STORY V—BILLY BUNNY AND MR. TOOTIE OWL
Let’s see, I left off in the last story just where Billy Bunny landed on the bank of the river. Well, now I’m going to tell you what happened after that.
“I was lucky to get across on that old board,” thought the little rabbit, as he hopped up the bank to look about him. The field was covered with daisies and in the distance a black cow stood flicking off the flies with her long tail.
“Helloa!” cried the little rabbit. “Why don’t you eat the flowers?” The black cow looked up and said:
“Why don’t you stand on your head?” And, would you believe it, Billy Bunny did. Yes, sir. He stood first on his right ear and then on his left ear, and then he turned two somersaults and a handspring backward, and this made the cow laugh so hard that she got her tail twisted around a fence rail and couldn’t get away.
“What shall I do?” she cried, anxiously. “It’s almost milking time, and when I don’t come home they’ll wonder where I am. Oh, dear! Oh, dear!”
“Don’t worry,” said Billy Bunny, and he opened his knapsack and took out his little hatchet and chopped the tail—I mean the rail—off the fence so that she could get home, although, of course, she had to drag the rail all the way back to the farm, and the farmer scolded her for breaking down his fence, which was too bad, for she couldn’t help it, you know.
Well, after that the little rabbit hopped away, and by and by, just as it was getting quite dark, he came to a big pile of wood. “Now this will be a good place for me to sleep,” he said to himself, and looked about for a hole to squeeze into. But, oh dear me, and oh dear you!
A big owl flew out and hooted and tooted three times and a half, and then winked his eyes at the little rabbit until he was so scared he could hardly stand up.
“Oh, please, Mr. Owl, don’t hooty-tooty me so. I don’t mean any harm.”
“What are you doing in my woodpile?” asked the blinky old bird fiercely. “Trying to steal my wood, eh?”
“Oh, no, Mr. Owl,” cried Billy Bunny. “I was only looking for a place to sleep.”
“I don’t believe you,” screeched the blinky winky bird, and he made a grab for the little rabbit with his hooked feet. And he would have caught Billy Bunny, too, and eaten him for supper that very night, I guess, if the little rabbit hadn’t pulled his popgun out of his knapsack and hit the wicked owl on the tail with the cork bullet, which so scared the ugly old bird that he flew into the forest. After that Billy Bunny crept into the woodpile and went to sleep and dreamed that it caught on fire and the sparks flew up into the air and covered the whole sky with twinkling stars.