"Ah, a Candy Rabbit and a Sawdust Doll!" exclaimed the organ man's girl. "Nobody seems to want them. I have a doll of my own, but I have no Candy Rabbit. I think I will take this one. I would rather have him than pennies!"
And, looking quickly here and there to see if any one was going to toss her a penny, but seeing no one, the hand-organ man's little girl picked up the Candy Rabbit, tucked it under her apron, and quickly went down the steps again.
"Well, of all things!" thought the Candy Rabbit, as he felt himself being taken away in this fashion. "Of all things! What is this hand-organ girl going to do with me?"
And that is something we must find out.
CHAPTER VI
THE PEDDLER'S BASKET
Slowly down the street walked the organ grinder, turning the crank and making music. His little girl, an Italian child, after putting the Candy Rabbit under her apron, looked around the house where Madeline lived to see if any one might be coming out with pennies. But no one came.
Madeline and Dorothy and Mirabell were in the back yard where they had gone to play in the sand pile, after leaving the Sawdust Doll and the Candy Rabbit on the front veranda. Madeline's mother was not at home, and the cook was too busy in the kitchen to bother with giving pennies to organ grinders, though she might have done so if she had had time and had had plenty of pennies.