"There"s sand down at Cousin Tom"s," put in Laddie. "I heard my mother say so. I"m going to dig for gold, and if I get a lot, Sammie, I"ll send you some."
"I hope you find a big lot!" exclaimed the visiting boy with a laugh.
They talked over their hopes of finding treasure in the seash.o.r.e sand, forgetting all about the soap bubbles they had been blowing.
"I"ll be lonesome when you go away," said Sammie to Russ. "I like you Bunkers."
"And we like you," said Russ. "Maybe if we dig for gold down at Cousin Tom"s, and can"t find any, you"ll come down and help us."
"Sure I will!" exclaimed Sammie, as if that would be the easiest thing in the world. "I"ll ask my father the best way, and then I"ll come down."
"Could you bring a diving suit?" asked Laddie. "Maybe the gold would be down on the bottom of the ocean, and we"d have to dive for it. Would your father let you take a diving suit?"
"No, I don"t guess he would," said Sammie, shaking his head. "They are only for big men, and you have to have air pumped down to you all the while. It makes bubbles come up, and as long as the bubbles come up the diver is all right."
"Did a shark ever bite your father?" asked Rose.
"No, I guess not," Sammie answered. "Anyhow he never told me about it.
But I must go now, "cause it"s time for my lunch. I"ll come over after lunch and we can have some more fun."
Sammie said good-bye to the six little Bunkers and started down the side path toward the front gate of Aunt Jo"s home. Hardly had he reached the sidewalk when Russ and the others heard him yelling:
"Oh, come here! Come here quick, and look! Hurry!"
CHAPTER III
ON THE BOAT
"What is it? What"s the matter?" cried Rose, as she hurried after her brother, who started to run toward Sammie Brown.
"I don"t know," Russ answered. "But something has happened!"
"Maybe Sammie found the treasure," suggested Laddie. "Oh, wouldn"t that be great? Then we wouldn"t have to dig for it down in the sand at Cousin Tom"s!"
"Pooh! there couldn"t be no treasure out in front of Aunt Jo"s house,"
exclaimed Violet, not being quite so careful of her words as she should have been.
By this time Russ and Rose were in the front yard, but they could not see Sammie, because between the yard and the street were some high bushes, and the shrubbery hid Sammie from sight.
"What"s the matter?" asked Rose.
"What happened?" Russ wanted to know.
"A policeman has arrested a big bear!" cried Sammie. "Come on and see it! The policeman has the bear, an" there"s a man with gold rings in his ears, and he"s got a red handkerchief on his neck, or maybe that"s where the bear scratched him, and there"s a big crowd and--and--everything!"
Words failed Sammie. He had to stop then.
"Oh--a--a bear!" gasped Rose.
She and Russ, followed by the rest of the six little Bunkers, hurried out to Aunt Jo"s front gate. There they saw just what Sammie had said they would--a policeman had hold of a long cord which was fastened about the neck of a bear. And there was an excited man with a red handkerchief tied about his throat, and he had gold rings in his ears. He was talking to the policeman, and there was a crowd of men and children and a few women about the bear, the policeman, and the other man, who seemed to be the bear"s owner.
"What happened?" asked Russ of a boy whom he knew, and who lived a few doors from Aunt Jo"s house.
"I don"t know," was the answer. "I guess the bear bit somebody though, and the policeman arrested it."
"No, that wasn"t it," said another boy. "The bear broke into a bake shop and ate a lot of pies. That"s why the policeman is going to take it to the station house."
"Here comes the patrol wagon!" some one else cried, and up the street dashed the automobile from the precinct station house, its bell clanging loudly.
"Get in!" the six little Bunkers heard the policeman say to the man with the red handkerchief around his neck. "Get in, you and the bear! I"ll teach you to come around here!"
"Oh, maybe the bear bit the policeman," half whispered Rose.
"No, my dears," said Aunt Jo, who, with Mother Bunker, had come out to see what the excitement was about and why the six little Bunkers had run so fast around the side of the house. "Nothing much at all happened, my dears," said Aunt Jo. "But in this part of Boston, at least, they don"t allow performing bears in the streets. That is why the policeman is taking this one away. The man, who is an Italian, led his tame bear along the street and started to have the animal do tricks. But we don"t allow that in this Back Bay section."
"Will he shoot the bear?" asked Mun Bun breathlessly.
"Oh, no," said Aunt Jo with a laugh. "The poor bear has done nothing, and his master did not know any better than to bring him here. They will just make them go to another part of the city, where, perhaps, performing bears are not objected to. Whether they allow them anywhere in Boston or not, I can"t say. But he will be taken away from here."
The automobile patrol, with the bear and man in charge of the policeman, rumbled away. The crowd waited a little while, and then, as nothing more seemed likely to happen, it began to scatter.
"I"m glad we saw it," said Russ, as he turned back into the yard.
"So"m I," added Laddie. "It"s "most as much fun as digging for gold.
Say, Russ, I hope we find some, don"t you?"
"I sure do! I wish we were at Cousin Tom"s right now. I want to start digging for that treasure."
"Don"t be too sure of finding any," said Mother Bunker, who heard what her two little boys were saying. "Many persons dig for gold but never get any."
"Oh, we"ll get some," declared Russ, and if you read this book through you will find out that what Russ said came true.
After supper that evening, when they had finished talking about the bear that had been arrested, Laddie and Vi wanted to go out into the yard and start digging.
"Oh, no," said their mother. "You have been washed and dressed, and digging will get you dirty again. Better wait until to-morrow."
"I thought we were going to start to pack to-morrow to go to Cousin Tom"s," remarked Rose.
"So we are, but I guess you"ll have time to dig for a little gold,"
returned Mother Bunker with a laugh. "Though that doesn"t mean you will find any," she went on with another laugh.
The next day Laddie and Vi did start to dig in a place where Aunt Jo said it would do no harm to turn over the ground.
"Though if there is a golden treasure in my yard I never knew it," she said. "But dig as much as you like."