Uncle Wiggily and Baby Bunty

“Uncle Wiggily, I am sorry to trouble you,” said Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, the muskrat lady housekeeper to the bunny rabbit gentleman one day, “but do you think you could go to the store for me? Or are you too stiff? Is your rheumatism too bad?”

Uncle Wiggily looked all around the hollow stump bungalow before answering. Then he asked:

“Is Baby Bunty here?”

“Not just now,” replied Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy, trying not to smile. “Why do you ask?”

“Because if I say I’m too stiff and old to go to the store for you she’ll say I’m not too stiff to play tag with her. And I certainly am!” said Uncle Wiggily, positive like and semi-emphatic. “I don’t want to move about quickly at all today. I just want to go slow and easy like.”

“Then you may,” said Nurse Jane. “I only want you to go to the store for me and get Baby Bunty’s shoes!”

“What’s that?” cried Mr. Longears, and he gave such a jump that his pink nose stopped twinkling. “I thought you said you wanted me to go to the store for you, Nurse Jane.”

“So I do. I’d have to go after Bunty’s shoes if you didn’t, and, really, I haven’t time. But you don’t have to take Baby Bunty, so you may hop as slowly as you like. I took her down and she tried on the shoes yesterday. I left them to be stretched. All you have to do is to bring them home.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” said Uncle Wiggily. “I like Baby Bunty, and all that, but when I want to hop slowly she wants to play tag and the like of such nonsense. I’ll go to the store alone.”

Away he started, leaning on his red, white and blue striped rheumatism crutch that Nurse Jane had gnawed for him out of a cornstalk. And Uncle Wiggily had not hopped very far before he heard a voice calling:

“Oh, Uncle Wiggily! Wait for me! Wait a minute!”

“My goodness me, sakes alive and some peanut hash!” thought the bunny rabbit. “I hope that isn’t the Pipsisewah or the Skuddlemagoon after me!”

He was just going to hide behind a tree when he saw that it was Baby Bunty who was hopping along through the woods.

“Wait a minute, Uncle Wiggily!” she cried.

“Well, something is surely going to happen now,” thought the bunny rabbit.

It did not take long for Baby Bunty to catch up to Mr. Longears, for she was a lively little rabbit girl.

“Oh, Uncle Wiggily!” she gasped. “I know where you are going! You are going after my new shoes. I heard Nurse Jane tell you! I was playing tag down behind the rain water barrel. I didn’t mean to listen, but I couldn’t help hearing. Please take me with you.”

Well, what could Uncle Wiggily do? He didn’t want to hurt Baby Bunty’s feelings, and he certainly was going after her shoes. So he said:

“Now, look here, Baby Bunty! No tricks, you know! No making me hop up and down stairs to look at you try on new hats, you know!”

“Of course not!” laughed the little rabbit girl. “Besides, we are going after shoes today, and I don’t have to try them on. Nurse Jane helped me buy them yesterday. I’ll be good.”

“And please be quiet—don’t make me do any extra hopping today!” begged the bunny rabbit gentleman. “My joints are too stiff.”

Baby Bunty had a funny little twinkle in her eyes as she hopped along with Mr. Longears. Soon they were at the shoe store and a nice rat gentleman handed Mr. Longears a neat package.

“Well, this isn’t so bad,” thought the bunny rabbit. “There’s to be no trying on, and, in consequence, there can be no hopping up and down stairs.”

With the shoe package under one leg, and holding Bunty’s paw in his other one, Uncle Wiggily started back for the hollow stump bungalow.

“Can’t we go any faster than this?” asked Baby Bunty. “I want to hurry home and wear my new shoes.”

“Oh, this is fast enough for my rheumatic joints,” spoke the rabbit gentleman, contented like.

Baby Bunty started to run backward.

“Why—why—where are you going?” asked Uncle Wiggily.

“Oh, I think the man forgot to put any laces in my new shoes!” cried Baby Bunty. “I must run back and get them. You wait for me, Uncle Wiggily.”

“No, I can’t wait,” said Mr. Longears. “I must go with you, to see that you don’t get lost!”

Back ran Baby Bunty and back ran Uncle Wiggily. And when they reached the shoe store the rat gentleman said:

“Why, the lacers are in the shoes!”

“Oh, how silly of me!” said Baby Bunty. “So they are! Now we must hop along fast, Uncle Wiggily, or it will be dark before we get home!” So, whether he liked it or not, Uncle Wiggily had to hop along very fast, and so did Baby Bunty. But it’s a good thing they did, for, when they were almost at the hollow stump bungalow, out popped the bad Pipsisewah, trying to get the new shoes.

And, only that Uncle Wiggily and Baby Bunty were hopping so fast, the Pip might have caught them.

But he didn’t, I am glad to say, and when Baby Bunty reached home and tried on her new shoes they fitted perfectly, and Uncle Wiggily wasn’t hardly stiff at all. And if the lawn mower doesn’t try to cut a slice off the cake of soap for the goldfish to take a bath, I’ll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and Bunty’s hair ribbon.