Well might this be said, for, as the hardware man spoke, the monkey leaped from one shelf to another and, in so doing, knocked down a lot of tin pans which fell to the floor with a clatter and a bang.

"Can't you do something to stop him?" cried Mr. Raymond.

"Well, yes, I suppose I can," said Mr. Winkler slowly. "I didn't know he was loose till a minute ago, when some one came and told me. I was down on the fish dock, talking with Bunker Blue. But I'll get w.a.n.go down. I'm real glad he isn't in a china store, for he surely would break things!

Here, w.a.n.go!" he called, holding out his hand to the monkey, now perched on a high shelf. "Come on down, that's a good chap! Come on down!"

"He doesn't seem to want to come," suggested a man with a red moustache.

"Oh, I'll get him. He needs a little coaxing," returned the old sailor.

"Come on down, w.a.n.go!" he went on.

w.a.n.go looked at the egg beater he held in one paw, and then, seeing the little handle which turned the wheel, he began to twist it. To do this he dropped the pie pans he held in the other paw and they fell to the floor with a crash.

"Land goodness, he certainly makes noise enough!" said one of the women in the store, covering her ears with her hands.

Perched above the heads of the crowd, and paying no attention to the calls of Jed Winkler, the monkey began turning the egg beater. He seemed to like that most of all.

"Maybe he thinks it's a hand organ," suggested Bunny Brown, and the people in the store laughed.

"Come on, w.a.n.go! Come down!" cried Mr. Winkler, but the monkey would not leap down from the high shelf.

"Guess you'll have to climb up and get him yourself, Jed," suggested Mr.

Reinberg, who kept the drygoods store next door. He had run in, together with other neighboring shopkeepers, to see what the excitement was about.

"I could get him down if I had something to coax him with," returned the old sailor.

"I promised him a cookie," said Mr. Raymond.

"He'd rather have a piece of cake--cocoanut cake would be best," went on Mr. Winkler.

"I'll go home and get some," offered Bunny Brown. "My mother baked a cocoanut cake yesterday, and I guess there's some left."

"You don't need to go all the way back to your house after the cake,"

said Mrs. Nesham, who kept a bakery across the street from the hardware store. "I'll get one from my shelves."

She hurried across the way, and soon came back with a large piece of cocoanut cake.

"If the monkey doesn't take it I wish she'd give it to me," said Tom Milton.

"Oh, w.a.n.go will take this all right," said Jed Winkler. "Here you are, you little rascal!" he called to his pet. "Come down and see what I have for you." He held up the piece of cake. w.a.n.go saw it and this seemed to be just what he wanted. He dropped the egg beater, which fell to the floor with another clatter and clang, and then the monkey began climbing down the shelves.

He had almost reached the old sailor, his master, when the front door of the hardware store opened to allow a new customer to come in. Whether this frightened w.a.n.go, or whether he thought he had not yet had enough fun, no one knew. But instantly he s.n.a.t.c.hed the piece of cake from Mr.

Winkler's hand, and, holding it in his paw, skipped out the door.

"There he goes!" cried Bunny Brown. "He's loose again!"

"And he's up in a tree out in front!" added Tom Milton, who had rushed out ahead of the others in the store.

Surely enough, when the crowd got outside, there was w.a.n.go perched high in a big, leafless tree, eating cake.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THERE WAS w.a.n.gO PERCHED HIGH ON A BIG TREE.

_Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue Giving a Show._ _Page 42_]

"Well, how are you going to get him down out of there?" asked Mr.

Snowden.

"Looks as if I'd have to climb after him," said Mr. Winkler. "When I was a sailor on a ship, and had w.a.n.go for a pet, he used to climb up the mast and rigging and I'd go after him. That was when I was younger. I don't believe I could climb that tree and get him now."

"Do you want me to do it for you, mister?" asked a new voice.

Bunny, Sue, and the other children turned to see who had spoken. They saw a boy about twelve years old, with bright, shining eyes standing beside Mr. Winkler and pointing up at the monkey in the tree. The strange boy seemed to have arrived on the scene very suddenly.

"Do you want me to climb the tree and get your monkey for you?" asked the boy. "I'll do it, if he doesn't bite."

"Oh, he doesn't bite--w.a.n.go is very gentle," said Mr. Winkler. "But can you climb that high tree?"

"I've climbed higher ones than that," was the answer. "And ropes and poles and the sides of buildings. I can climb almost anything if I can get a hold. I'll go up and get the monkey for you!"

As he spoke he took off his coat; and though the day was cold Bunny noticed that the strange boy wore no overcoat. Hanging his jacket on a low limb of the tree which held w.a.n.go, the boy began to climb. And, as he did so, Sue pulled her brother's sleeve.

"Do you know who that is?" she whispered.

"Who?" asked Bunny Brown.

"That boy climbing the tree. Don't you 'member him?"

"No. Who is he?"

"Why, he's the boy who turned somersaults in the Opera House show!"

CHAPTER V

A COLD LITTLE SINGER

Bunny Brown was so excited in watching to see how the strange boy would climb up and get the monkey that, at first, he paid little attention to what Sue said. The boy by this time was beginning to scramble up the trunk of the tree. Sitting on a branch, high above the lad's head, was w.a.n.go the monkey, eating the piece of cake.

"It's the very same boy, I know it is!" declared Sue.

"What same boy?" asked Sadie West, while the other boys and girls watched the climber.

"The same one who was with the little girl that sang songs in the Opera House show. Don't you remember, Bunny?" asked Sue.

This time Bunny not only heard what his sister said, but he paid some attention to her. And, noting that the climbing boy was half way up the tree now, Bunny turned to Sue and asked her what she had said.