gate. "We can take turns seesawing."

"That'll be fun!" said Charlie.

"Can't we get another board and make another seesaw?" asked Harry. "We
can't all get on that one. It'll break."

"I guess we can find another board," said Bunny. "I'll go and ask my
mother."

"No!" said Sue quickly. "You'd better not, Bunny!"

"Why?" asked her brother, in surprise.

"'Cause if you go in now mother will know we didn't go to the store, and
she might not like it. We'd better go now and let Charlie and Harry and
Sadie and Mary have the teeter-tauter until we come back," suggested
Sue. "It'll hold four, our board will, but not six."

Bunny Brown thought this over a minute.

"Yes, I guess we had better do that," he said. Then, speaking to his
playmates, he added: "We have to go to the store, Charlie, Sue and I.
You can play on the seesaw until we come back. And then, maybe, we can
find another board, and make two teeters."

"I have a board over in my yard. I'll get that," offered Charlie, "if we
can get another sawhorse."

"We'll look when we come back," suggested Sue. "Come on, Bunny."

Sue got off the seesaw, as did her brother, and their places were taken
by Charlie, Harry, Mary and Sadie. Though Sue was a little younger than
Bunny, she often led him when there was something to do, either in work
or play. And just now there was work to do.

It was not hard work, only going to the store for their mother with the
pocketbook to pay a bill at the grocer's and get some things for supper.
And it was work Bunny Brown and his sister Sue liked, for often when
they went to the grocer's he gave each a sweet cracker to eat on the way
home.

Bunny, followed by Sue, started for the bench where the pocketbook had
been left. But, before they reached it, and all of a sudden, a big
yellow dog bounced into the yard from the street. It leaped the fence
and stood for a moment looking at the children.

"Oh, what a dandy dog!" cried Charlie.

"Is that your dog, Splash, come back?" asked Harry, for Bunny and his
sister had once owned a dog of that name. Splash had run away or been
stolen in the winter and had never come back.

"No, that isn't Splash," said Bunny. "He's a nice dog, though. Here,
boy!" he called.

The dog, that had come to a stop, turned suddenly on hearing himself
spoken to. He gave one bound over toward the bench, and a moment later
caught in his mouth the leather handle of Mrs. Brown's black pocketbook
and darted away.