GOLDEN APPLES
Orange Beach, where Mr. Halliday owned many fruit groves, was the name
of a small village. It was almost as small a town as the one in which
Mr. Black, the switchman, lived. But Bunny and Sue liked small places.
They had seen enough of cities, having passed through many on their
railroad journey.
Alighting from the train, the Brown family found Mr. Halliday waiting
for them in his motor car, Daddy Brown having telegraphed to tell the
time of their arrival.
"Well, you got here at last, I see!" the orange grower exclaimed, as he
came up to welcome his guests.
"If Bunny and Sue could have had their way perhaps we wouldn't have
come," said Mrs. Brown, with a smile.
"Why not?" asked Mr. Halliday, with a smile.
"Oh, they went for a ride on a freight train," laughed their mother, and
then she told of the adventure.
"I guess they have had enough nuts for a time," the fruit grower said,
at the end of the little story. "I'll try them on oranges."
"May I pick some for myself?" Sue asked eagerly.
"All you want!" was the answer. "We have a big crop this year."
"And will you please show me where to catch alligators?" asked Bunny
Brown.
"Oh ho! So that's what you came here for, is it?" exclaimed Mr.
Halliday, with a wink at Mr. Brown. "Well, I'm sorry to say we are all
out of alligators!"
"Aren't there any?" inquired Bunny, in disappointed tones.
"Not right around here," went on the orange grower. "But there are some
farther down Squaw River. I'll take you down some day and show them to
you."
"Hurray!" cried Bunny Brown.
"My grove and house are a few miles from here," the orange grower said.
"You'll soon be there, and I hope you'll have lots of fun."
Bunny Brown and his sister Sue felt sure that they would. They liked the
sunny South very much, as a change from the cold northland where they
had been coasting a few days before.
Everything was lovely and green in Florida now, though it was the middle
of what is called winter in the North. Trees and bushes glowed in soft
green tints, and had been washed clean in a recent rain. As the
automobile bearing the Brown family and their host along a pleasant road
chugged on and on, Sue suddenly exclaimed:
"What's that nice smell?"
"I hear it, too--I mean I smell it!" said Bunny.
"Those are orange blossoms you smell," said Mr. Halliday. "In some of my
groves you will find both blossoms and fruit. We get so used to the
sweet smell that we don't notice it, but I suppose a stranger, coming in
from another place, finds it very nice."
"I just love it!" exclaimed Sue, taking long deep breaths.
"So do I!" added Bunny, sniffing hard.
They had left the small village behind some time before, and were now on
a pleasant country road, lined with trees on either side. The road
twisted and turned, and in about an hour, after making a sudden turn in
the highway, Mr. Halliday called out:
"There's my place!"
Bunny and Sue looked and saw a white house, surrounded by a few barns
and other outbuildings set in a green landscape. All about were rows of
green trees, and the sweet smell of the orange blossoms was stronger
than ever.
"Oh, look at the golden apples!" cried Sue, pointing to some trees quite
near the road.
"Those golden apples, as you call them," said Mr. Halliday, "are yellow
oranges. I'll stop and let you pick some."
It was the first time the Brown children had ever seen the wonderful
fruit growing, and they were delighted when Mr. Halliday stopped the car
and they were allowed to get out. Then they saw that in between the
rows of trees were men picking the oranges.
Some of the men were up on high stepladders, so they might reach the top
branches of the trees. Other men stood on the ground, from which they
could easily reach up to the low limbs and pull off the ripe fruit.
The men had big cloth bags slung over their shoulders or tied around
their waists, and as fast as they picked the "golden apples," as Sue
called them, they were dropped into the bags. When the bags were filled
the men took them to empty boxes, placed here and there amid the trees,
and placed the oranges into them. Other men took the boxes away as fast
as they were filled, leaving more empty ones in their places.
"Do you ship the fruit right from here?" asked Mrs. Brown.
"First it has to be sorted, graded, as we call it," Mr. Halliday
answered. "Then it is carefully packed and sent up North."
Bunny and Sue had been standing quietly to one side, listening to the
talk of their parents and Mr. Halliday and watching the men pick the
fruit. The grove owner now turned to the children and said:
"Go ahead! Pick as many as you like. Here, these are the best and
ripest," and he led them to a tree, the lower branches of which were
easily within the reach of Bunny and Sue.
With delight and wonder showing on their faces, the children picked
their first oranges and ate them there in the grove, while the wind
brought to them the sweet smell of distant blossoms.
"Oh, how good!" murmured Sue, as she finished her fruit.
"Best I ever ate," declared Bunny.
"Try some," said Mr. Halliday to Mr. and Mrs. Brown. "You will find
oranges picked ripe from a tree taste very different from those you get
up North."
"I should say so!" exclaimed Mother Brown. "They are delicious."
"Guess we didn't make any mistake coming to Florida," laughed Mr. Brown,
as he, too, ate not one, but two ripe oranges.
"Well, let's go on to the house," suggested Mr. Halliday, as he walked
back toward the road where the automobile had been left standing. "My
wife will be eager to see you, and the orange groves aren't going to run
away as Nutty, the tramp, did," and the Southerner laughed at the
remembrance of the story of the travels of Bunny Brown and his sister
Sue.
Mrs. Halliday made her guests welcome, and when she and Mrs. Brown were
chatting over a cup of tea, and while Daddy Brown and Mr. Halliday were
talking business, Bunny and Sue changed into some of their every-day
clothes and asked if they might walk around and see things.
"Yes," their mother told them. "Only don't get into mischief."
"And keep away from the river," added their father, for the stream which
went by the name of Squaw River was not far from the house.
"Can't we just stand on the bank and look for alligators?" asked Bunny.
"Yes, let them," Mr. Halliday advised. "The river is not as big nor deep
as it sounds. In fact up here it is only a shallow creek, though down
below it widens and deepens. And there aren't any alligators in it."
"Well, anyhow, we can look," said Bunny, hoping against hope that there
would be some of the scaly lizards in the water.
So, having been cautioned not to fall in, a promise the children readily
gave, Bunny and Sue started off down through an orange grove near the
house to go to Squaw River. They paused only a little while to watch the
men picking oranges, and then hastened on. Soon they were at the edge of
a slow-moving stream which flowed this way and that between banks of
overhanging palm trees, some of which were festooned with Spanish moss
that hung down in clusters like the ragged beard of a very old man.
It was very quiet and still beside the river. It was shady and cool,
too, after the hot sun of the open places and the orange groves, and
Bunny and Sue rather liked it.
Bunny picked up a stone and tossed it into the river. It fell with a
splash.
"What you doing?" Sue wanted to know.
"Maybe I can scare up an alligator," Bunny answered.
"Mr. Halliday said there wasn't any," Sue responded.
Bunny tossed in another stone, and hardly had it sunk beneath the
surface than Sue grasped her brother's arm, and, pointing to the river,
whispered:
"Look! There's an alligator!"
Something like the long, black snout, as Bunny remembered once to have
seen it on an alligator in a zoological park tank, rose into view. And
there was a swirl of the water as though the reptile had switched its
tail.
"Oh!" exclaimed Sue. "It's an alligator! I'm going to run!"