wildly around the farm, causing mass destruction.

At last, the farmer couldn’t take it anymore. The pig had destroyed his farm one too many times. It was time to slaughter it, but because Nancy begged him not to, the pig was instead sold to a farm outlet store called Hayseeds-R-Us, where it remained until this very day.

Hayseeds-R-Us
Present Day

Just outside the city limits was Hayseeds-R-Us. It carried everything and anything that a farmer could desire: tractors and implements, feed, seed, even livestock. Because there were animals on the premises, an earthy smell of dirt, manure, and hay emanated from the place - a putrid stench to the city dweller, the sweet smell of money to a farmer.

As Baloo passed beneath the Hayseeds-R-Us sign with Rebecca, he thought that this time his boss had completely flipped her lid. The feather idea had been stupid, but using pigs to find mushrooms was going too far. This was a seriously deranged lady, and she needed someone to look after her. Unfortunately, he was the only one around to do it.

Something about this place was familiar to Baloo. Something about the name. Snapping his fingers, he said, “Hey, I know this place. Fred gets some of his fertilizer from here.”

Rebecca rolled her eyes. He had such low tastes in friends. “Only youwould know someone who sells fertilizer, Baloo.”

“Well,I ain’t the one buyin’ a pig, an’ I ain’t goin’ hog wild over some mushy mushrooms, lady,” Baloo muttered under his breath. He was peeved that she had put down Fred, his friend, without even knowing him. Little did Rebecca know, fertilizer was a very lucrative business; Fred had at least a half a million shaboozies.

Rebecca made a beeline for a pen containing three piglets. She leaned against the wooden fence and watched them play. The spotless peach-colored pigs frolicked in the warm sunshine, rolling in the dirt and bright, golden straw. Rebecca knew that they had to be inexpensive, because they were so tiny. “One needs a specially trained pig to sniff out truffles,” she said, recalling what she had read in A Million Ways to Make a Million Dollars. “One of those cute little squealy ones.”

“We need a pontoon,” Baloo reminded her, not caring two straws about the piglets. Didn’t she realize that if they didn’t get a pontoon, he couldn’t deliver cargo? “Besides, you don’t seem like the type that hangs around with pigs.”

Rebecca shot him a meaningful glance.

“Watch who you’re insultin’, Becky,” Baloo growled, frowning.

“Aren’t they adorable?” she said, scratching one of the piglets behind its ear. “Each one a truffle-finding juggernaut.”

The piglet oinked happily.

Feeling as if he was fighting a losing battle, Baloo said, “But...but there are more important things we should be buying.”

As if on cue, a grey hippo salesman wearing a blue jacket, white shirt, red tie, and denim bib overalls skittered over to the two bears. With a big toothy grin under his pencil-thin mustache, he asked eagerly, “Did I hear someone say ‘buying’?”

“Yes,” Rebecca said with a cordial smile; “we’re interested in hunting truffles.”

“Well!” The salesman rubbed his hands together, feeling very pleased about this prospective sale. He worked on commission and wasn’t having a very profitable week. “These miniature babarooses can smell out a truffle from over a mile away.”

“Imagine that,” Baloo muttered sarcastically.

Rebecca reprovingly jabbed her elbow in his chest, prompting a pained, “Oof!” from the pilot.

The salesman opened the gate and entered the pen, making sure to close the gate behind him. He gingerly picked up each piglet and put it on a little stage - a miniature theater complete with red curtains. From this vantage point, the pigs would be at the customer’s eye level and could be shown off. He pulled the curtain open and the well-trained pigs started prancing about in a circle; they knew that they would be rewarded with a treat if they performed their trick correctly. He told the prospective buyers, “They are pedigreed and papered from only the finest bloodlines.”

“And how much for one?” Rebecca asked.

“A reasonable three thousand dollars.”

Rebecca’s face fell. Her hand flew to her mouth in astonishment. It was much, much more than she had expected. “Oh, dear.”

“Three thousand smackers for an underfed piece of bacon?” Baloo exclaimed, incredulous.

When the salesman heard angry squeals, grunts, and oinks, a panicked look crossed his face. “Oh, no! You said the ‘B’ word.”

“What? Bacon?” Baloo said wonderingly.

“No! NO!” the salesman yelled.

The salesman and the other farm animals took cover when a small shed in the middle of Hayseeds-R-Us started to violently rock from side to side and jump up and down as if the inhabitant was having a fit. But surely the inhabitant wouldn’t be able to get out. The shed’s door was secured with six sturdy padlocks. In addition, boards were nailed across the door. On the front of the building was a large, prominent sign - ‘Stay back’.

With a deafening “Rrrrreeerrrr!” the largest pig in the world burst out of the shed, disintegrating it. The porker tore through Hayseeds-R-Us like a crazed Tasmanian devil, knocking Baloo and Rebecca off their feet, overturning hay bales, ruining the chicken coop, and reducing tractors to scrap metal. Basically, it destroyed everything in its path.

Then, to Baloo’s and Rebecca’s astonishment, the salesman began to sing. “Rock-a-bye, baby, in the treetop. When the wind blows, the cradle will rock. When the bow breaks, the cradle will fall. And down will come baby, cradle, and all.”

Entranced by the song, the pig slowed its manic whirling. It stopped atop a crate, swaying to the music. With a blissful expression on its fleshy face, it paused on tiptoe for a second before crashing onto Baloo’s head. It had fallen into a deep, peaceful sleep.

“You know, for much less money, you could have this fine animal,” the salesman said quickly as if the pig’s destructive behavior wasn’t anything out of the ordinary.

Baloo, his head and upper torso pinned under the snoring pig, flailed his arms. He was being suffocated by the overpowering stench of stale manure. His muffled voice shouted, “Get this smelly monster off me!”

The salesman was desperate to get rid of this particular pig, so he told Rebecca, “You know what they say - the bigger the pig, the bigger the truffle. Only five hundred dollars.”

“Well...I...I...” Rebecca stammered. This huge hog, complete with a five o’clock shadow was not exactly what she had had in mind. However, she still wanted to hunt truffles, and she couldn’t afford one of the piglets. What was a businesswoman to do?

Finally, Baloo managed to push the pig off of him; the top of his head was flattened. He shook his head, causing it to pop back to its normal shape. While he fished under the pig for his hat, he said, “Look, the truffle idea was bad enough. Don’t go buyin’ Hogzilla here!”

“Don’t badmouth my truffle idea,” Rebecca snapped, facing off against her pilot. “It’s perfectly wonderful.”

“Four hundred dollars,” the salesman interjected.

“Perfectly pigheaded. Why don’t you just admit it?” Baloo riposted.

The salesman said hopefully, “Three hundred?”

If buying this hog made her rich and Baloo look like a fool, then Rebecca was all for it. “I’ll show you!” She rummaged around in her purse and pulled out all of the cash that she had. “I have two hundred and fifty dollars and twenty-three cents.”

“Sold!” Faster than you could say ‘jackrabbit’, the salesman snatched the money from her hands, handed her the pig’s leash, and left before she could change her mind.

“But we need a new pontoon.”

Rebecca patted Baloo on the cheek. “After we find those truffles, I’ll buy you a hundred pontoons. Now, isn’t that a good idea?”

Incensed by her condescending attitude, Baloo whispered in the pig’s ear, “Pssssst...bacon.”

With a frightened squeal, the pig immediately awoke and took off, running in a zigzag pattern.

Rebecca, who was holding the pig’s leash, was jerked along behind. “Aaaahhhh!”

Baloo thought that he had never seen anything as satisfying as his boss being dragged by that pig. It almost made up for the torture that she had put him through with her get-rich-quick schemes. Grinning, he leisurely sauntered back to Rebecca’s car, saying, “Great idea, Rebecca. Great idea.”

Higher for Hire

“Poor little Ducky. You don’t like having all of those pokey arrows stuck in you, do you?” Wildcat crooned as he yanked on another arrow stuck in the pontoon. With difficulty, he wrenched it out and said, “There, now. That’s better. Bandage, Kit.”

Kit handed him two strips of white medical tape. He watched, smiling, as Wildcat patched up the hole and gave the seaplane a loving pat on the pontoon strut. The boy’s ears perked up at a familiar, far-off scream. Intermingled with the screams were frantic grunts and snorts. “Gee, that sorta sounds like Miz Cunningham.”

“Yeah, does she have a cold?” Wildcat added, tugging on another arrow.

Kit was surprised to see a pig round the corner of Higher for Hire, dragging Rebecca along with it. The strange procession flew past him and made straight for the end of the dock with Rebecca yelling, “Stop this pig! Stop this pig!”

Seeing the water in the harbor, the pig made an abrupt U-turn at the end of the dock, causing Rebecca to be whiplashed into the harbor. “Stop this...aaahhhhhh!” SPLASH!

Smirking, Baloo strolled to the end of the dock. In a voice every bit as condescending as Rebecca’s had been earlier, he

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