ll things!" cried the jolly switchman. "And was the cat with
you, too?" he wanted to know.

"Yes," answered Sue. "This was Nutty's cat."

"What, Nutty, the tramp?" cried the switchman. "Did he have you two
tots?"

Bunny shook his head.

"Nutty was very good to us," answered the little boy. "He was in the car
when we crawled in to get the pussy, but we didn't know it. Then the
train started up and we couldn't get off. Nutty jumped off a while ago,
'cause he was afraid he'd be arrested. But we couldn't jump off until
just now."

"My! My! That's quite a story!" cried the jolly switchman. "You had
better come home with me, and my wife will give you something to eat.
You two children must be lost! Come, I'll take you to my wife."

"Does she live there?" asked Sue, pointing to the shanty.

The jolly switchman burst into a loud laugh.

CHAPTER XVII

A WORRIED MOTHER

While Bunny Brown and his sister Sue were traveling in the freight car
with the pussy and with Nutty, the tramp, Mrs. Brown was left alone on
the station platform, where she had sat down to rest after lunch and to
wait for her husband. Mr. Brown had some business to attend to uptown,
and he had to see not one man, as he thought at first, but several.

Mrs. Brown watched Bunny and Sue walk down the street alongside of the
freight tracks, but she did not see the children cross to look into the
open car.

Then Mrs. Brown went to sleep, or, if she did not exactly go to sleep,
she closed her eyes, so she saw nothing of what went on.

Mrs. Brown was suddenly awakened from her mid-day doze on the railroad
station bench by hearing a loud banging noise. The noise was caused
when the engine backed down the track, bumped into the train of freight
cars and was coupled to them. Then the engine started off, pulling the
cars with it.

"My, I thought that was a clap of thunder!" said Mrs. Brown, sitting up
and rubbing her eyes. "I'm glad it isn't," she went on, as she saw the
warm, southern sun shining.

"Where did Bunny and Sue go?" she asked herself, speaking aloud, as she
arose from the bench. Then she heard some voices of children on the
other side of the station, and, thinking her two might be there, she
walked around to the farther platform.

But there were only some colored boys playing with their marbles and
tops.

"Dear me!" exclaimed Mrs. Brown, "I hope those two haven't wandered
away. I hope they haven't gone toward the town, thinking the