind filled with his father’s appearance. “How handsome he is!” he thought over and over again. “How handsome he is!”

As though his mother could read his thoughts, she said, “If you live, my son, if you are cunning and don’t run into danger, you’ll be as strong and handsome as your father is sometime, and you’ll have antlers like his, too.”

Bambi breathed deeply. His heart swelled with joy and expectancy.