The squirrel followed, scolding a little because to him carrots meant nothing especially good to eat. And there, just beside the path, was an old coverless box raised on a peg, and underneath it a bunch of juicy, fat, yellow carrots.
There was room under the box for Fuzzy Wuz to creep in and get the carrots, and this she promptly did, while Chatter Chuk stood on his hind legs a short distance away and impatiently waited. But when the white rabbit nibbled the carrots, the motion pulled a string which jerked out the peg that held up the box, and behold, Fuzzy Wuz was a prisoner!
She squealed with fear and scratched at the sides of the box in a vain endeavor to find a way to escape; but escape was impossible unless some one lifted the box. The red squirrel had seen the whole mishap, and chattered angrily from outside at the plight of his captured friend. The white rabbit thought he must be far away, because the box shut out so much the sound of his voice.
“Juggerjook must have heard us, and this is part of his revenge,” said the squirrel. “Oh, dear! Oh, dear! I wonder what the great magician will do to me.”
“they hopped through the bushes.”
He was so terrified by this thought that Chatter Chuk took flight and darted home at his best speed. He lived in a tree very near to the burrow where Mrs. Wuz resided, but the squirrel did not go near the rabbit-burrow. The sun was already sinking in the west, so he ran into his nest and pretended to sleep when his mother asked him where he had been so late.
All night Mrs. Wuz waited for Fuzzy, and it was an anxious and sleepless night for the poor mother, as you may well believe. Fuzzy was her one darling, several other children having been taken from her in various ways soon after their birth. Mr. Wuz had gone to attend a meeting of the Rabbits’ Protective Association and might be absent for several days; so he was not there to help or counsel her.
When daybreak came, the mother rabbit ran to the foot of the squirrels’ tree and called: