Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue Part 27

"w.a.n.go is good, too," said Bunny. "Only I guess he is scared, now. Come on down, w.a.n.go!" called Bunny, "and I'll give you a peanut."

"Oh, yes, he'll come down for a peanut, or maybe two peanuts!" exclaimed Sue. "w.a.n.go loves peanuts. Have you any, Mrs. Redden?"

"Yes," answered the store-lady. "But I'm not going to give him peanuts, after all the candy he has taken and spoiled. Nearly half the jelly beans will be wasted, and the gla.s.s jar is broken, and he will spoil all those lollypops, too. Oh dear!"

"Just give him two peanuts," said Bunny, "and that will make him come down. Then maybe he'll give back the lollypops."

"Well, child, we can try it," the candy-lady said. "I can't hit him with the broom, that's sure, unless I stand on a chair, and if I do that he may reach down and pull my hair, as he did Mrs. Winkler's one day. I'll get the peanuts."

She brought a handful from another show case, and gave them to Bunny, who held them up so the monkey could see them.

"Come and get the nuts, w.a.n.go!" Bunny called.

The monkey chattered, and made funny faces, but he did not come down. He seemed to like the lollypops better, and, also, his perch on the shelf, he thought, was safer than one on the floor.

"What shall we do?" asked Mrs. Redden.

"Bunny, could you run down the street, and ask Mr. Winkler to come and take his monkey away?"

"Yes'm, I'll do it," the little boy answered politely.

But just then something else happened.

w.a.n.go, trying to peel the wax paper from another lollypop, dropped a second one. He reached for it, but he did keep hold of the shelf, and, the next second down he himself fell, knocking over several more candy jars.

They crashed to the floor, smashing and spilling the candy all over.

w.a.n.go turned a somersault, and landed lightly on his feet, close beside Mrs. Redden.

"Oh, you bad monkey! You bad monkey!" she cried. "Shoo! Get out of here!

Out of my shop!"

She brushed at w.a.n.go with the broom, and the lively monkey made a rush for the back door of the store, as the front one was closed.

"Here! Don't you dare go into my kitchen!" cried Mrs. Redden, as she ran after the monkey. "You'll upset everything there!"

w.a.n.go chattered, and made funny faces. Then he turned and ran back, sliding right under Mrs. Redden's skirts, and nearly upsetting Bunny.

At that moment the front door opened, and there stood Jed Winkler, the old sailor, who owned the monkey.

"Have you seen anything of w.a.n.go?" began Mr. Winkler, but there was no need for him to ask such a question. There was w.a.n.go, in plain sight, holding some lollypops in one paw, and in the other some jelly beans and coconut candies he had grabbed up from the floor. And in his mouth, with the stick-handles pointing out, were three other lollypops!

"Take him away! Oh, take him away!" begged Mrs. Redden. "He will spoil all the candy in my shop!"

"This is too bad!" exclaimed the sailor, "w.a.n.go, behave yourself! You are a bad monkey! Up with you!"

w.a.n.go jumped up on his master's shoulder, and hung his head. I really think he was ashamed of what he had done.

"He broke loose from his new chain," said the old sailor, "and I have been looking all over for him. I am glad I have found him, and I will pay for all the candy he spoiled."

"Well, if you do that I can't find any fault," said the store-lady. "But he certainly gave me a great fright."

"And he wouldn't even come down for peanuts," cried Bunny.

"w.a.n.go isn't very good to-day," said Mr. Winkler. "I must get a stronger chain for him, I think. Now I'll take him home, and, Mrs. Redden, when you find out how much candy he spoiled, and how many jars he broke, I will come and pay you."

"All right," answered Mrs. Redden. Then the sailor took his monkey home, and the store-lady, after she had given Bunny and Sue the lollypops they came for, began to clean up her place. Certainly w.a.n.go had upset it very much.

"He must have come in the store by the back way, when I was out hanging up the clothes," said the candy-shop lady. "He hid under the counter until he saw me open the showcase for you, Bunny. Then he put in his paw, and grabbed the lollypops."

"Yes, that's what he did--I saw him," said Sue, who was now taking the paper off her candy. But she did not put two in her mouth, at once, as the monkey had done. Of course Sue wouldn't do anything like that.

Bunny and Sue made all the folks at home laugh, as they told of w.a.n.go's funny tricks.

"Well, it was quite an adventure," said Aunt Lu, "wasn't it?"

"What's an ad--adventure?" Sue wanted to know.

"It's something that happens," her aunt explained.

"Then w.a.n.go must be an adventure," said Bunny, "for lots happened to him."

It was two days after the monkey had gotten in the candy-store that Harry Bentley, Charlie Star, Sadie West and Helen Newton came over to play with Bunny and his sister Sue.

"What shall we play?" asked Bunny.

"Hide-and-go-to-seek," said Sadie.

The others liked this game, so they began to play it. Helen covered her eyes with her arms, so she could not see where the others hid, and began counting.

"When I count up to fifty, I'm coming to find you," she said, "and whoever I find first will have to blind next time, and hunt for the rest of us."

Off they all ran to hide. Sue stooped down to hide behind a lilac bush, near "home," which was the side porch. Whoever reached "home" before Helen did, after she had started on her search, would be "in free."

"Ready or not, I'm coming!" called Helen, after she had counted fifty, and she began to look for the hiding ones.

"She'll not find me," said Bunny Brown to himself. "I'm going to hide in a funny place. She'll never find me!"

And where do you think he hid? It was in a queer place--down in an empty rain-water barrel, that stood back of the house. Bunny climbed up into it by standing on a box, and, once inside, he crouched down on the bottom, where anyone would have had to come very close, and look over the edge, to see him. And there Bunny hid.

CHAPTER XX

SPLASH RUNS AWAY

"Where is Bunny?"