r as a joke at all. He was quite sure he was being overlooked
and that he was just as important as anybody else in the crowd.

"Here's me!" cried Mun Bun again, and he laid hold of the skirt of
Cowboy Jack's long coat and tugged at it. "You forgot me."

"Jumping grasshoppers!" exclaimed the big man, staring down at Mun Bun.
"What do I see? Another Bunker?"

"It's me," said Mun Bun soberly. "I have a name, too."

"I--I wouldn't have seen you if you hadn't pulled my coat-skirt,"
declared the ranchman quite as soberly as the little boy himself. "And
are you a Bunker? Honest?"

"I'm Mun Bun," said the little boy.

"Jumping grasshoppers!" ejaculated the ranchman, stooping down very low
and staring at Mun Bun. "Another Bunker--and named 'Mun Bun'? That's a
very easily remembered name, isn't it? I couldn't forget you--sure I
couldn't! For you see every time I go to the bake shop I buy buns--and
you are a bun, so you say. Are you a currant bun, or a cinnamon bun, or
what kind of a bun are you?"

"I'm a Bunker bun," declared the little boy. "And you can't eat me."

"No, I can't eat you," admitted the ranchman. "But I can pick you
up--this way--and carry you off, can't I?"

And he suited his action to the word and rose up with Mun Bun on one of
his palms, and held him right out on a level with his twinkling eyes and
smiling lips. Mun Bun squealed a little; but he liked it, too. It was
just like being carried about by a giant!

The next thing was to get something to eat in the lunchroom of the
railroad station. To be sure, breakfast had been not many hours before,
but there was a long trip yet before Cowboy Jack's ranch would be
reached, and one could always count on one or more of the six little
Bunkers being hungry if not fed at rather frequent intervals. So
sandwiches and buns--cinnamon buns, not Mun Buns--were bought, and milk
for the children and coffee for the grown-ups, and a light lunch was
eaten. There was really not very much to choose from, but the children
were satisfied with what was got for them.

"Now, come on, all you little Bunkers," said Cowboy Jack. "We've got to
start right away for my ranch, or we won't get there before supper time;
and then Maria Castrado, my cook, won't give us anything but beans for
supper."

"Oh! Where are your horses?" cried Laddie and Vi together.

"Out on the range," said Cowboy Jack. "Plenty of 'em there."

"But don't we ride out to your ranch on them?" Russ wanted to k