Some grannies knit and some grannies bake bread.

But Jack’s granny plays the banjo.

            Jack’s Granny settled into her rickety rocking chair and began to fiddle with the tuning pegs on her banjo.  Both Jack and his granny could hear excited clucking from the hen house.  Inside the barn, all the hens were getting gussied up for their favorite night of the year: The Spring Chicken Cotillion.

            Prudence gazed intently into a cracked mirror.  “Help me glue on my eyelashes, Mother,” she said to a plump old hen who looked on with approval.

            “Squaaaaawk!  I’ve got such thin lips,” complained Frieda, as she smeared hot pink lipstick on her beak.  “Do you think pink is my color?” she asked no one in particular.

            Etta looked down and exclaimed, “Cluck, cluck, cluck! What skinny legs.  Can’t do much about that.  Guess I’ll just have to paint my toenails fuchsia.”

            “Lovely color,” said Etta’s mother.

            Each chicken wanted to look her very best.  For, at the end of the night, there could be only one Cotillion Queen.

            Unknown to Jack, his granny and the chickens, another creature lurked behind a chinaberry bush by the porch, also preparing for the Spring Chicken Cotillion.  Slim Sly, a skinny red fox with a big fat appetite, stretched and sniffed the evening breeze.  “Chicken,” he whispered.  He smacked his chops and licked his lips.

            Slim Sly had found an old sheepskin in the storage shed behind Granny’s house. He draped it over his shoulders, trying to disguise himself. However, his long pointy nose stuck out from under the fleece and his bushy red tail drooped down from behind.

            Granny’s first song, The Cajun Capon Two-Step, signaled that the dancing was about to begin.  The chickens high-tailed out of the coop.

            Granny plunked out one tune after another:  waltzes, reels, jigs.  The birds schottisched and shimmied.  They mamboed and sambaed.  They did the hokey-poky, buck-and-wing and bunny hop.

            The competition was fierce.  Prudence pecked and preened.  Frieda flapped and flew.  But it was Etta who astounded them with a three-toed tap dance.  Her fuchsia nails hypnotized them all.

            Everyone agreed when Granny declared, “Etta, you are the Cotillion Queen.”

            The chickens bubbled over with frolicking and merriment.  No one but Jack noticed a dark, hairy figure emerging from the barnyard shadows.

            The fox inched his way toward Granny, succulent spring chicken on his mind.

            “Hold still, Etta honey,” said Jack’s granny as she was about to place a lovely daisy crown on Etta’s head. 

            Slim Sly crept out from the shadows, asking, “Need a little help with that crown, Granny?”

            Jack’s granny took one look at Sim Sly’s long pointy nose and another look at his red scraggly tail.  She knew she wasn’t in the presence of a sheep.

            So, Jack’s Granny just rolled her eyes.

            Impatient as ever, Slim Sly demanded, “Hand over the Queen, geezer!”

            “Slim Sly, you old fox, I’ll make a deal with you.  I’ll play banjo tunes as hard and as fast as I can.  If you can keep dancing for as long as I play, you may have the Cotillion Queen—or any chicken you want, for that matter.”

            At that, Jack gasped and a few of the chickens fainted. 

However, old Slim Sly merely eyed Granny up and down.  He noted her white hair sticking out every which way. He observed her teeny-tiny eyes set way back behind her thick glasses.  He noticed a stained apron covering a rather plump belly.  Then he looked down and saw one ragged stocking hitched up and one ragged stocking flopped down over thick-soled brown shoes.

            “She’s just a crinkled and wrinkled old lady,” he smirked.  “I’ll have me a spring chicken dinner, for sure.”

            “You’ve got yourself a deal, Granny,” said Slim Sly with a toothy grin.

            So Jack’s granny tuned up her banjo, gave her right hand a good shake, gave her left hand a good shake, and then began to play. Slim Sly slipped off his sheepskin and started in to dance.

            Jack’s granny played quick and lively.  The fox, a show-off at heart, whirled and spun, flipped and dipped.  He did the rumba.  He cha-chaed. He cakewalked, polkaed and jitterbugged.  Yes, he even did the fox trot.  Slim Sly was a sight to be seen.

            To Jack’s amazement, his granny didn’t tire.  She played one song after another, far into the night.  Those spring chickens gave out, though.  The false eyelashes were heavy on their eyelids.  They dozed off, one by one.

The fox danced on…until every bone and muscle ached.

Finally, when the sun glimmered pink on the eastern horizon, Granny lit into The Spanish Fandango in triple time.  Her fingers fairly burnt up the banjo.

            Old Slim Sly gave a yelp, then collapsed into a sorry looking heap at Granny’s feet.

            Granny muttered, “Pitiful creature.”  She picked up that fox by his ratty tail. 

Jack watched in awe as she swung the creature over her head once…twice…three times, and then let go.  That fox sailed over the fence and off into the woods, never to be seen again.

            Some grannies knit, some grannies bake bread, but Jack’s granny plays the banjo.