"There he is again!" cried Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, as she ran to the window of the hollow stump bungalow and looked out. "He's digging up all the nice carrots in your garden, Uncle Wiggily!" "Who is?" asked the bunny gentleman, laying aside the cabbage-leaf newspaper he was reading, with his glasses perched on his pink, twinkling nose. "Who is taking my carrots, Nurse Jane?"
"That wild rabbit," answered the muskrat lady housekeeper. "He lives in the thick bushes in the middle of the woods. I think he hasn't been here very long, and he doesn't seem to know any of your other animal friends. He's wild and runs the minute I go out. But he has been spoiling your garden lately."
"That isn't nice of him," said Uncle Wiggily. "I'll go out myself and see what he has to say."
But as soon as Uncle Wiggily started down the steps of his hollow stump bungalow, toward where the other bunny was digging up the carrots, the wild rabbit hopped away.
"What's the matter with you?" asked Uncle Wiggily, twinkling his pink nose in a friendly way. "Why are you [Pg 230]spoiling my garden?"
"Because I like to!" answered the wild rabbit. "You live in a fine hollow stump bungalow, and all I have is a hole in the ground, or burrow. You're rich and I'm poor, and I'm going to spoil everything you have!"
"Oh, that isn't a good way to feel!" said Uncle Wiggily kindly. "That's the way the Bolshevics talk! I used to be poor, like you, but I went off to seek my fortune and I found it. I built me this hollow stump bungalow, and, if you like, I'll show you how to make one. Nurse Jane and I will help you!"
"Nope!" cried the wild rabbit. "I'd rather be bad! I'm going to dig in your garden every chance I get, and you can't catch me, either, so there!" And it sounded as if that wild rabbit might be making a funny "face" at Uncle Wiggily. Mind you, I'm not saying for sure, but maybe!
"Dear me!" thought Mr. Longears, as he went back in his house. "That wild rabbit is certainly a queer chap. I don't want to hurt him, but I wish he would get tame. I'll have to speak to Policeman Dog Percival about him, and set Percival on guard in my carrot patch."
"Did you make that wild rabbit stop his digging?" asked Nurse Jane, as she met Uncle Wiggily coming in.
"No, he says he's going to be bad," sighed the bunny gentleman, as he took his tall, silk hat down off the rubber plant.
"Where are you going?" asked Nurse Jane.
"Out in the woods to look for an adventure," answered Uncle Wiggily. "And perhaps I may find a way to make that wild rabbit tame and good."
"I hope so," sighed Nurse Jane. "It isn't nice to have our garden spoiled."
[Pg 231] As Uncle Wiggily was hopping through the woods, over on that side of the forest nearest the village, where the real children lived, the bunny gentleman, all of a sudden, heard the voice of a little girl.
"Oh, Donald!" said the little girl, in sad tones. "You've broken it. You've spoiled my nice little jumping bunny!"
"Well, I didn't mean to," answered a boy's voice. "He jumped all right a minute ago!"
"Yes, but you went and squeezed the rubber ball too hard, that's what you did!" sobbed the little girl. "And now my nice Easter bunny won't hop any more! Boo hoo!"
"Dear, dear!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily to himself. "This is too bad! There's trouble here! I wonder if I can help?"
You see Uncle Wiggily knew what the boy and girl were saying, though the bunny himself could not speak their talk. Uncle Wiggily hopped softly nearer the children. He looked through the bushes, and there he saw a little boy trying to mend a toy bunny for the little girl.
The toy bunny was made to look like a real one, with ears and fur and everything. Fastened to the toy was a little rubber hose and a rubber ball was on the end of the hose.
When the toy rabbit was placed on the ground, and the rubber ball was pressed, some air was squeezed inside the bunny's legs, and he would hop across the floor; and his ears would flop up, too, because he had springs and other things inside him.
"There's no use squeezing the ball," sadly said the little girl. "My toy bunny is broken, and won't ever hop again! Oh, dear! Boo hoo!"
"My! This is too bad!" said Uncle Wiggily. "I wonder [Pg 232] what I can do to make that little girl feel happier? I might get Sammie or Susie Littletail, the rabbit children, to come and stay with the real children for a while. They seem to be kind—this boy and girl. They wouldn't hurt Sammie or Susie. That's what I'll do! I'll go get the Littletail brother and sister, and have them hop over here so this boy and girl can easily catch them and play with them a while."
Uncle Wiggily started off through the woods. The boy and girl sat in a moss-covered dingly dell, trying to mend the broken toy. And Mr. Longears had not gone very far before, all of a sudden, he came to a little hollow place, filled with leaves. There he heard a voice saying:
"Oh dear! Oh what a pain! Oh what trouble I am in!"
"Ha! This seems to be my busy day for trouble!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily, as he looked at the leaf-filled hollow. "Who are you, and what is the matter?" asked the bunny gentleman.
"Oh, I'm the wild rabbit," was the answer. "The wild rabbit who was eating the carrots in your garden. But alas! I can eat no more!"
"Why not?" Uncle Wiggily asked.
"Because I have fallen and broken my leg," was the answer. "I can hop no more, and I s............