He certainly was, although at first he had proceeded cautiously around the drawing-room, with long backward stretches of the hind legs. But now he found the staircase,—made of a board with little slats nailed across it,—and scratched his way up very slowly, smelling the air with little tosses of the head.
“He’ll find the celery now,” called Eunice, delightedly. “I put a piece in Dulcie’s boudoir.”
Stamper ate the celery loudly, beginning with the leafy end, and Dulcie heard him from the cupola.
“She’s coming down!” Kenneth exclaimed.
“No, she’s stuck,” said Beansy. “Your old cupola door ain’t big enough for her to get out at.”
“Ho!” answered Franklin, with scorn, “you just see!” And in a minute Dulcie had squeezed her way through, and dropped down suddenly on Stamper’s head, which surprised him so much that he dropped the last bit of celery,—the widest end,—and Dulcie ate it. Then they sat looking at each other with wiggling noses, as if they had never met before, and each one was thinking, “Now who on earth can this other rabbit be!”
“They’re all right now,” said Mrs. Wood, turning back to the house; “but they’ll never be able to get into that cupola after they’ve had their dinner.”
Kenneth ran after his mother, Beansy went home, and Franklin went into the shed to get his tool chest.
“Let me hold Stamper while you fix the door,” Eunice begged, for being Franklin’s sister, she naturally regarded Stamper in the light of a nephew.
“No, sir, he’ll stay below decks,” said Franklin, taking the cupola off the house.