The bunny uncle soon had many piles of soft, dried leaves, and in a little while along came Sammie and Susie Littletail, the rabbit children, and into the leaves they jumped, off a stump, bouncing up and down like rubber balls.
Pretty soon Uncle Wiggily heard a voice saying:
“Oh, dear, isn’t it too bad? Yes, it’s even three, four, five, six, seven bad! That’s what it is!”
“Ha! Some one in trouble!” said Uncle Wiggily, dropping his tree-branch rake and running back to the pile of leaves. “I suppose either Sammie or Susie has fallen down, and bumped one of their noses. I must help them up!”
But when Uncle Wiggily got there the cupboard was bare—oh, no, excuse me, if you please. That’s in another story. I mean when the bunny uncle reached the pile of leaves where Sammie and Susie had been playing neither one of the rabbit children was in sight.
“Oh, my!” cried Uncle Wiggily. “They must be all covered up with the leaves! I’ll have to dig them out! No wonder it’s two, six, seven bad! Poor rabbits under the leaves.”
With his paws he began digging at the piles of leaves, scattering them all over, after his hard work of raking them up. But as he went deeper and deeper he could see no signs of the bunny children. And then, from somewhere behind him, Uncle Wiggily heard the sad voice again saying:
“Oh, dear! It’s too bad! Yes, it’s two, three and even sixteen-eleven bad. Oh, dear!”
Turning quickly, Uncle Wiggily saw Jimmie Wibblewobble, the boy duck, with an empty bag over his wing shoulder.
“Why, Jimmie! Is that you?” asked the bunny uncle, in surprise. “I thought it was Sammie and Susie Littletail. They were playing in these dried leaves a while ago, but now I can’t find them, and I fear they may be covered up so far down that I can never get them out.”