“Yes, if there was a raft handy. But suppose there was none in sight. What would you do then?”
Bumper stretched himself, and answered lazily: “I can’t say, Spotted Tail, until I was put to the test. But I think I’d use my wits or try to.”
They had been sunning themselves on a board some hunter had stretched across a bend in the river. Spotted Tail had lured Bumper to the far end of the board for his wicked purpose. The middle of the board rested on a stone, and sometimes the young rabbits used it as a see-saw. By running out to the ends two rabbits could make it jump up and down so that it splashed in the water and made a great commotion.
Spotted Tail was sitting next to Bumper on the far end which stretched over very deep water. He turned now to him, and asked:
“Can you swim, Bumper? Were you ever in the water over your head?”
“No,” Bumper answered truthfully, “but some day I must learn. I think I’ll begin to take lessons.”
“Well, to-day is as good as any day to begin,” replied Spotted Tail.
Before Bumper realized what he meant by this remark, he leaped high in the air, and landed on the other end of the spring-board with a thud. The result was that Bumper was shot straight up into the air nearly two feet right over the deepest part of the river. He turned a complete somersault in the air, and made a frantic struggle to reach the end of the board as he came down. But he missed it by a foot, and fell plump in the river.
He went down, down, down out of sight. It seemed an age before he came up again, wet, bedraggled and puffing. The fright caused by his sudden ducking threatened to make him panicky, and his first thought was to squeal for help and splash around like a child in a bathtub.
But Spotted Tail’s words aroused him. “Now, Bumper,” he called, “you’ve got a chance to use your wits. Let me see what you can do to get ashore.”