The Great Rabbit Revenge Plan Read Online Free PDF Page A

praise.
    Yesterday, Mum and Dad saw the list for the first time, when Konrad was making an entry at breakfast. They both read the list, and they reacted completely differently. Which is pretty unusual. Dad covered his face with his hands and left the room, saying his son had fallen victim to consumerism to such an extent that he was turning his neighbours into a mail-order catalogue. Konrad didn’t quite follow this. Mum, on the other hand, said there was no need to get so het up, and anyway it had been a great idea to move into The Dransfeld. All the same, Konrad didn’t bring the list with him to breakfast this morning, in order to avoid as much conflict as possible, especially on Sunday morning when the family has to decide what to do today.
    â€˜Zoo!’ says Peter.
    A good suggestion. And because the Bantelmanns have a yearly ticket for the zoo, and because the yearly ticket is only worth it if you go to the zoo fairly often, they all agree.
    Out of sheer delight, Peter knocks over his drinking chocolate.

Rivals on the Obernoko
    Every evening, when they go to bed, Konrad and Peter are asked what the best thing was about the day, and what the silliest thing was. Dad and Mum started doing this because it’s a great help in bringing up their wonderful sons.
    Well, then?
    â€˜The zoo,’ says Peter. He’s lying in bed on the wall side and pushing in the face of his cuddly mouse. The mouse is called Lackilug and it’s fairly old and has a little bell round its neck.
    â€˜Can you be a bit more specific?’ says Dad, who is lying in the middle of Peter’s bed.
    â€˜The animals,’ says Konrad, who is lying on the falling-out side of Peter’s bed. He has his toy mouse tucked, in the approved manner, under his arm. For reasons that are lost in the mists of time, his mouse is called Mattchoo, with a double-t and a double-o. It is considerably older than Lackilug, and looks it.
    â€˜Not specific enough!’
    That’s always the way. When the children want something, then talk comes bubbling up out of them, but when their parents want them to answer a question, then their little mouths are all zipped up. That’s what Dad says right now.
    â€˜The elephants,’ says Peter.
    Which is exactly what you would expect him to say. Peter had been unbelievably brave today at feeding the elephants. First he took the biggest piece of stale bread that you could buy from the elephant keeper and he didn’t let go of it until the elephant had got hold of it good and proper with its trunk. He was masterly. The other children screamed and let go of the bread as soon as the big hairy trunk tried to get hold of it, and it kept falling into the muck. But Peter held on till the elephant had got half his trunk round the piece of bread. And not until the elephant started to tug on Peter himself and his parents were beginning to scream a bit did Peter let go of the bread so that the elephant could whisk it elegantly into its mouth.
    Encore! Bravo!
    â€˜And the silliest thing?’ says Mum. She’s sitting at the foot of the bed. There’s a bit of room left there.
    Inevitably, the knocking over of the drinking chocolate at breakfast gets mentioned. Because that was undoubtedly the silliest thing this Sunday. The Bantelmanns have been discussing the knocking over of drinking chocolate for years. That is to say, for years, the Bantelmann parents have been trying to convince Peter that the chocolate can’t help it if it is knocked over. Peter, however, always has some new reason why it is not his fault but the fault of the stupid chocolate itself that it has fallen over. So what’s his excuse going to be today?
    â€˜It was standing all wrong!’ says Peter.
    Not very imaginative.
    â€˜It wasn’t standing wrong. It was put down wrong.’
    â€˜But it was wobbling!’
    Not much better.
    â€˜It wasn’t wobbling. It was wobbled.’
    Konrad has to laugh.