THE BARN STORE
For a second or two Miss Bradley seemed to pay no attention to the
buzzing sound which Bunny, Charlie, and some of the other pupils heard
only too plainly. The teacher was busy thinking whether she had done
enough talking to make sure her boys and girls would not again go near
the deep hole in the school yard.
"I wouldn't want any of them to get hurt," thought Miss Bradley. "I had
better scare them a little now than have any of them harmed the least
bit."
She was thinking what else she might say, to impress on the pupils the
danger of the hole, when she seemed to hear, for the first time, the
buzzing of Charlie's auto.
"What's that?" asked Miss Bradley.
No one answered, except that, here and there in the room, a boy or girl
snickered.
There was one queer thing about Charlie's new toy auto. It made a great
deal of buzzing as the wheels whirred around when the wound-up spring
made them do this, but the machine itself did not go very fast. It
seemed to make a great fuss about getting anywhere, but it took its own
time in doing it.
This was the reason why the auto, though it had been pulled out of
Charlie's pocket with his handkerchief and had fallen into the aisle
down which it ran, did not very soon get where Miss Bradley could see
it. She could hear the buzzing sound, but she did not know what it was.
"Who is making that noise?" she asked again.
No one answered, for, truth to tell, neither a boy nor a girl in the
room was causing the noise; though of course Charlie was to blame, in a
way.
Miss Bradley was looking over the room, into the faces of her pupils.
The buzzing sound kept up. It seemed to be coming nearer and nearer. The
windows were open, and she thought a bee or a wasp might have flown in.
But it would be a very large wasp or bee, indeed, which would make so
loud a buzzing sound as this.
"Children----" began Miss Bradley, and then she suddenly stopped, for
something struck her on the foot. And it was right near her foot that
the buzzing noise sounded. But as she had walked a little way down from
her platform, and her foot was partly under the first desk--that of fat
Bobbie Boomer--Miss Bradley could not see what had struck her.
"Oh!" she cried, as she jumped back, rather startled.
Charlie Star and Bunny Brown could not help laughing right out loud.
They knew what had caused all this excitement.
A moment later Miss Bradley knew also. For Charlie's buzzing auto,
having struck her foot, turned aside and rolled out on the floor in
front of her teaching platform, in plain sight. There the little red toy
came to a stop, for its spring was fully unwound.
Charlie and Bunny stopped their laughing suddenly as the teacher looked
down at them.
"Whose is this?" asked Miss Bradley, in a voice she hardly ever used in
the classroom, for her pupils were generally very orderly. "Who owns
this automobile?" she asked, sternly.
Timidly Charlie Star raised his hand.
"If you please, Teacher, it's mine," he said. And such a weak little
voice as it was! Not at all like the loud, hearty tones Charlie used
when he called to Bunny, "first shot agates!"
Miss Bradley stooped over and picked up the toy. She placed it on her
desk, and then, turning to face the children, she said:
"I am very sorry about this. I thought, after what had happened to
Helen, that you were going to settle down and study your lessons. Why
did you bring this auto to school, Charlie? And why did you take it
out?"
Charlie was silent a moment, and then he answered, saying:
"I--I didn't exactly take it out, Miss Bradley. It came out when I took
out my handkerchief. I--I didn't mean to do it."
"Very well then, you didn't," the teacher agreed, with a little smile,
for she knew Charlie was telling the truth. "But why did you bring the
auto to school at all?"
Then Charlie told of having bought the toy that morning, on his way to
school with Bunny Brown.
"I didn't have time to go home with it after I bought it," he said, "so
I put it in my pocket. We played with it at recess, and I forgot and
wound it up and stuck it in my pocket. I didn't mean to let it get out
and run down the aisle."
Miss Bradley wanted to smile, but she knew it would not be just the
thing to do. So she said:
"Well, Charlie, I will excuse you this time. But please don't bring any
more toys into the schoolroom. And now, as we have lost much time from
our lessons, we must study extra hard to make it up. Come to me after
school, Charlie, and I'll give you back your auto."
Miss Bradley put the toy in her desk for safe keeping, and went on with
the lessons. But it was rather hard for the pupils to get their minds
back on their studies, because so much had happened that day from the
time the parrot had screeched "Cracker! Cracker!" in the cloakroom
until Charlie's auto fell out of his pocket and went buzzing down the
aisle to bang into the teacher's foot.
However, the day came to an end at last, and then, talking and laughing,
the boys and girls ran out of doors. Charlie stayed after the others,
and walked shyly up to the desk at which Miss Bradley sat, looking over
some examination papers. The room was very still and quiet after the
noise and excitement of the children's outgoing.
"Yes, Charlie. What is it?" asked Miss Bradley, as she saw him standing
near her desk.
"If you please--my auto----"
"Oh, yes," and she opened her desk and handed it to him. "It is a cute
little toy," and she smiled at Charlie.
"You ought to see it go!" he exclaimed eagerly, for Miss Bradley was
really a friend to her pupils, and she knew how to make kites and spin
tops almost as good as a boy.
"Here! I'll show you!" Charlie went on. "It's a dandy!"
Quickly he wound up the auto and set it down on the floor. The wheels
buzzed and the little red car spun across the schoolroom floor.
Bunny Brown and George Watson, waiting outside for Charlie, wondered
what was keeping their chum. They knew he had stayed in to get his
plaything.
"Maybe she's going to make him stay in half an hour," suggested George.
"She didn't say she was," replied Bunny. "But maybe she's giving him
a--a leshure." What Bunny meant was lecture.
"Let's look in," suggested George.
On tiptoes they went to a window whence they could see into the room.
There they saw Miss Bradley winding up Charlie's auto, and they heard
Charlie saying:
"You try it now, Miss Bradley! See how nice it runs!"
And as the surprised watchers looked on, their teacher started the toy
across the floor as Charlie had done. For, following the first showing
of his plaything, Charlie had offered to let his teacher wind it, and
she had agreed.
"Yes, it is a cute toy," said the teacher, as the auto banged into a
side wall and stopped. "But we mustn't play with it in school hours."
"Oh, no'm!" agreed Charlie, and then he hurried outside, where Bunny and
George were waiting for him.
"Say, you ought to see!" exclaimed Charlie, half breathless. "She ran
the auto herself!"
"We saw her," said Bunny.
"She's a dandy teacher all right!" declared George.
One Saturday morning Bunny and Sue came downstairs to breakfast at the
same hour as on other days. Usually this did not happen, for on
Saturdays they were allowed to remain in bed a little longer than on
days when they had to go to school.
"Well, what does this mean?" asked Uncle Tad, who was finishing his meal
and reading the paper at the same time. "This is Saturday, isn't it?
Unless I have on the wrong glasses!" he added, as he looked at the
calendar on the wall.
"Yes, it's Saturday," said Bunny.
"Then why are you up so early?" asked Uncle Tad.
"'Cause a lot of the boys and girls are coming over, and we're going to
play store out in our barn," explained Sue. "You can come and buy
something if you want to, Uncle Tad."
"Thanks! Maybe I will!" chuckled the old soldier. "Are you going to sell
any inside outside cocoanuts flavored with saltmint?" he asked.
"What are those?" Bunny inquired.
"Oh, he's only joking!" declared Sue, as she saw a twinkle in the eyes
of Uncle Tad. And of course he was joking.
"Well, maybe I'll look in and see what you do have to sell in your barn
store," he said, as he left the table.
Bunny Brown and his sister Sue were not long in finishing their
breakfast, and then they hurried out to the barn where they were to keep
store. Bunny and Sue had found some boards and boxes out there which
would make fine shelves for a pretend store.
"We'll put the shelves up before the others get here," said Bunny.
"Yes," she agreed. "But what kind of store are you going to play? Are
you going to have washboilers and tin pans?"
"No, I guess not," said Bunny, after thinking about it a moment. "We'll
keep a store like Mrs. Golden's."
"Yes, that will be nice," agreed Sue. "Here, Splash!" she cried. "Get
out of there! That box isn't for you to sleep in!" For the big dog had
crawled into one of the boxes that were to form the store shelves.
Splash was curling up most comfortably.
"We'll use him for a delivery dog," said Bunny. "We'll tie a basket on
his neck and he can take the groceries and things to different places."
"Oh, that will be fun!" laughed Sue, clapping her hands. "Here comes
Helen!" she cried a moment later, and then, with joyous shouts and
laughter, a number of children came running into the Brown yard, ready
to play barn store.