Little Rabbit Out on a Limb

Charles Wallace was standing outside again. It was very early on a mid-December morning, the sun was not yet up over the hills, and despite the fact that Charles was wearing a flannel shirt, his Osh Kosh overalls and was covered in fur, there was no getting around the fact that it was a cold and he did not want to be outside.

Thelma had kicked him out. Not for the first time, or even the forth or fifth time, but for the… actually, Thelma had kicked Charles Wallace out of the kitchen so many times since Thanksgiving that Charles Wallace had lost count.

Charles Wallace knocked on the back door. But of course there was no answer. “Pleeeease…” he tried, his teeth chattering. But from inside the kitchen there was no sound but the banging of pots and pans. This, sad to say, had become something of a routine.


To say that Charles Wallace’s tenure as substitute kitchen helper had gotten off to a rocky start would be an understatement. This sweeping the floor – in exchange for Hula Bunny’s muse services -- was turning out to be trickier than it had at first sounded.

For one thing Hula did quite a bit more then sweep the floors each morning before Thelma came down. The oven had to be turned on and set. Then the muffin tins needed to be greased and lined. After that he had to scoop the muffin batter into the tins and then he had to bake them for twenty-five minutes.

In the middle of baking the muffins he had to brew the morning’s round of coffee – pouring each type into large insulated coffee urns. Next, cups had to be taken down to the shuttered café, as well as forks, knives spoons and napkins. Then everything had to be stocked in its appropriate place. It was a lot for Charles Wallace to remember.

None of this was a problem. The problem was that he was a morning person and Chef Thelma most decidedly was not.

Thelma Rabbit stumbled down to the kitchen every morning just around 6AM, grumbly and groggy. Thelma needed to ease into the day. Her paws could do the tasks at hand automatically but her brain needed time to wake up. Charles Wallace, on the other paw, woke up with a dozen thoughts humming through his mind. By the time she walked in Charles Wallace was eager for conversation. And that’s what always got him into trouble.

Making things worse was the fact that, although Charles Wallace was a small rabbit, he wasn’t much for small talk. He liked facts and information. And when he found things out, he liked to share what he knew.

So on his first morning in the kitchen, as Chef Thelma walked in, Charles Wallace called out brightly, “Good morning Chef, did you sleep well?”

“Mmm…” said Thelma as she reached for a mug to make her morning cup of tea.

“By the way, I’ve been reading all about baking soda.”

“Uhuh,” was the only response he got.

“Very interesting stuff. Also known as bicarbonate of soda. Actually the first thing that was used as a baking soda was something called, ‘Pearl Ash’ or ‘potassium carbonate’ and that was extracted from wood ash. Apparently though that stuff could react with the fats in foods forming a kind of soap or soapy taste and of course that didn’t taste very good. So then someone came up with sodium bicarbonate. Of course everyone knows that it too can taste soapy unless it’s counteracted by an acid.”

Thelma half listened to Charles Wallace droning on as she started mixing up her first recipe for the day, Chocolate Whopper cookies. A perennial favorite at the No Foam Café, they were especially in demand during the holiday months. Now, the recipe for Chocolate Whoppers calls for baking powder and not baking soda. But with all the chattering going on from Charles Wallace about baking soda Chef Thelma reached for her box of baking soda rather than her tin of baking powder and it wasn’t until the first tray of cookies were out of the oven that Thelma realized her mistake. When she saw what she had done wrong she was so frustrated that she threw down her baking mitt and started hopping up and down. It was shortly after that that Charles Wallace found himself standing outside for the first time.

“Hey!” he had shouted indignantly. He’d banged on the door, begged to be let inside, promised to be quiet, pressed his face to the kitchen window with his most sincere smile, and finally, when none of that worked, ran around to the front door of Rabbit Run, where a sympathetic Beatrix got out of bed, came down the stairs, and let him back inside.

After that things only went downhill. Although Charles Wallace knew it was a bad idea, sooner or later each morning he would bring up whatever deeply interesting thing was on his mind – say, the marvelous properties of crystallizing sugar – and distract her at a key moment, something would go awry and he would get kicked out.

Then, shivering outside the kitchen, he would count to ten and bang on the door. Sometimes, not always, after a moment or so Thelma would open the door and glower at him. And then he, Charles Wallace would say, “Sorry, sorry, sorry! I promise to be quiet.” And Thelma would let him back in as things had to be done and she couldn’t do it alone and the other rabbits had other responsibilities.

But sometimes she would leave him outside to fend for himself. And after this had gone on for a while, when he’d ran around to the front door and knocked, Beatrix, who had let him in before, just opened her window and peered out in a sleepy haze. When Charles Wallace had pleaded with her to let him in, she’d said, “Charles, if my sister put you outside she must have a good reason!” and then shut her window and pulled the curtains closed.

That had been a week ago and now here he was again, locked out before he was done with the sweeping.

And this morning the kitchen door stayed firmly shut.

“Alright then” he said with a determined note to his voice. Off he raced to the front of Rabbit Run, but this time he didn’t even bother knocking on the door. Under the large oak Charles positioned himself below a low branch and began to hop. All rabbits are good hoppers and despite his husky frame, Charles Wallace could be rather agile. One hop, two hops, and he reached his branch. Quickly he swung his legs to the trunk and “walked” himself up into the tree.


Harry’s room was also at the front of the house on the second floor. Conveniently, a large branch rested right in front of the window. All Charles needed to do was climb the tree, hooch out onto the correct branch and then jump from the branch through the window – which, fortunately, Harry left open at night, even in winter, as he found the night air “invigorating.”

Thump! Charles landed on the floor next to the bed. Harry rolled over. “Good morning, Charles Wallace,” he said in a sleepy voice. “Did Thelma kick you out again?”

“As per her usual” said an unabashed Charles Wallace. And then he exited the bedroom on tiptoe. Quietly he crept down the stairs and into the parlor.

Hula was sitting at the table, cup in hand, dunking one of yesterday’s Rabbit Paws in her hot tea. Beside her were stacks of coffee cups and napkins, forks, knives and spoons. “Kicked you out again, did she?”

“Yup”

“Well, here are your supplies for the café.”

“Gee thanks Hula!” he gathered up his supplies for the No Foam and headed cheerfully towards the door. As he reached it he turned around and said, “See you this afternoon then?

“Absolutely” said Hula, “I’ve been thinking about your case, and I think perhaps today a round of kite flying might be creatively stimulating.”

“Excellent!” said Charles Wallace. And he skipped out the front door and down to the café thinking, “maybe later I should put a small step ladder in the bushes so next time I don’t have to worry about getting up into the tree.”