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Every evening, Grandpa Rabbit told the little bunnies a bedtime story about a land where fox and rabbit say goodnight to each other.
“Where is that land where we don’t have to be afraid of foxes, Grandpa?” asked little Long-Ears curiously. But Grandpa Rabbit just smiled mysteriously.
“Tomorrow, I’ll search for that land!” thought Long-Ears, just before falling asleep.
“Come play with us!” the other bunnies shouted the next morning. But Long-Ears didn’t want to play.
“I’m going to look for the land where fox and rabbit say goodnight to each other,” he said.
“That place only exists in Grandpa’s stories,” laughed the others. But Long-Ears had already hopped away.
In a sunny clearing, a deer was nibbling on fresh green grass.
“It’s nice here,” said Long-Ears. “Do fox and rabbit say goodnight to each other here?” he asked.
The deer chuckled. “There’s no such place. You’d better watch out before a fox finds you.”
As Long-Ears hopped along, he tripped over a molehill. He crawled into the ground and found a tiny burrow.
“Why are you waking me up, Long-Ears?” mumbled a sleepy mole.
“Because I want to know—do fox and rabbit say goodnight to each other down here?”
“What nonsense,” grumbled the mole. “They don’t do that anywhere.”
As Long-Ears poked his nose out of the hole, a dragonfly landed on one of his long ears.
“Hello!” said Long-Ears.
“Do fox and rabbit say goodnight to each other up in the sky?”
“Do you really believe in fairy tales, silly bunny?” giggled the dragonfly.
Long-Ears crawled out and leaned against a tree, feeling sad.
“Maybe it’s true,” he thought. “That land only exists in Grandpa’s bedtime stories.”
Suddenly, he heard a nervous voice from above.
“Can you help me? I’m too scared to climb down!”
Long-Ears looked up and saw a small fox cub stuck in the branches. The cub looked so worried that Long-Ears forgot all about being afraid. He had an idea!
“I’ll help you down!” he called. He quickly asked a wood pigeon to fly to the rabbit meadow and bring his siblings.
There was quite a commotion when the pigeon told them the news.
“Then he really found the land where fox and rabbit say goodnight!” shouted the youngest bunnies.
“Nonsense!” said big sister Silky-Tail. “Long-Ears is in danger. We have to rescue him!”
And off they all hopped, fast as they could.
When they reached the tree, Silky-Tail said firmly,
“Leave the fox up there and come home with us!”
“No!” said Long-Ears. “The little fox needs our help. Besides, we’re already friends.”
Silky-Tail paused for a moment.
“Alright. We’ll help you,” she said at last.
And—ONE! TWO! THREE!—the bunnies climbed onto each other’s backs and made a rabbit ladder. Now the little fox could safely climb down.
“Thank you so much, dear friends,” said the fox. “Without your help, I’d still be stuck up there.”
From that day on, the little fox and Long-Ears played together every day in the woods and meadows. And every evening, before they said goodbye, they would always say:
“Goodnight, Long-Ears.”
“Goodnight, little fox.”
