CHAPTER XXYELLOW AND WHITE
Mun Bun felt like bursting into tears. To see his beloved big brother, Russ, knocked down in this fashion was enough to make any small boy cry. It was almost like the time when Russ was so nearly run over by the truck.
But suddenly it came to Mun Bun that he must be brave. If Russ were badly hurt Mun Bun must do something about it—just what, of course, Mun Bun did not know. But he felt he must not cry.
So he “squeezed back” the tears, as he said later, and then he did what perhaps was not just right, but what, I think, most children would have done had the boy who started the fight been a big boy, as was the peddler lad.
Mun Bun caught up a stone and threw it at the peddler boy.
“You let my brother alone!” cried MunBun angrily. “I’ll throw another stone at you if you don’t. And I’ll call my father! I’ll go get my father now—and Farmer Joel and Adam! That’s what I’ll do!”
Usually Mun Bun was not a very straight shot with a stone or a baseball. Generally, when Mun Bun threw, Russ would laugh and say the safest place was right in front of the little fellow. For Mun Bun seldom hit the thing he aimed at.
However, this time, as luck would have it, the stone he threw struck the peddler boy on the shoulder. And then the peddler boy ran away, leaving Russ lying there. I think the peddler boy ran more because of what Mun Bun said about Mr. Bunker being called than because of the stone, for it was a small one and could not have hurt him much.
“There! He’s gone, Russ!” cried Mun Bun, as he ran to his brother. “You needn’t be ’fraid any more!”
“Pooh! I’m not afraid!” boasted Russ, as he arose. He had been stunned by the blow and the fall, and really was not much hurt. “I was going to get up and punch him,” went on Russ. “He hit me too sudden, or hewouldn’t have knocked me down. I was just getting up to hit him.”
“He ran away. I made him run!” cried Mun Bun. “I hit him with a stone and he ran away!”
“Good for you!” exclaimed Russ, and then Laddie came back from down the stream where he had gone to fish.
“What’s the matter?” asked Laddie.
“Oh, that mean peddler boy was around again,” said Russ. “He hit me and knocked me down. He hit me before I had a chance to fight him.”
Laddie dropped his pole and line.
“Where is he?” cried the little fellow. “I’ll fix him!”
“Mun Bun fixed him,” chuckled Russ, telling what had happened.
“I wonder what’s the matter with that fellow, anyhow?” asked Laddie, when he had looked around among the bushes and made sure the ugly peddler chap was not to be seen. “What’s the matter with him, stealing things and knocking folks down?”
“I don’t know,” answered Russ, with a shake of his head. “That’s like one of yourriddles, Laddie, only it isn’t so easy to answer. He didn’t have any good reason for hitting me.”
“We’ll tell Farmer Joel on him,” said Mun Bun.
And this was done when the boys went back to the house after each catching a few more fish. They really did very well, and Mrs. Bunker said they had enough for what Norah called a “mess,” meaning enough to cook so all would have some to eat.
“That boy is a rascal,” said Farmer Joel, when he heard what had happened. “I’ll tell the constable about him, and if he finds out where the peddler is staying I’ll have him arrested.”
“And if I find him,” threatened Adam North, “I’ll set him out among the beehives and let him get stung three or four times. That will cure him of wanting to knock people down.”
“Speaking of bees,” said Mr. Bunker to Farmer Joel, “did you ever find that swarm that got away?”
“No, I didn’t,” answered Farmer Joel. “But I wish I could, for that was a valuablequeen. I guess they’re somewhere in the woods, but I’m afraid I’ll never get them back.”
Russ had a little bruise on his chin where the peddler boy had struck him, and Mother Bunker bathed the sore spot with witch hazel, which made it feel better.
Aside from this little happening and small accidents that occurred from day to day, the six little Bunkers had wonderfully good times at Farmer Joel’s. They played all day long out of doors when it did not rain, and when it showered there was the big barn.
As the summer passed many good things to eat ripened on the trees in the farmer’s orchard. There were apples, plums, peaches, and pears, and Mrs. Bunker had a hard time to keep the children from eating so much fruit that it would make them ill.
One day they were all out in the orchard helping gather the apples. Farmer Joel, Adam, another hired man and Mr. Bunker were picking the apples and packing them in boxes and baskets to be sent away. Care was used in picking the apples not to let them fall, for if they were bruised they soon rotted.Apples that fell to the ground were not packed and shipped away with the best fruit. Farmer Joel was very particular with his apples.
I said the six little Bunkers were helping pick the apples, but of course the four smaller ones could not do much more than pick up those that fell to the ground when the tree was shaken by the men climbing up in it. To their great delight, Russ and Rose were allowed to climb up some of the low trees.
Mun Bun was running about in the orchard, laughing and having a good time, when he suddenly gave a howl, calling:
“Oh, that boy hit me! That peddler boy hit me on the head with a stone! Look out for the peddler boy!”
“What’s that?” cried Farmer Joel. “Is that rascal here?”
Mun Bun sat down on the ground, and this time he cried real tears.
“That boy hit me on the head with a stone!” he sobbed.
For a time there was some excitement, the men coming down out of the trees to look for the peddler boy. But a moment later alongcame Ralph Watson from the next farm, and with him was his dog Jimsie.
“Did you see anything of a peddler boy?” Ralph was asked.
“No,” he answered.
“I don’t believe Mun Bun was hit by a stone at all!” suddenly exclaimed Mrs. Bunker, looking at Mun Bun’s head. “I don’t believe that peddler boy has been here, either.”
“But something hit me, Mother!” insisted Mun Bun.
“Yes, but it was an apple falling from one of the trees,” his mother said. “Look, here is an apple leaf in your hair, Mun Bun. It was an apple that hit you.”
And, surely enough, when they looked, there on the ground beside Mun Bun was an apple. They were more sure it was a bit of fruit that had hit him a moment or two lately for suddenly Jimsie, the dog, let out a howl, and they all saw an apple fall and hit the dog on the head.
This made Mun Bun laugh, and he said:
“Jimsie got hit just like me, didn’t he?”
“And he howled pretty nearly as loudly,” chuckled Russ.
“Perhaps I’d better take the smaller children in from the orchard,” said Mrs. Bunker, after a while. “A lot of apples are falling, and some are so large and hard that little heads might be hurt.”
“I think it’s as well,” agreed Mr. Bunker.
“You may gather the eggs, if you wish,” said Farmer Joel. “It’s about time.”
“Oh, that’ll be fun!” cried Violet.
“An’ I want a basket all by myself!” insisted Margy.
“So do I,” said Mun Bun, forgetting all about being hit by a falling apple.
So off to the barn went Mrs. Bunker, with Margy and Mun Bun, Laddie and Violet, while Russ, Rose, and Ralph remained in the orchard to help pick the apples.
Most of the hens laid in nests in the big hen-house built for them, but there were some of the chickens that “stole their nests,” as Farmer Joel said, going in the barn, or even under it.
The children had been around long enough now to know where most of these hidden nests were, and they scattered and began looking for the eggs.
Mrs. Bunker had the basket with the most of the eggs in, for she did not dare trust them to the children. She was coming out of the hen-house with Laddie and Violet when Mun Bun, who had gone into the barn with Margy, came running up to his mother.
“Oh! Oh!” cried the little fellow. “You ought to see her!”
“See whom?” asked Mrs. Bunker.
“Margy!” gasped Mun Bun. “She’s all yellow and white!”