Indeed it was so dark in the train and the station that the car lamps were lighted. No wonder Bunny and Sue thought it time to go to bed.

But when they got outside the sun was shining, though it was afternoon, and would soon be supper time.

"Oh, here you are! h.e.l.lo, Bunny dear! h.e.l.lo, Sue dear!" cried a jolly voice.

"Oh, Aunt Lu! Oh, Aunt Lu!" cried Bunny and Sue as they clung to their aunt. "We're so glad to see you!"

"And I'm glad to see you!" she cried, as she kissed her sister, Mrs.

Brown. "Now come on, and we'll soon be at my house."

"But where's the surprise?" asked Bunny.

"Yes, we want to see the surprise," said Sue.

"It's in my automobile," said Aunt Lu with a laugh. "Come on, I'll show her to you."

"Is it--is it a _her_?" asked Bunny.

"Yes, my dear. You'll soon see. Come on!"

Aunt Lu led the way to a fine, large automobile just outside the station. A man wearing a tall hat opened the door of the car, and looking inside Bunny and Sue saw a queer little colored girl, her kinky hair standing up in little pigtails all over her head. She smiled at Bunny and Sue, showing her white teeth.

"There!" cried Aunt Lu. "What do you think of my surprise?"

CHAPTER IX

THE WRONG HOUSE

For a second or two Bunny Brown and his sister Sue did not know what to say. They stood on the sidewalk, at the door of the automobile, which was one of the closed kind, staring at the little colored girl, with her kinky wisps of hair.

"Well, what do you think of Wopsie?" asked Aunt Lu again. "Don't you like my surprise, Bunny--Sue?"

"Is--is this the surprise?" asked Bunny.

"Yes, this is Wopsie. I'll tell you about her in a little while. Get in now, and we'll soon be at my house."

Wopsie, the colored girl, smiled to show even more of her white teeth, and then she asked:

"Is yo' all de company?"

"Yes, this is the company I told you about, Wopsie," said Miss Baker, which was Aunt Lu's name. "This is Bunny," and she pointed to the little boy, "and this little girl is Sue. They are going to be my company for a long time, I hope."

Wopsie gave a funny little bow, that sent her black topknots of hair bobbing all over her head, and said:

"Pleased to meet yo' all, company! Pleased to meet yo'!"

Bunny and Sue thought Wopsie talked quite funnily, but they were too polite to say so. They looked at the little colored girl and smiled. And she smiled back at them.

"Home, George," said Miss Baker to one of the two men on the front seat of the automobile. The man touched his cap, and soon Bunny, Sue and their mother were being driven rapidly through the streets of New York in Aunt Lu's automobile.

"It's almost as big as the one we went in to grandpa's, in the country,"

said Bunny, as he looked around at the seats, and noticed the little electric lamp in the roof.

"But you can't sleep in it or cook in it," said Sue. "And there's no place for Splash or Bunker Blue."

"No," said Bunny. "That's so."

The children had had to leave Splash, the dog, home with Daddy Brown, and of course Bunker Blue did not come to Aunt Lu's.

"No, we can't sleep in my auto, nor eat, unless it is to eat candy, or cookies, or something like that," said Aunt Lu. "And I have some sweet crackers for the children, if you think it's all right for them to eat,"

said Aunt Lu to Mother Brown.

"Oh, yes. I guess it will be all right. They must be hungry, though they ate on the train."

"And Bunny stopped the train, too!" cried Sue. "He pulled on the whistle cord, with mother's parasol, and we stopped so quick we slid out of our seats; didn't we, Bunny?"

"Yep!"

"My! That was quite an adventure," said Aunt Lu, laughing.

"And we went in the choo-choo engine," went on Sue. "I ringed the bell, I did, and so did Bunny. Was you ever in a train, Wopsie?" Sue asked the little colored girl.

"Yes'm, I was once."

"Wopsie came all the way up from down South," said Aunt Lu. "She is a little lost girl."

"Lost!" cried Bunny and Sue. They did not understand how any one could be lost when in a nice automobile with Aunt Lu.

"Yes'm, I'se losted!" said Wopsie, shaking her kinky head, "an' I suttinly does wish dat I could find mah folks!"

"I must tell you about her," said Aunt Lu. "Wopsie, which is the name I call her, though her right name is Sallie Jefferson, was sent up North to live with her aunt here in New York. Wopsie made the trip all alone.

She was put on the train, at a little town somewhere in North Carolina, or South Carolina--she doesn't remember which--and sent up here."

"All alone?" asked Bunny.

"Yes, all alone. She had a tag, or piece of paper, pinned to her dress, with the name and house number of her aunt. But the paper was lost."

"De paper was losted, and now I'se losted," said Wopsie.

"I'll tell them all about you, Wopsie," said Aunt Lu.

Then she told Bunny and Sue how the little colored girl had reached New York all alone, not knowing where to go.

"A kind lady, in the same station where you children just came in, looked after Wopsie," said Aunt Lu. "This lady looks after all lost boys and girls, and she took Wopsie to a nice place to stay all night. In the morning she tried to find Wopsie's aunt, but could not. Nor could Wopsie tell her aunt's name, or where she lived. She was lost just as you and Sue, Bunny, sometimes get lost in the woods."