Six Little Bunkers at Grandma Bells | Page 7

though. It's like this--'Why does a barrel eat a roll for breakfast?'"
"Why does a barrel eat a roll for breakfast?" repeated Mr. Bunker. "I didn't know barrels ate rolls. I thought they always took crackers or oatmeal or something like that."
"Oh, she hasn't got it right!" said Russ, with a laugh at his sister. "The riddle is, 'When is a barrel hungry?' and Laddie says Jerry told him it was when the barrel takes a roll before breakfast."
"Oh, I see!" laughed Mr. Bunker. "Well, that's pretty good. Now I have a riddle for you. 'How many lollypops can you buy for two pennies?'" and he stopped in front of a little store with the two children--one on each side of him.
Russ looked at Rose and Rose looked at Russ. Then they smiled and looked at their father.
"I think we can find the answer to that riddle in here," went Mr. Bunker, as he led the way into the candy store, for it was that kind.
And Russ and Rose soon found that they could each get a lollypop for a penny.
"You used to get two for a cent," said Russ. "But I guess, on account of everything being so high, they only give you one."
"Well, one at a time is enough, I should think," said Mr. Bunker, as they went out of the store. "If you had two lollypops I'd be afraid you wouldn't know which one to taste first, and it would take so long to make sure that you might grow old before you found out, and then you wouldn't have any fun eating them."
"Oh, you're such a funny daddy!" laughed Rose.
They walked down Main Street, and soon came to Mr. Bunker's real estate office. He hurried inside, followed by the children.
Mr. Bunker looked behind the door in the little room where he had his desk. The office was made up of three rooms, and in the large, outer one, were several clerks, writing at desks. Some of them knew the two little Bunker children and nodded and smiled at them.
"Where's that old coat of mine I sometimes wear?" asked Mr. Bunker of one of his clerks, when the office door had been opened but no garment was found hanging behind it.
"Do you mean that ragged one?" asked the clerk, whose name, by the way, was Donlin--Mr. Donlin.
"That's the one I mean," said Mr. Bunker. "I stuck some real estate papers in the pocket of that coat yesterday when I went out to the lumber pile with Mr. Johnson, and now I want them. I must have left them in the pocket of the old, ragged coat."
"If you did they're gone, I'm afraid," said Mr. Donlin.
"Gone? You mean those papers are gone?"
"Yes, and the old coat, too. They're both gone. If there were any papers in the pocket of that old coat they're gone, Mr. Bunker."
"But who took them?" asked the real estate man, much worried.
"Why, it must have been that old tramp lumberman," answered the clerk. "Don't you remember?"
"What tramp lumberman?" asked Mr. Bunker.
"It was this way," said Mr. Donlin. "After you went out to the lumber pile with Mr. Johnson--and I saw you had on the old coat--you came back in here and hung it up behind the door."
"And the valuable papers were in the pocket," said Mr. Bunker. "I remember that."
"Well, perhaps they were," admitted the clerk. "Anyhow, you hung the ragged coat behind the door. And just before you went home for the night an old tramp came in. Don't you remember? He was red-haired."
"Yes, I remember that," said the children's father.
"Well, this tramp said he used to be a lumberman, but he got sick and had to go to the hospital, and since coming out he couldn't find any work to do. He said he was in need of a coat, and you called to me to give him your old one, as you were going to get another. Do you remember that?"
"Oh, yes! I certainly do!" cried Mr. Bunker. "I'd forgotten all about the tramp lumberman! And I did tell you to give him my old coat. I forgot all about having left the papers in it. I was so busy talking to Mr. Johnson that I never thought about them. And did the tramp take the coat?"
"He did, Mr. Bunker. And he said to thank you and that he was glad to get it. He went off wearing it."
"And my papers--worth a large sum of money--were in the pocket!" exclaimed Mr. Bunker. "I never thought about them, for I was so busy about selling Mr. Johnson the lumber. It's too bad!"
"I'm sorry," said the clerk. "If I had known the papers were in the old coat I'd have looked through the pockets before I gave it to the tramp."
"Oh, it wasn't your