IN THE HAY
Russ looked up from the dam he was making for the water wheel. He could
not see Rose. Nor could Laddie, who was helping his brother make the
little mill pond. But Rose kept on yelling and the dog kept on barking.
“Oh, somebody please come!” cried Rose.
“I’m coming!” shouted Russ.
He leaped up, followed by Laddie, and, as they turned around a clump of
bushes and looked down the brook they saw Rose standing with her back
against a big tree while in front of her, leaping about and barking
loudly, was a large brown dog.
“Oh, Russ! Russ!” begged his sister, as she caught sight of him and
Laddie. “Come and drive this dog away! He wants to bite me!”
“I’ll drive him away!” declared Russ.
“And I’ll help,” added Laddie. “He’s a bad dog!”
Before the two brothers could reach their sister there came running
toward Rose another boy. This boy had a freckled face and red hair.
“Don’t hit my dog!” cried this red-haired boy. “He won’t hurt you. Hi,
Jimsie!” called this new boy, “behave yourself! Down! Quiet! Quit your
barking!”
The dog looked around at the voice, wagged his tail to show that he
was friendly, and stopped barking. Just then up rushed Russ and Laddie
with sticks in their hands. Rose also had a stick which she had raised
toward the dog, but she had not hit him.
“Don’t beat my dog Jimsie!” begged the strange boy. “He didn’t mean any
harm.”
“What did he try to bite my sister for?” demanded Russ, who was angry.
“Oh, he didn’t exactly try to _bite_ me,” said Rose. “He just barked a
lot and he wouldn’t let me get away, and I was afraid he’d bite me.”
“Jimsie wouldn’t bite anybody,” said the boy, whose name was Ralph
Watson. He lived on the farm next to that of Mr. Todd.
“Well, then, what made him bark at my sister?” asked Russ.
“’Cause she had a stick,” answered Ralph.
“Does he bark at everybody who has a stick?” asked Laddie. “If he does
why doesn’t he bark at Russ and me—we have sticks?”
“I guess he will bark at you as soon as he sees you have sticks,” Ralph
answered. “I’ll try him.” He moved around until he stood beside Russ
and Laddie, and as the dog’s eyes followed his young master Jimsie
caught sight of the two Bunker boys and the sticks they held. At once
Jimsie began to bark, greatly excited.
“There! I told you!” cried Ralph.
“What makes him bark so just because he sees a stick?” asked Russ.
“Does he think we’re going to hit him with ’em? I wouldn’t hit any dog,
unless he was going to bite somebody.”
“No, Jimsie doesn’t think he’s going to be hit,” explained Ralph. “He
just wants you to throw the sticks in the brook so he can jump in and
bring ’em out. Always when he sees any one with a stick he thinks
they’re going to play with him and throw the stick into the water. I
guess he thought you were going to play with him,” said Ralph to Rose,
“and when you didn’t—why, he just barked.”
“Oh, I see!” exclaimed Rose, with a laugh, for she was over her fright
now. “That was his way of asking me to throw the stick in the water.”
“Yes,” answered Ralph with a smile that lighted up his jolly, freckled
face. “Sometimes he barks like anything when I take a stick and don’t
throw it in for him to bring out.”
And, indeed, Jimsie seemed very much excited now because Russ and
Laddie would not toss their sticks into the brook. And at last, to
please the dog, Russ tossed his stick in.
Instantly Jimsie plunged in after it, swimming out and bringing the
stick back to shore, dropping it at the feet of Russ as if asking that
it be thrown in again.
“Oh, isn’t he cute!” exclaimed Rose.
“He’s a good dog!” declared Russ.
“Will he bring out a stick for me?” asked Laddie.
“He’ll do it for anybody,” answered Ralph.
“I’ll try it,” said Laddie.
In he tossed his stick, and in plunged Jimsie after it, bringing it
back to shore, which made Laddie laugh. Then Jimsie gave himself a
shake, sending a shower of drops all over Rose, who was near him.
“Oh!” cried the little Bunker girl in surprise.
“Jimsie, don’t you know any better than that?” cried Ralph, in a
scolding voice. “Shame on you!”
“Oh, I don’t mind,” said Rose quickly. “This is an old dress and water
won’t spot it. There, go in and get my stick!” she ordered, as she
tossed hers into the brook. “You wanted me to throw it before, but I
didn’t know what you meant by your barking. Now get the stick.”
Jimsie quickly brought the stick to shore for Rose. Then Ralph tossed
one in and his dog got that. Russ and Laddie wanted to try their sticks
over again, but Rose said:
“Oh, the poor dog will get tired! Don’t make him do so much.”
“He likes it,” Ralph said. “He’d chase sticks all day, I guess, if
you’d throw ’em for him. But maybe it’s time he quit. I have to go
after the cows, anyhow.”
“Where are they? Could we go with you?” asked Laddie eagerly.
“Do you live around here?” Russ wanted to know.
Ralph Watson told his name and where he lived, but he said it was a
long distance to the cow pasture where he had to go, and he added that
the mother of the Bunker children might not let them go.
“I’ll take you to-morrow if you want to come, though,” Ralph promised.
“Then we’ll go,” said Rose.
Then, in answer to a question, she told the others that she had been
walking along the brook looking for watercress, of which Daddy Bunker
was very fond. Rose was using the stick to poke aside the bushes on the
edge of the brook when suddenly Jimsie had sprung out at her, driving
her back against the tree, where she had stood, afraid to move while
the dog barked so furiously.
“If I had only known he wanted to play I’d have played with him,”
finished Rose, with a laugh. “But I thought he was a savage dog.”
“Oh, Jimsie is never ugly,” said Ralph. “He barks a lot, but I guess
that’s because he has to do it when he helps me drive the cows. Well,
I’ll see you again,” he added, as he started away with his dog.
“He’s a nice boy,” said Rose, when he was out of sight.
“I’d like to have that dog,” remarked Russ.
“I think—now maybe—I guess I have a riddle about a dog,” began Laddie,
but before he could ask it, or even before he could think what it was,
yells and screams came from another part of the brook.
“That’s Mun Bun!” exclaimed Rose.
“Sounded like Margy, too,” said Russ.
“Maybe they’ve fallen into the water,” suggested Laddie.
Just then Violet was heard asking:
“Oh, what did you want to go and do that for? Now you have gone and
done it! Are your feet wet? Did you get hurt, Mun Bun?”
“Gosh!” laughed Russ, as he and the others started on a run for the
place whence the voices sounded. “I guess Vi would ask questions if the
house was on fire.”
“Sounds as if Margy and Mun Bun had fallen into the brook,” said Rose.
And that’s just what had happened. The three older Bunkers came upon
Violet, Margy and Mun Bun a few seconds later. It was at a place where
a small plank was laid across the brook as a bridge.
Standing in the water on one side of the plank was Mun Bun. In the
water up to her knees on the other side of the plank, was Margy. Both
children were in the middle of the brook, and Violet was on one shore.
“I guess Mun Bun’s feet are wet, and Margy’s, too!” chuckled Russ.
“What’s the matter, Vi?” he asked. “What happened?”
“Oh, these children started to cross the little bridge, and Margy
wanted to go first and Mun Bun wanted to go first, and they pushed and
shoved and———”
“Which one went into the water first?” asked Rose, with a laugh, for,
after all, the accident was not a bad one.
“I fell in first!” cried Mun Bun, as if this was something to be proud
of.
“No, I did!” declared Margy.
“Well, you’d both better come out,” advised Rose. “You’ll have to go
up to the house and get on dry shoes and stockings.”
“I’m going to ask mother if I can’t go barefoot,” said Mun Bun.
“So’m I,” declared Margy.
Their mother let them go barefoot after scolding them a little for
getting their shoes and stockings wet. She said they should have
been more polite and not have tried one to get ahead of the other in
crossing the plank.
“Well, I guess you’ll have to expect such things as wet feet and muddy
clothes if the children play about the farm,” said Farmer Joel’s
sister, who was getting ready to go off on her vacation.
“Oh, I don’t mind as long as the children aren’t hurt,” said their
mother, with a laugh. “They’ll get used to the place after a while and
know how to have fun without getting into too much trouble. Don’t go
far away now,” she added. “Supper will soon be ready.”
“I’ll stay and help set the table,” offered Rose. And as Miss Todd
would be busy with her own affairs and as Norah had the cooking to
look after, Mrs. Bunker was glad of Rose’s help.
Russ and Laddie went back to where they had been building the water
wheel when Rose was frightened by the dog, and Violet, Mun Bun and
Margy said they would go with Adam North, who started out to the barn
to gather the eggs.
“Where do the hens lay their eggs?” asked Violet, starting some of her
usual questions.
“Oh, in different places,” answered the hired man. “Sometimes away
under the barn, and I have to crawl under the beams to get them out.”
“We could do that for you,” offered Violet. “We’re small and we could
easy fit under the barn.”
“Yes, I do have trouble there,” replied Adam. “Once I got stuck under
the barn floor.”
“Did you have to stay there a long time?” Violet asked.
“I did until they could take up some boards in the floor and let me
crawl out that way,” laughed Adam.
Violet watched him go about in different places in the barn to gather
the eggs. She saw Margy and Mun Bun climbing about in the haymow, and
then she forgot about her little brother and sister for a few moments,
as Adam found a nest with more than a dozen eggs in it and called
Violet to look at them.
When she returned to the middle of the barn she could not see either
Mun Bun or Margy.
“Where are you?” she called.
Back came the answer, but in queer, muffled voices.
“We’re in the hay,” roared Mun Bun.
“And we can’t get out and it’s dark!” wailed Margy.
“What has happened to them?” Violet asked Adam North.