Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue in the Big Woods | Page 7

we have," he agreed. "But we can easy go back to the farmhouse."
"No, we can't," said Sue.
"Why not?" Bunny demanded. "It isn't far, and if you're afraid of the dog you can stay here, and I'll go for the milk."
"Nope!" cried Sue, shaking her head until her hair flew into her eyes. "Mother said you mustn't ever leave me alone, to go anywhere when we were on the road or in the big woods. I've got to stay with you, and you've got to stay with me," and she went up and took Bunny by the hand.
"All right, Sue," said he. "I want you to stay with me. But come along to the farmhouse and we'll get more milk. I'll take a stick, if you want me to, and keep the dog away. I don't believe he'll come back anyhow. Don't you know how 'fraid dogs are to come back to you when they've done something bad. That time Splash ate the meat Bunker Blue brought in and left on the table--why, that time Splash was so ashamed for what he'd done that he didn't come into the house all day. This dog won't bite you."
"Pooh! I'm not afraid of the dog, Bunny Brown," said Sue.
"Then what are you afraid of?"
"I'm not 'fraid of anything. But you know what that farm lady said. She said this was the last quart of milk she could spare, and she didn't have any more."
"Oh, so she did!" agreed Bunny. "Then what are we going to do?"
"I don't know," said Sue.
"We've got to do something," said Bunny gravely.
"Yes," said Sue. "There isn't any more milk at the camp, and the farm lady hasn't any, and----"
"Mother wants some to make the surprise-pudding," added Bunny. "I guess we didn't ought to have tooken that for our play-game," he went on all mixed up in his English.
"No," said Sue, "maybe we oughtn't. Let me think now."
"What you going to think?" asked Bunny. Though he was a little older than Sue he knew that she often thought more then he did about what they were going to do or play. Sue was a good thinker. She usually thought first and did things afterward, while Bunny was just the other way. He did something first and then thought about it afterward, and sometimes he was sorry for what he had done. But this time he wanted to know what Sue was going to think.
"Aren't you going to think something?" he asked after a bit.
Sue stood looking up and down the road.
"I'm thinkin' now," she said. "Please don't bother me, Bunny."
Bunny remained silent, now and then looking into the empty milk pail, and tipping it upside down, as though that would fill it again. Finally Sue said:
"Well, we can't get any milk at the farmhouse. I don't know any other place around here where we can go, so the only thing to do is to go back to Camp Rest-a-While."
"But there's no milk there," said Bunny.
"I know there isn't. But we can tell daddy and mother, and ask them what to do. They wouldn't want us to go off somewhere else without telling them. And maybe daddy can go off in the automobile and get some milk at another farm."
"Maybe," said Bunny slowly. "And if we go with him," he added, "and he does get more milk, we won't set the pail down in the road when we chase a squirrel. We'll put it in the auto."
"I guess by the time we get the milk it will be too dark to see to chase squirrels," said Sue. "It's getting dark now; come on, Bunny."
The two children started down the road toward the camp, and as they did so they heard a crackling in the bushes on the side of a hill that led up from the road.
"Oh, here comes that milk dog back again!" cried Sue, and she snuggled up close against her brother, though the sinking sun was still shining across the highway.
"I won't let him hurt you," said Bunny. "Wait until I get a stone or a stick."
"Oh, you mustn't do anything to strange dogs!" cried the little girl. "If you do they might jump at you and bite you. Just don't notice him or speak to him, and he'll think we're--we're stylish, and he'll pass right by."
"Oh well, if you want me to do that way," said Bunny, looking up toward the place the sound came from, "why I will, only----"
He stopped speaking suddenly, and pointed up the hill. Sue looked in the same direction. They saw coming toward them, not a dog, but an old man, dressed in rather ragged clothes. He looked like what the children called a tramp, though since they had arrived at the camp they had come to know that not all