Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue Part 28

"Bunny! Bunny Brown!"

"Come on in! The game is over and Charlie Star is it. He's going to blind next time, you won't have to!"

"Come on in, Bunny Brown!"

Thus called Helen, Sue and the others who were playing the game of hide-and-go-to-seek. For Bunny had not been found, and he had not run up to touch "home," and be "in free."

Helen had not been able to find the little fellow, so well was he hidden.

"I can't think where he is," she said. "I looked all over."

"But you didn't find ME!" cried Sue, clapping her hands in fun.

"No, you were so close to me, back of the lilac bush, that I never thought of looking there," said Helen. Sue had run "in free," as soon as Helen's back was turned.

"But where is Bunny?" everyone asked.

"Come on in!" they called.

But Bunny did not come.

"Let's all look for him," suggested Charlie Star. "Maybe he went away off down the street, or maybe he is out in the barn."

There was a barn back of the Brown house, in which Bunny's father kept some horses used in his business. The children often played in the barn, especially on rainy days, when they did not go up to the attic.

"Let's look in the barn," Charlie went on.

"It wasn't fair to hide out there," Helen said. "That is too far away."

"Maybe Bunny didn't," suggested Sue.

"Well, we'll look, anyhow," went on Sadie.

Out to the barn trooped the children, but though they looked in the haymow, and in the empty stalls (for most of the horses were out at work) no Bunny could be found.

Then they went back to look around the house, in some of the nooks and corners near which the others had hidden.

"Bunny! Bunny!" they called. "Why don't you come in, so we can have another game? You won't have to blind."

But Bunny did not answer.

Pretty soon Sue began to get a little frightened, and her playmates, too, thought it queer that they could not find Bunny, and that he did not answer.

"Maybe we'd better tell your mother, Sue," Sadie said.

"Yes, for maybe he fell down a hole, and can't get up," suggested Helen.

They called once more, and looked in many other places, but Bunny was not to be found. Then into the house they went.

"Oh, Mother!" cried Sue, her eyes opening wide, "we can't find Bunny anywhere, and he won't answer us."

"Can't find him!"

"Won't answer you!"

Mother Brown and Aunt Lu spoke thus, one after the other.

"We were playing hide-and-go-to-seek," explained Helen, "and Bunny hid himself in such a queer place that we can't find him."

"Maybe it's just one of his tricks," said Aunt Lu.

"No, it can't be a trick," Charlie Star explained, "because Bunny likes to play the game, and he doesn't have to blind this time. We've hollered that at him, but he won't come in."

Seeing that the children were really worried, Mrs. Brown and Aunt Lu said they would come out and help search. They looked in all the places they could think of, and called Bunny's name, as did the others, but the little fellow was not found.

Even Mrs. Brown was beginning to get a little anxious now, and she was thinking of telephoning for Mr. Brown to come home, when Bunny was suddenly found. And it was the cook who found him.

The cook came out to the back door, near which stood the empty rain-water barrel, into which Bunny had climbed to hide. She took from the open top a large towel which, a little while before, she had thrown over the barrel to dry, and, looking down in, she cried out:

"Why here he is! Here's Bunny now!"

And so he was! Curled up on the bottom of the barrel, in a little round ball, and fast asleep, was Bunny Brown.

"Oh, we never looked in there!" exclaimed Sadie West.

"I thought of it," said Helen, "but I saw the towel spread over the top of the barrel, and I didn't see how Bunny could be under it, so I didn't look."

"Well, he's found, anyhow," said his mother, smiling.

They had all gathered around the barrel to look into it, the littler ones standing up on the box, by which Bunny had climbed in. Then Bunny, suddenly awakened, opened his eyes and saw his mother, his Aunt Lu, the cook and his playmates staring down at him.

"Why--why what's the matter?" he asked, rubbing his eyes.

"Oh, Bunny, we couldn't find you!" cried Sue.

"Why, I was right here all the while," Bunny answered. "I climbed in the barrel to hide."

"And didn't you hear us calling that you could come in free?" asked Sadie.

Bunny shook his head.

"He was asleep," said Aunt Lu. "He must have fallen asleep as soon as he curled up inside the barrel. That's why he didn't hear. Oh, you funny Bunny boy!" and she laughed and hugged Bunny, who was helped out of the barrel by his mother.

"I never saw him down in there when I came to the door a while ago, and threw the cloth over the barrel," explained the cook. "I thought the barrel would be a good place to dry the towel. And to think I covered Bunny up with it!"

"If it hadn't been for the towel we'd have looked in the barrel ourselves," said Charlie Star.

"I guess it was so nice and quiet and warm in the barrel that I went to sleep before I knew it," Bunny remarked.