Six Little Bunkers at Aunt Jo's Part 36

"Yes," urged Mary Turner. "Come and see my queer little office, where I sit all day and hand out tickets and take in gold watches and diamond rings and things like that."

"Do you keep 'em?" asked Russ.

"Oh, no! The people who go in bathing leave them with me for safety. I have to give them back when they hand me the check I give them. I keep each person's things separately in little pigeonholes, and there is a man on guard there, too,--a sort of policeman."

"Are there any pigeons in the pigeonholes?" asked Vi.

"Oh, no!" laughed Mary. "They just call them pigeonholes because they are like the openings that pigeons go in and out of at barns, and such places, I suppose. They are like the boxes in a post office, only larger. Come, I'll show them to you."

As this would keep Margy in the shade a while longer, Mrs. Bunker said the children could go with Mary and look at her "office."

"My daddy's got an office," said Rose. "It's a real estate office."

"Well, mine is different from that," Mary said.

They went with her to look. As it was rather soon after the dinner hour, not many persons were in bathing, and the compartments or "pigeonholes"

were not all filled. In some, however, were the envelopes in which people sealed their watches, rings and other valuables.

The six little Bunkers were quite pleased at seeing Mary Turner's office, and the "policeman" who was on guard so no one would come in and take the envelopes.

"Did some one leave that when they went in bathing?" asked Mr. Bunker with a smile, as he pointed to something in one of the pigeonholes.

"Oh, no," answered Mary with a smile. "That's mine. It's a doll, and I brought it with me to-day, thinking I would have time to make a new dress for it, and give it to a little girl I know. I don't play with dolls any more, though I used to like them very much, and I still like to make dresses for them. But I've been rather busy this morning, helping Mr. Barton, who owns the bathing pavilion, so I didn't get time to do any sewing."

As she spoke she took down the doll, and held it out for Margy and the others to see. And, as Rose looked at it, she exclaimed:

"Oh, look! Why--why, that's Lily! That's my doll that went up in the airship! That's Lily!"

"It can't be, Rose!" said her mother.

"Yes, it is!" insisted the little girl, as she took the doll from her sister's hand. "Look! Don't you 'member where there was a cut in her and her sawdust insides ran out and Aunt Jo sewed up the place with red thread?" and Rose turned the doll over and showed where, surely enough, the doll was sewed with red thread.

"Is that really your doll?" asked Mary, and there was a queer look on her face.

"It really is," said Rose Bunker. "I sent her up in a basket and there was a lot of balloons tied to it. I called it an airship and it got loose and Lily went away up in the sky, and I couldn't get her down."

"I said she'd come down," cried Russ, "'cause I knew the balloons couldn't stay up forever. But we looked for the doll and couldn't find her."

"Did she drop out of the airship?" asked Rose eagerly.

"No, she came down with the 'airship,' as you call it," went on the bathing-pavilion cashier. "She was in a basket when I found her. And tied to the basket were some toy balloons. A few of them had burst, and the gas had come out of the others, so that they were all flabby and wouldn't keep the airship up any more. Then it came down, and it happened to land right in the back yard of the place where I board, in Boston.

"I saw it in the morning, when I went out to feed the pet cat, and I brought the doll in. She was all wet, and her dress had come off. But I carried her into the house and I've kept her ever since. I've been intending to dress her and give her to a little girl, but I'm glad you have her back," and she smiled at Rose.

"Oh, isn't it just wonderful!" cried the little girl. "To think I have my own darling Lily back after her going up in the airship!"

CHAPTER XXV

THE POCKETBOOK OWNER

Indeed it was quite strange and wonderful, as they all agreed, that Rose's doll had been found in such a curious way. Rose, herself, was very happy, for, though the doll was not her "best" one, she liked it very much indeed, and had felt sad at losing Lily.

"I'm glad the airship came down at your house," said Rose to Mary.

"And I'm glad I found her for you," said the cashier.

"'Cause," remarked Vi, "she might have fallen in a house where there was a puppy dog, and he'd have bitten her and torn her dress. I wonder where her dress went."

"Oh, I guess the wind blew it off," said Russ. "The wind is awful strong up high in the air. Once it busted one of my kites."

"I guess that's how it happened," said Daddy Bunker. "The toy balloons must have gone up very high, carrying your doll along, Rose."

"No. Lily didn't have on a dress that day. I was in an awful hurry, an'

I just wrapped a handkerchief around her. That blew away, I guess."

By this time Margy was feeling all right again, and after a little more talk with Mary, the six little Bunkers went out to play on the sandy beach, Rose carrying her doll.

"Oh, it's lovely at Nantasket Beach!" said Russ, as he and Laddie ran about and waded in the shallow water. "Thank you, Aunt Jo, for bringing us here."

"Oh, I'm enjoying it as much as you children are," said Daddy's sister.

But all things must come to an end, even picnics, and when the six little Bunkers had done about everything they wanted to at the pleasure resort it was time to take the boat back for Boston.

On board, after the children and the grown folks were seated, Vi saw her friend Mary Turner.

"There's the girl that found me when I was lost, and the one that had Rose's doll," said Vi, pointing.

"Oh, so it is!" exclaimed Mrs. Bunker. "Don't you want to come over and sit by us?" she asked the bathing-pavilion girl.

"Yes, I should like to," was the answer. "It's lonesome riding home alone."

"Where do you live in Boston?" asked Mrs. Bunker, as Mary sat down near her and the children, who were too tired with their fun to romp around much.

"I board down near where I can get this steamer easily," was the answer.

"I have a pa.s.s on the boat, and by walking to the dock I save carfare.

And these days one has to save all one can," she added.

"You say you board," put in Aunt Jo. "Have you no relatives?"

"Oh, yes, I have a brother and a mother, but Mother is ill in the hospital," was the answer.

"That's too bad," said the ladies, who felt quite sorry for Mary.

Then they talked about different things until, at dusk, the boat landed at the wharf, and the six little Bunkers and all the other pa.s.sengers got off. Rose whispered something to her mother, who looked a little surprised and then spoke to Aunt Jo.