Aunts -- Juvenile fiction; Boston (Mass.) -- Juvenile fiction; City and town life -- Juvenile fiction; Siblings -- Juvenile fiction
"What are you going to do?" asked Mrs. Bunker.
"I thought I'd walk back a little way and see if Sue had not dropped out
along the road," answered her husband.
"Have we got time for that? Won't the train go?"
"Well, we've got a little time," said the driver. "I'll get out and help
you look, Mr. Bunker."
"Why'd you lose Sue, Rose?" asked Vi.
"Why, Vi Bunker, I didn't mean to lose her!" exclaimed Rose.
Rose was still searching among the blankets, hoping that, somehow or
other, the doll might be found, and her father and Mr. Mead, the auto
driver, were getting out, when they heard a shout behind them.
"That's some one calling," said Mrs. Bunker.
They looked and saw riding toward them a boy on a bicycle. He had
something in one hand, and clung to the steering bars with the other.
"Oh, he has my doll! He has my doll! I can see Sue!" cried Rose,
clapping her hands in joy. "He found her!"
"I do believe he has the child's doll," said Mother Bunker.
"But where did he get her?" asked Vi.
"He must have picked her up along the road after she slipped out of the
auto," answered Mrs. Bunker.
By this time the boy on the bicycle had caught up to the auto, which had
stopped in a shady place.
"This doll dropped out of your car in front of our house," panted the
bicycle boy. "I saw it fall, and I picked it up and rode after you. But
I had hard work to catch you."
"I'm glad you did catch us," said Mr. Bunker, taking the doll from the
boy's hand. "You had quite a ride. Aren't you tired?"
"Oh, I'm a little tired, but not much," said the boy. "The doll is all
right. She had a little dust on her, but I brushed it off."
"I'm ever so much obliged to you," said Mr. Bunker.
"Thank you--a whole lot!" murmured Rose. "I was 'fraid my doll was lost
forever."
"And here is something for your trouble," said Mr. Bunker, giving the
boy a silver quarter.
"Oh, I don't want to take it!" he said, backing away.
"Of course you must take it!" insisted Rose's father. "You had a hard
ride to bring the doll back to us, and you saved us a long walk to look
for her. Take the money and get yourself something with it."
"All right. Thank you," said the boy, blushing a little under his tan.
"I'll get me a new knife. I want a knife a lot. My old one's no good."
Then the boy told of having seen the doll bounce out of the automobile
as it went past his house. He had called, but the machine made such a
noise, and the six little Bunkers were probably talking so much, that no
one heard the lad.
So he picked up Sue from the road and hurried on after the car.
"And I never want to lose you again," said Rose, as she hugged her doll
close in her arms.
Mr. Bunker and Mr. Mead got back into the auto, and they set off again,
Rose and the children waving good-bye to the boy, who stood near his
bicycle, looking at the silver quarter in his hand.
"Why'd you give the boy a quarter, Daddy?" asked Vi. But that was one
question too many from Vi, and her father did not explain.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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