“I just threw my Sawdust Doll at the cat!” exclaimed Dorothy.  “I knew it couldn’t hurt her, ’cause she’s stuffed with sawdust.”

“Did you hit him?” Dick asked.

“I almost did,” answered Dorothy.  “Anyhow, I scared him away, and he didn’t get any goldfish.”

“That’s good,” said Arnold.

“I wish I’d been there!” said Dick.

Just then Madeline looked up and saw something dangling on the end of the kite tail.

“Why, Herbert!” she cried, “what have you there?  Oh, you have my Candy Rabbit on your kite!  I was looking all over for him.  Where’d you get him?”

“I found him here in the field where you dropped him,” answered her brother.

“I didn’t drop my Candy Rabbit here,” went on Madeline.  “I wouldn’t do such a thing.  I left him in the house, and then I couldn’t find him, and I was coming to ask if you had seen him.  I thought maybe Carlo had carried him off as he carried Dorothy’s doll once.”

“Well, if you didn’t take your Candy Rabbit out and leave him here in the field, maybe Carlo did,” said Herbert.  “Anyhow, we didn’t hurt him and you can have him back again.  We can tie a bunch of weeds on the kite tail.  They’ll be just as good as the Rabbit.”

“Oh, the idea of saying my Candy Rabbit is like a bunch of weeds!” cried Madeline.  “Give him right back to me this minute, Herbert!” and she shook her finger at her brother.

“All right,” Herbert answered.  “Pull the kite down, fellows.”

“All right.”

Down came the kite when the string was wound up, and slowly the Candy Rabbit floated back to earth.  Madeline stood under the tail with her dress held out to catch the Bunny in it.  And down he came, not being hurt a bit.  Quickly Madeline loosened her Easter toy from the kite tail, and she nestled him in her arms.

“You poor little Bunny!” she murmured.  “I guess he was scared half to death away up there in the air.”

She and the other girls looked at the toy.  He did not seem to be harmed in the least.

“But he’s got a green grass stain on one ear,” said Mirabell.

“That only makes him look more stylish,” said Dorothy.

“And green goes well with the pink color of his ribbon,” added Madeline.  “Oh, I’m so glad to get my Rabbit back.”

Madeline took her Candy Rabbit back to the house.  There she and the girls had some fun, and the boys kept on flying the kite.  They used a bunch of weeds as a weight on the tail, instead of the Rabbit, as they had done at first.

And of course neither Madeline nor any of the others knew that the cat had carried the Bunny away and had dropped him in the grassy field.  They all thought Carlo had done it, but of course there was no way of finding out for sure, except by reading this book.  In this the true story of the Candy Rabbit is told for the first time.

Madeline tried to get the green grass-stain off her Rabbit’s ear, but it would not come out.