Bumper was perfectly safe for two reasons. One was that Sneaky was thinking only of Billy and ignoring Bumper, and another was the distance was too great for Sneaky to reach the white rabbit in a single bound. It seemed like a just punishment for his rough joke in spattering Bumper with the mud. In another minute Sneaky would have him in his jaws, and Billy would never play another joke or raid a rabbit’s burrow.
“He who laughs last laughs the longest,” Bumper said to himself, smiling.
Then there came a sudden change over him. He seemed to see Billy all torn and bloody, and heard his pitiful squeals as Sneaky killed him. Oh, that was too severe a punishment for playing a rough joke! No, he couldn’t stand by in silence and see Billy killed even to satisfy a desire for revenge.
“Billy!” he called suddenly. “Billy, dive in the water! Don’t look around! Sneaky’s behind you! Dive! Dive!”
Billy had a horror of Sneaky the Wolf, and the very mention of his name sent the shivers through him. He didn’t wait to ask questions, not even to turn and look. He took a flying dive for the water just as Sneaky leaped for him.
Billy plunged into the water not a second too soon. It had hardly closed over him before Sneaky was there, snapping and snarling. Then finding that his victim had escaped him, for Sneaky was no diver or swimmer, he turned angrily upon Bumper to punish him for giving the warning.
But Bumper had taken advantage of the interval to escape. When Sneaky sprang to where he had been standing there was no rabbit in sight. Doubly angry at finding both of his victims gone, Sneaky snarled and snapped his teeth, trotting up and down the edge of the river, watching for the return of Billy or Bumper.
But they were wise enough to remain out of sight. Sneaky waited a long time, and then hid in the bushes and waited longer. But nothing happened. Then disgusted, and still very angry, he finally trotted away in the woods.
He hadn’t been gone long before a head popped out of a hole, and Bumper, with the mud all dried and caked on his fur, crawled out. He watched and listened to make sure he was alone, and then hopped to the bank of the stream.
“Oh, dear,” he said, “how will I ever get this mud off of me? It’s all dried on!”