bottom of the cove much as the fishermen in
the small boats dragged their rakes.

Of course the sailboats could use much larger rakes and cover a wider
part of the cove. Now and then the men on board the sailboats would haul
up the rakes, which were shaped something like a man's hand is when half
closed and all the fingers and the thumb are spread out. The clams were
dumped on deck, afterward to be washed and sorted.

The sight was not new to any of the Browns, and of course Bunker, Uncle
Tad, and Captain Ross had often taken part in clam raking. But Bunny and
Sue never tired of watching it. Now they sat on deck, as much out of the
wind as possible, and looked at the drifting boats and at the clammers
in their dorries.

The storm was passing. Gradually the wind was dying out and the waves
were getting smaller.

"I think we can start again by this afternoon," said Mr. Brown, coming
up on deck following a short nap in the cabin. He had felt sleepy after
dinner.

"Yes, we can leave before evening if you say so," replied Captain Ross.
"How are you enjoying it?" he asked Sue. "Let's see, I know a riddle
about a clam, if I can think of it. Let me see now, I wonder----"

"Where's Bunny?" asked Mrs. Brown, coming up on the deck at that moment.

"Wasn't he with you?" asked her husband.

"No, he didn't come down. I asked Bunker some time ago about him, and
Bunker said he was on deck with Sue. But he isn't. Where is Bunny?"

CHAPTER XII

CHRISTMAS TREE COVE

When a family is making a trip on a boat and one of the children becomes
lost, or is missing, there is always more worry than if the same thing
happened on land. For the first thing a father and a mother think of
when on a boat and they do not see their children or know where they
are, is that the missing child has fallen into the lake, river or
ocean--whatever the body of water may be.

So when Mrs. Brown came up on the deck of the _Fairy_ and did not see
Bunny, who she had thought was with Sue, she asked at once where he was.

And when Mr. Brown heard his wife say that Bunny had not come to the
cabin he, too, began to wonder where the little boy was.

"Where did Bunny go, Sue?" asked Mother Brown. "Wasn't he sitting here
with you?"

"Yes, he was here a little while ago," answered Sue. "And then I was
watching two of the sailboats to see if they would bump together, and I
didn't look at Bunny. When I did look he was gone, but I thought he was
downs