"Yes, if you can get away with him. Toby isn't old enough yet for pets."

"He's old enough," sniffed Edith, "but he's been spoilt, and don't know
how to treat them. If he ever lays hands on my rabbit again, I'll box his
ears so hard he'll never forget it. That's what I'll do!"

Mary seemed to concur in this, for she smiled, and rubbed Bumper's head
before adding. "He'd raise an awful howl, I suppose, if he knew you were
here. You'd better go home now. You can get through the backyard without
Toby seeing you."

"Let him see me if he likes," retorted Edith, shaking her red curls and
tilting her freckled nose upward. "I won't let him have the rabbit. Aunt
Helen ought to spank him. That's what he deserves."

Mary walked ahead down the stairs to see if Toby was around, and then when
they reached the kitchen Edith climbed through an open window into the
backyard. There was a thick hedge around the yard, and back of that
another yard which smelt so sweet with flowers and green lawn that Bumper
raised his head and sniffed.

My, what a whiff that was! There was a vegetable garden hidden back of the
rose bushes, filled with crisp lettuce, golden carrots, emerald-green
cabbages, blood-red beets, blanching celery, peas, beans, corn, potatoes,
and green grass everywhere. It was a whiff from Rabbit Arcady, and Bumper
forgot all the dangers he had been through.

"No, no, you mustn't jump out of my arms!" warned Edith when he struggled
to get down and roll around in the green grass. "Toby might be looking."