GETTING READY
Sue Brown was too curious when she heard Charlie say this to do as she
had been told.
"Oh, Bunny!" she called out, as she heard her brother's cries, "what's
the matter, and where are you?"
"He's stuck in the watering trough," explained Harry Bentley. "Come on
back here and you can see him!"
"Get me out! Get me out!" begged Bunny. "Please get me out!"
"Better go get your father or mother," advised Charlie again. "I've
pulled and pulled, and I can't get Bunny loose. His trick didn't work
out right."
But Sue made up her mind that she would see what was the matter with
Bunny before she called on her father and mother to come and help. She
and Bunny had often been in little troublesome scrapes before, and often
they got out by themselves. They might do it this time. So Sue darted
around the piled-up scenery, and there she saw a group of boys around
the stage watering trough.
This was made to look like the watering troughs you may have seen in the
country, made from a big, hollowed-out log. Only this one was made of
sheet tin, and painted to look like wood.
Down in the trough was Bunny Brown. He was stretched out at full length
and he seemed to be caught. In fact he was caught, and the reason for it
was that Bunny was a little too big to fit in the stage trough--that is
his shoulders were too large. But his legs and feet were free, and with
his shoes he was drumming a tattoo on the inside of the tin trough,
which was somewhat like a bathtub.
"Oh, Bunny Brown, what have you done now?" cried Sue, when she saw her
brother in the trough and the crowd of boys standing around him.
"I--I'm stuck fast!" Bunny replied. "I was practising a trick, like the
one I'm going to do on the stage when we give our play. I got in the
trough, and now I can't get out."
"It's a good thing we didn't put the water in as he wanted us to do,"
said George Watson, "else he'd be soaking wet now."
"Yes, I'm glad you didn't put the water in," agreed Bunny. "But say, I
wish I could get out!"
He wiggled and squirmed, but still he was held fast.
"Oh, if he has to stay stuck in there all the while Bunny can't be in
the show!" said Sadie West.
"We'll get him out!" declared Charlie Star. "Come on, Harry, you and
George each take hold of him on one side, and Bobby Boomer and I'll pull
his legs."
"My legs aren't caught!" said Bunny. "It's my shoulders!"
"Well, if I pull on your legs it'll help get your shoulders loose, I
guess," returned Charlie. "Come on now, fellows!"
"Can't we girls help too?" asked Sue.
"Well, maybe you could," Charlie agreed. "All pull."
"Don't tear my clothes," protested Bunny. "If I tear my clothes maybe my
mother won't let me be in the show."
"Come on now, let's all pull together!" suggested Charlie.
[Illustration: "COME ON NOW, LET'S ALL PULL TOGETHER!"
_Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue Giving a Show._ _Page 96_]
As many of the boys and girls as could, gathered around the trough and
tried to pull Bunny loose. But he stuck fast in spite of all they could
do. Then Sue said:
"I'm going to tell mother. She'll know how to get him loose. Once he was
stuck in the rain water barrel, when it was empty, and my mother got him
out. She can do 'most everything. I'll go for her."
"Yes, I guess you'd better," agreed Bunny. "We've got a lot to do to get
ready for the play, and I can't do anything while I'm stuck fast here."
"It's a good thing this isn't in the play, or everybody in the audience
would be laughing at us," said Harry Bentley.
"I--I guess I won't get in the trough when we give our play real,"
decided Bunny. "I might get stuck then. I'll think up some other trick
to do."
Sue was about to hurry away, intending to call her mother, when some one
was heard coming up the stairs that led to the loft over the garage. A
moment later the head and shoulders of Mart Clayton came into view.
"Oh, Mart!" cried Sue, for she and Bunny felt quite well acquainted with
the boy and girl performers, "Bunny is stuck in the trough and he can't
get out!"
"Is there water in it?" asked Lucile's brother quickly, as he jumped up
the rest of the stairs.
"No!" answered a chorus of boys and girls. "Not a drop."
"Oh, then he's all right," said Mart. "I'll soon have him out."
And he did. It was very simple. Mart simply pulled Bunny's coat off,
over the little fellow's head, and then Bunny was small enough to slip
out of the trough himself. He had so wiggled and squirmed after getting
into the tin thing like a bath tub that his coat was all hunched up in
bunches. This kept his shoulders from slipping out, but when the coat
was off everything was all right.
"What did you get in there for?" asked Mart, when Bunny was on his feet
once more.
"I was practising my act," was the answer. "I'm going to be a farmer boy
in the play, and then I hide in the trough so I can scare an old tramp
that comes to get a drink of water. Only there isn't going to be any
water in the trough when I do my act," said Bunny. "I wanted there to be
some, but mother won't let me."
"I guess we can do that act just as well without water as with it," said
Mart with a smile. "An audience likes to see real water on the stage,
but we can use some in the pump, I guess. Now then, boys and girls, are
you all going to be in the new play, 'Down on the Farm?'"
"Yes, I am! I am! So'm I!" came the answers, and Mart laughed and put
his hands over his ears.
"I guess we'll have plenty of actors and actresses," he said. "Mr.
Treadwell will be out here this afternoon and tell you something of the
little play he is going to write for you--for all of us, in fact, for my
sister and I are going to be in it with you. But now suppose I tell you
a little about a stage, and how to come on and go off."
"Is Bunny going to get stuck again?" asked Sue. "If he is I'm going to
tell mother so she can help get him out."
"No, I won't get in the trough again," said Bunny. "I only did it now to
see if I'd fit. And I don't--very well," he added.
Then Mart told Bunny, Sue, and the others something about how a stage in
a theater is set, and something about the proper way to come on and go
off. A little later Lucile also came out to the garage and she drilled
the girls in a little dance they were to give.
Then the two young performers showed the others how the stage scenery
was set up to look as real as possible from the front.
"Where are you going to give your play?" asked Mart, as they all sat
down to rest.
"Oh, we don't know, yet," said Bunny. "I guess we won't have it until
around Christmas, and by then my father will think up some place for
us."
"Couldn't we have it up here?" asked Sadie West. "All the scenery is
here."
"Oh, there isn't room," said Lucile. "We have to have a stage, and then
there is no place up here for the audience to sit. And there isn't any
use in giving a play unless you have an audience. That's half the fun.
What are you going to do with all the money you make, Bunny Brown?" she
asked the little chap.
"Oh, I--I guess we'll give it to mother's Red Cross," he answered. "But
first we've got to find out what sort of acts we can give. Our dog
Splash is a good actor--he was in our circus."
"I guess Mr. Treadwell can work Splash into the play in some way," said
Mart. "We'll ask him."
That afternoon the actor gathered the children around him, out in the
loft over the garage, and, by questioning them, he found out what each
one could do best. Some could recite little verses, others could sing
and some could dance.
"Can't I have my trained white mice in the play?" asked Will Laydon.
"They twirl around on a wire wheel and one of 'em stands up on his hind
legs."
"Well, perhaps we can use them," said the actor. "Now I'll tell you a
little about the play I am going to write for you. It will be in three
acts. One act will be in the meadow, as we have the scenery for that and
must use what we have. Another act will be in the barnyard, and we can
use as many animals there as we can get. Then we'll have the last act
in the orchard, and you children can be in swings, in the trees, or
playing around."
"We've got only one tree and not many of us can get in that," objected
Charlie Star.
"Well, perhaps I can rig up another tree--or something that will do,"
said Mr. Treadwell. "We'll decide about that later. Now as to the play.
I thought I'd have it very simple. It's about an old man and two
children who have lived in the city all their lives. They are in the
show business and they get tired of it. One day while traveling about
they miss their train, and they are left in a lonely country town.
"At first they don't like it, but when they see how quiet and peaceful
it is, after the hot, noisy city, they decide to stay. They reach a
farmhouse and find some children who are tired of the country and want
to go to the city. The old man and the city children tell the country
children about how hot it is in town, and advise them to stay in the
fields and meadows.
"Then the old man and the children with him do some of the things they
used to do in a city theater, and the country children do some of the
things they do Friday afternoons at school. And they all have a good
time. Then they hear about some poor people who live in a hospital, or
some place like that, and they decide to get up a show to make money to
give to the poor folks who haven't had much joy in life. So they give a
little show, make some money and all ends happily. How do you like
that?"
No one spoke for a moment, and then Bunny cried:
"Why--why that's just like you and--and us, Mr. Treadwell! It's almost
real--like it is here."
"Yes," agreed the actor, "I thought I'd make it as real as possible, and
as natural. It will go better that way. Do you like it?"
"Oh, it's lovely!" said Sue. "I hope Sadie West will speak the piece
about a Dolly's Prayer."
"Yes, she speaks that very nicely," said Mary Watson.
"Then we'll have her do it in our little play," decided Mr. Treadwell.
"And now I'll start to work writing the play and we can soon begin to
practice."
"And we really can give the money to the Blind Home here, instead of to
the Red Cross, maybe," said Bunny. "Once mother and some ladies got up
an entertainment and they made 'most fifty dollars for the Blind Home."
"I hope we can make as much," said Lucile. "It's dreadful to be blind. I
feel so sorry for our Uncle Bill. I wish we could find him."
"And I wish we could find Uncle Simon and Aunt Sallie," added Mart. "But
still we like it here," he hastened to add, lest Bunny and Sue might
think he and his sister did not care for all that Mr. and Mrs. Brown had
done for them.
In the week that followed Mr. Treadwell, when he was not working in Mr.
Brown's office, keeping books, wrote away at the little play. Mart, too,
when he was not busy at the dock, helping Bunker Blue, did what he could
to get ready for the show. The children did not tell any one except
their fathers and mothers what it was to be about.
"It must be a secret," said Bunny Brown. "Then everybody will buy a
ticket to come and see it."
"But where are we going to have the show?" asked Sue of Bunny one night.
"I don't know," Bunny answered.
"I must begin to look around for a place for you," said Mr. Brown. "I
did think we could use the old moving picture theater, but that has been
sold and is being torn down. But we'll find some place. How are you
coming on with the children's play?" he asked the impersonator.
"Very well, I think," was the answer. "We'll soon be ready for a trial,
or rehearsal, as it is called. Have you heard anything about the uncle
and aunt of Mart and Lucile?" he asked.
"No," replied Mr. Brown, "I haven't. I have written several letters
hoping to get some word, but I haven't as yet. I can't even find out
where Mr. and Mrs. Jackson are. They might have found the address of the
children's Aunt Sallie and Uncle Simon. But Jackson seems to have
vanished after his show failed."
"Yes, that often happens," said Mr. Treadwell.
"If we could only find our Uncle Bill he could tell us just what we want
to know," said Mart. "But I don't know where he is."
"Could he, by any chance, be in this Blind Home just outside of your
town?" asked the actor.
"No, I thought of that, and inquired," said Mr. Brown. "There is no
person named Clayton in the place. Well, we'll just keep on hoping."
The weather was now getting colder. Thanksgiving came, and there were
jolly good times in the Brown home. Mart and Lucile said they had never
had such a happy holiday since their own folks were with them, and Mr.
Treadwell, who was invited to dinner, told such funny jokes and stories,
making believe he was a colored man, or an Irishman, at times, that he
had every one laughing. Bunker Blue came to dinner also, and he said he
had had as much fun as if he had been to the theater.
"You'll come to our show, won't you, Bunker?" asked Bunny, when he could
eat no more.
"Oh, sure, I'll come!" said the fish boy. "And I'll clap as loud as I
can when you get in the water trough."
"I'm not going to get in," decided Bunny. "I'm going to let Charlie
Star do that--he's smaller 'n I am."
The children were given their parts for the farm play, and they
practiced whenever they had a chance over the garage. The scenery was
still stored there, and Mr. Brown was trying to find a place in town
large enough for the show to be given.
It was one evening after a day of practice, and while Bunny, Sue, and
the others in the Brown house were talking about the play, that a ring
came at the front door.
"Oh, maybe that's a special delivery letter to say our uncle and aunt
have been heard from!" exclaimed Lucile.
"Oh, if it should be!" murmured Sue, hopefully.
But it was Mr. Raymond, the hardware store keeper, in whose place Wango
the monkey had once got loose.
"Good evening, Mr. Brown," was Mr. Raymond's greeting as he came in. "I
heard you were looking for a place for the children to give some sort of
entertainment--is that so?"
"Yes," was the answer. "I did hope we might get the old moving picture
theater, but that's been sold, and I really don't know what to do. We
have the scenery, the children have nearly learned their parts, but we
have no place to give the show."
"Well, I've come to tell you where you can find a place," said the
hardware man, and Bunny and Sue clapped their hands in delight.