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Six Little Bunkers at Mammy June's, a novel by Laura Lee Hope |
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Chapter 5. Off For Summer Seas |
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_ CHAPTER V. OFF FOR SUMMER SEAS How busy the six little Bunkers were on the next day you can easily imagine. Such a packing of bags and steamer trunks! Though of course Mother Bunker did most of that, although Rose helped some. And such a running about the bedrooms and upper halls of Aunt Jo's house asking if this thing shouldn't be put in, or that thing shouldn't be left out! The little people could think of more articles that might be needed down South than ten grown-ups could imagine! Laddie was sure they would need their bathing suits that they had had at Captain Ben's. Mun Bun, who had been playing with Margy in the yard making big snowballs, came in to ask his mother if they couldn't take just one of the biggest snowballs with them in one of the trunks, because Sam, the colored boy, said there wouldn't be any snow down South. "But, my dear!" exclaimed Mother Bunker, laughing, "we are going down South just to escape the snow and the cold. Why carry it with us?" "But maybe the little boys and girls down there will want to see some real snow," said Mun Bun, who could almost always find an answer for any question like this. "Then they will have to come up North to see it," declared his mother decidedly. "We cannot take snow along on the boat, that is sure." Violet found at least a hundred brand new questions to ask about the preparations for the trip. Mother Bunker finally called her a "chatterbox" and begged her to stop. "How do you suppose I can attend to a dozen different things at once, Violet, and answer your questions, too?" "Never mind the things, Mother," Vi replied. "Just tell me----" "Not another question!" exclaimed Mother Bunker. "Stop it!" And then she put out her hand for something to put in the trunk she was packing, and actually squealed when her hand unexpectedly met Alexis's cold, damp nose. "Goodness me!" cried Mother Bunker. "That dog is a nuisance. That is the third time, at least, that I have tried to pack his nose in this trunk. Every time I reach out for something he thinks I want to pet him." This delighted Margy and Mun Bun very much. The idea of packing the great Dane in a steamer trunk was really quite ridiculous. Violet did not venture any more questions immediately however; but Laddie suddenly broke out with a new riddle. "Oh, Mother! Mother!" he cried. "Do you know the difference between a dog and an elephant?" "I should hope so!" Mother Bunker said, chuckling. "But I suppose you want me to give the riddle up so that you can have the pleasure of telling me what the difference is between Alexis and an elephant." "Not just Alexis; any dog," urged Laddie. "And, of course, it would be real polite of you if you said you didn't know," added the little boy. "Very well; what is the difference between an elephant and a dog, Laddie?" "Why," cried Laddie very eagerly, "an elephant owns a trunk of his very own; and a dog only wants to get into a trunk. There now!" "But all dogs don't want to get into trunks," objected Vi. "Do they? Do they, now, Mother?" "I am afraid Laddie's riddle is not as good as some he makes up," said Mother Bunker. "For you know, dogs have trunks as well as elephants." Her eyes twinkled as she said it, for she knew she was going to puzzle her little brood. At once they all broke out with questions and exclamations. How could that be? They had seen, as Vi said, "oceans of dogs" and none of them had had a nose long enough to be called a trunk, like the elephants they had seen at the circus. "Mother is just puzzling us," Laddie said. "How can a dog have a trunk when his nose is short and blunt? At least, most dogs' noses are short and blunt." "Each dog has a trunk nevertheless," declared Mother Bunker, laughing. "And so have you, and so have I." "I have a suitcase," announced Mun Bun gravely. "I don't have a trunk." Mother Bunker swept Mun Bun into her arms then and kissed his chubby neck. "Of course you have a trunk, honey-boy," she cried. "All your little body between your shoulders and your legs is your trunk. So you all have trunks, and so do the dogs." The children laughed delightedly at this, but Laddie suddenly stopped laughing. "Why!" he cried out in great glee, "then the elephant, Mother, has two trunks. I guess I can make a _good_ riddle out of that, can't I?" Russ and Rose took Alexis downstairs after that so that he would not be in the way. They wanted to see Sam again, anyway. And they asked him to dance for them. "I'm going to learn how to cut that pigeon wing," Russ declared. "You do it again, please, Sam. I ought to be able to learn it if I see you do it often enough." However, Russ did not succeed in this ambition. There really was not time for him to learn the trick, for the next morning, very early, the Bunker family started for the boat. The snowstorm had long since ceased, and the streets had been cleaned. William had recovered from his attack of neuralgia and drove them in the big closed car to the dock where the _Kammerboy_ lay. [Illustration: IT WAS A GREAT WHITE STEAMER WITH THREE SMOKESTACKS. _Six Little Bunkers at Mammy Junes._ _Page_ 46] It was a great white steamer with three smoke stacks and a wireless mast. There was so much to see when they first went aboard that the six little Bunkers could not possibly observe everything with only two eyes apiece! They wanted to be down in the saloon and in the staterooms that Daddy Bunker had engaged and out on the deck all at the same time. And how were they to do that? Russ and Rose, however, were allowed to go out on deck and watch the ship get out of the dock and steam down the harbor. But Mother Bunker at first kept the four smaller children close to her side. "I never knew Boston was so big," said Rose, as they looked back at the smoky city. "I guess Aunt Jo never showed us all of it, did she, Russ?" "I don't suppose if we lived there a whole year we should be able to see it all," declared her brother wisely. "Maybe we could see it better from an airplane. I'd like to go up in an airplane." "No, no! Don't do that, Russ! Maybe the engine would get stalled like the motor-car engine does, and then you couldn't get down," said Rose, very much worried by this thought. "Well, we could see the city better." "We can see it pretty well from here," said Rose. "And see the islands. There is a lighthouse, Russ. Would you like to live in a lighthouse?" "Yes, I would, for a while," agreed her brother. "But I'd rather be right on this boat, sailing out into the ocean. Just think, Rose! We've never been away out at sea before." "There was lots of ocean at Captain Ben's," said the girl. "I suppose the ocean is all the same everywhere. Just water. I hope it stays flat." "Stays flat?" repeated Russ, opening his eyes very wide. "Yes," said Rose gravely. "I don't like water when it's bumpy. It makes me feel funny in my stomach when it's that way." "Oh! It won't be rough," said Russ, with much assurance. "I heard Daddy say we were going to sail into summer seas. And that must be warm and pleasant water. Don't you think so?" Rose was looking over the rail now. She pointed. "That doesn't look as though the water was warm," she cried. "See the lumps of ice, Russ? It must be ice water. Where do you suppose the summer seas are?" "We are going to them," declared her brother with confidence. "Daddy said so. He said we would go out to a place he called the Gulf Stream and that the water would be warm there and the air would be warmer, too." "What do you think of that?" gasped Rose. "A stream in an ocean? I guess he was joking." "Oh, no, he wasn't. He said it real serious. He told Aunt Jo about it." "But how can a stream--that means a river--be running in the ocean? There wouldn't be any banks!" declared the doubtful Rose. "Let's go and ask him about it," suggested Russ. "And we'll want to keep on the lookout for that Gulf Stream too. I wouldn't want to go past it without seeing it." They were just about to hunt for Daddy Bunker in the crowd on deck when Laddie came running to them. He was very much excited and he could hardly speak when he reached his older brother and sister. "Oh! Oh! Oh!" gasped the smaller boy. "What is the matter, Laddie?" demanded Russ. "If it is another riddle, Laddie, take your time. We'll stop and listen to it." "It isn't a riddle--Yes, it is, too! I guess it's a sort of riddle, anyway," said Laddie. "Have you seen him?" "That sounds like a riddle," said Rose. "And of course we haven't seen him. What is the answer?" "Who is it that you are asking your riddle about?" demanded Russ. "Mun Bun," declared Laddie, breathing very hard, for he had run all the way from the stateroom. "Mun Bun isn't a riddle," said his sister. "He can't be." "Well, he's lost," declared Laddie. "We can't find him. He was there one minute, and just the next he was gone. And Mother can't find him, and Vi's gone to hunt for Daddy, and--and--anyhow, Mun Bun has lost himself and we don't any of us know what has become of him." _ |
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