cks ought to be.

Every time the train slowed down they were eagerly on tiptoe to see if
the "washout" had come. They were finally steaming through a deep cut in
the wooded hills when, of a sudden, the brakes were applied and the
train came to a stop with such a shock that the little Bunkers were all
tumbled together--although none of them was hurt.

"Here's the washout! Here's the washout!" cried Laddie eagerly.

"Can we go look out of the door, Mother?" asked Rose.

For some of the passengers were standing in the vestibule and the door
was open. Daddy got up and went with the children, all clamorous to see
the hole in the ground that had halted the train.

But it was not a hole at all. It was something so different from a hole,
or a washout as the children had imagined that to be, that when they saw
it they were very much excited and surprised.

CHAPTER IX

THE BIG ROCK THAT FELL DOWN

"Where is it? Let me see it!" was Vi's cry, as she rushed out into the
vestibule ahead of Daddy Bunker and her brothers and sisters.

Vi was so curious that she thought she just had to be first. Daddy
Bunker tried to restrain her, for he was afraid she would fall down the
car steps and out upon the cinder path beside the rails. And although it
had now ceased raining, she might easily have been hurt, if not made
thoroughly wet.

"Oh, Vi's going to see the washout first!" cried Laddie, who did not
like to play second when his twin wanted to be first.

"Now, wait!" commanded daddy. "You shall all see what there is to
see----"

"I want to see the wash up on the clotheslines," said Mun Bun, breaking
into his father's speech.

"Well, if you will be patient," Mr. Bunker said, smiling, "I think we'll
all have a fair view of the wonder. But the 'washup' isn't going to be
just what you think it is, Mun Bun."

Nor was it just what any of the six little Bunkers thought it would
be--as I said before. Daddy went down the steps first and then turned
and "hopped" the children down to the cinder path, one after the other.
Only Russ, who came last, jumped down without any assistance.

It was still very wet and all about were shallow puddles. But the rain
itself had ceased. In places, especially in the ditches alongside the
railroad bed, the water had torn its way through the earth, leaving it
red and raw. And big stones had been unearthed in the banks of the
ditches and in some cases carried some distance away from where they ha