Six Little Bunkers at Grandma Bells | Page 5

for many years.
Grandma Bell was Mrs. Bunker's mother, and lived at Lake Sagatook,
Maine. She was a widow, Grandpa Bell having died some years ago.
Margy, or Margaret, had been named for Grandma Bell.
Then there was Aunt Josephine Bunker, or Aunt Jo, Mr. Bunker's sister.
She had never married, and now lived in a fine house in the Back Bay

section of Boston. Uncle Frederick Bell, who was Mother Bunker's
brother, lived with his wife, on Three Star Ranch, just outside Moon
City in Montana.
And now, when I have mentioned Cousin Tom Bunker, who had
recently been married, and who lived with his wife Ruth at Seaview, on
the New Jersey coast, I believe you have met the most important of the
relatives of the six little Bunkers. You see they had a grandfather, and
two grandmothers, some aunts, an uncle and a cousin. Well supplied
with nice relatives, were the six little Bunkers, and thus they had many
places to visit.
But I'll tell you about that part later on. Just now we must see what
happened after the steamboat broke to pieces because Laddie jiggled
himself inside the barrel, when Russ was sitting on the outside of it.
"Are you sure none of you is hurt? You look so!" cried Mother Bunker,
as she saw the confused mass of children, barrel staves, box, footstool
and chairs in the middle of the playroom floor.
"I'm all right," said Laddie, as he pulled his leg out from where it was
doubled up in the box, and stood up straight.
"So'm I," added Russ. "Did I fall on you, Laddie?"
"Yep--but it didn't hurt me much."
"My dear Mun Bun!" said his mother, pulling the little boy out from
under a chair. "Are you hurt?"
Munroe Bunker was going to cry, but when he saw that Margy had no
tears in her eyes, he made up his mind that he could be as brave as his
little sister. So he squeezed back his tears and said:
"I just got a bounce on my head."
"Well, as long as it wasn't a bump you're lucky," said Russ with a
laugh.

Vi pulled her doll out from under the pile of barrel staves. The doll's
bathing-dress was torn, but Rose said that didn't matter because it was
an old one anyhow.
"What made it break?" asked Vi as she did this. "Did somebody hit
your steamboat, Russ? Or did it just sink?"
"I guess it sank all right," Russ answered, laughing.
"Well, what made it?" went on Vi.
"Oh, my dear! Don't ask so many questions," begged Mrs. Bunker.
"I got a new riddle," announced Laddie, as he rubbed his leg where it
had been a little scratched on a box. "It's a riddle about a wheelbarrow
and----"
"You told us that!" interrupted Russ.
"Well, then I can make up another," Laddie went on. He was always
ready to do that. "This one is going to be about a barrel. When does a
barrel feel hungry?"
"Pooh! There can't be any answer to that!" declared Russ. "A barrel
can't ever be hungry."
"Yes it can, too!" cried Laddie. "When a barrel takes a roll, isn't it
hungry? A roll is what you eat," he explained, "I didn't think that riddle
up," he added, for Laddie was quite honest. "Jerry Simms told me.
When is a barrel hungry? When it takes a roll before breakfast--that's
the whole answer."
"That's a very good riddle," said Mrs. Bunker with a smile. "But I
haven't yet heard what happened."
"Didn't you hear the noise?" asked Rose with a laugh. "It made a
terrible bang."
"Oh, yes, I heard that," answered Mrs. Bunker. "But what caused it?"

she asked anxiously.
Five little Bunkers looked at Russ, as the one best fitted to tell about
the upset.
"We had a make-believe steamboat," explained the oldest boy. "Laddie
was inside the flour barrel you let me take. He was the fireman. I sat
outside the barrel to steer. But Laddie jiggled and wiggled and joggled
inside the barrel and----"
"I had to, Mother, 'cause I was making believe the steamer was on the
rough ocean where the water is ten miles deep," interrupted Laddie. "So
I rolled the barrel and joggled it and----"
"And then it fell in!" added Rose. "I saw it."
"I felt it," remarked Russ, rubbing his back. "But it didn't hurt me
much," he added.
"I guess the barrel was so old and dry that it couldn't hold together
when you two boys got to playing with it," said Mrs. Bunker. "Well,
I'm glad it was no worse. At first it sounded as though the house was
coming down. You had better play some other game now."
"Oh, the rain has stopped!" cried Rose, looking out