Bunny did also, and when Mr. Treadwell had seated himself at the table the children listened to what followed.

"When you rang I was just telling Mart that perhaps my husband could give him some work, so enough money could be earned for the trip to New York," said Mrs. Brown. "Is it true that no one knows where these children's uncle and aunt can be found?"

"Well, I guess it's true enough," said Mr. Treadwell. "There are two uncles and one aunt, according to the story. William Clayton, who is a brother of Mart's father, is blind, and in some home or hospital--I don't know where, and I guess the children don't either," he added.

Lucile and Mart shook their heads.

"Simon Weatherby and his wife, Sallie, are brother and sister-in-law of Mrs. Clayton's," went on the impersonator. "The last heard of them was that they sailed for the other side--England, France or maybe Australia for all I know. We theatrical folk travel around a good bit. Anyhow, Simon Weatherby and his wife left in a hurry, and they gave the care of the children over to Mr. and Mrs. Jackson.

"Now Mr. Jackson is all right, and a nice man, but he is careless, else he wouldn't get into so much trouble, and he wouldn't have lost the address of Mart's Uncle Simon. But that's how it happened. So the children have some relations if we can only find them, and what they are to do in the meanwhile, now that the show is scattered, is more than I know."

"Well, I know one thing they're going to do, and that is stay right here with me until they are sure of a home somewhere else," said Mrs. Brown.

"I'm glad to hear you say that!" exclaimed Mr. Treadwell, as he finished his lunch. "I heard they left the boarding house, and that they had no money. Well, I haven't any too much myself, but I followed them, hoping I could find 'em and help 'em. Now I've found my little friends all right," he said, looking kindly at Lucile and Mart, "but some one else has helped them."

"They helped some one else first," said Mrs. Newton, with a smile. "Mart got Mr. Winkler's monkey down out of a tree."

"I heard about that," returned Mr. Treadwell, with a laugh. "Well, now that I have located you, I suppose I'd better travel on, though where to go or what to do I don't know," he added with a sigh. "I'm not as young as I once was," he added, "and there isn't the demand for impersonators there once was. If I could get back to New York----"

He paused and shook his head sadly.

"Why don't you stay here and look for work, just as I'm going to do?"

asked Mart. "If you get to New York there won't be much chance. All the theater places are filled now for the winter season."

"That's so!" agreed the impersonator. "But I don't know what sort of work I could do here."

"You--you could be in our show!" interrupted Bunny, who, with Sue, had been listening eagerly to all the talk. "We're going to have a show, and you three could be in it!"

"Going to have a show, are you?" asked Mr. Treadwell, with a smile.

"Yes, a real one," declared Sue. "Once we had a circus, but this show is going to be in the Opera House, maybe, and we'll give all the money we make to our mother's Red Cross."

"That will be nice," said Mr. Treadwell, with a smile. "But I'm afraid I'd be too big to fit into your show."

"Oh, no!" exclaimed Bunny. "We're going to have Bobbie Boomer in it, and he's a big fat boy."

Mr. Treadwell laughed and Mrs. Brown and Mrs. Newton joined in.

"What sort of play are you going to have?" asked Mr. Treadwell.

"Well, we were just talking about it, in our garage, when Tom Milton told us that Mr. Winkler's monkey was loose," explained Bunny, "and we didn't talk any more about it until just now. But the show is going to be different from the circus."

"Where are you going to have it?" asked Mrs. Newton.

"I don't know," confessed Bunny. "Maybe my father will let us have it in the boat shop. That's a big place."

A step was heard in the hall, and Bunny and Sue cried:

"There's our daddy now!"

Mr. Brown walked in, kissed the children and seemed quite surprised to see three strangers present. Matters were quickly explained to him, however, and he welcomed Mr. Treadwell, Lucile and Mart.

"Do you think you could find work for them?" asked Mrs. Brown, when the stories had been told.

"Well, I might," slowly answered Mr. Brown. "I need some help down at the dock and office to get things ready for winter."

"Don't make 'em work so hard they can't help in our show," begged Bunny.

"Oh, you're going to have another circus, are you?" asked his father, with a smile.

"No, it isn't going to be a circus, it's going to be a regular Opera House show!" cried Sue.

"What about?" her father wanted to know, as he caught her up in his arms.

"We don't know yet," Bunny said. "But maybe the play will be about pirates or Indians or soldiers."

"Why don't you have some nice quiet play that would be good for Christmas?" asked Mr. Brown. "Why not have a play with a farm scene in it? You have been down to Grandpa's farm, and you know a lot about the country. Why not have a farm play and call it 'Down on the Farm'?"

"That's the very thing!" suddenly cried Mr. Treadwell. "Excuse me for getting so excited," he said, "but when you spoke about a farm play I remembered that we have some farm scenery in our show that failed. I believe you could buy that scenery cheap for the children," he said to Mr. Brown. "There are three scenes, one meadow, a barnyard with a barn and an orchard; and the last had a house with it."

"Oh, Daddy! get us the farm theater things for our new play!" cried Bunny Brown.

CHAPTER VIII

THE SCENERY

Daddy Brown looked at his two children, and then, as he glanced across the table at the actor who made believe he was George Washington and other great men, Daddy Brown laughed.

"These youngsters of mine will be giving a real show before I know it, with scenery and everything," he said.

"Well, a show isn't much fun unless you have some scenery in it," said Mr. Treadwell, "and the scenery I spoke of, which was part of our show, can be bought cheap, I think."

"Say, Daddy, is the sheenery in a show like the sheenery in a automobile or one of your motor boats?" asked Sue.

"Oh, she's thinking of wheels and things that go around!" laughed Bunny.

"That's _ma_-chinery, Sue, and _scenery_ is what we saw in the Opera House--make-believe trees, and the brook, you know."

"Oh!" exclaimed Sue. "Well, can we have that--that _sheenery_ for our play?" she asked her father.

"I'll see about it," he answered, and Bunny and Sue looked happy, for, like their mother, whenever their father said "I'll see," it almost always meant that he would do as they wanted him to.

"I'm afraid, though," said Mr. Brown, "that getting up a show in town will be harder, Bunny and Sue, than getting up a circus. In the circus you could use your dog Splash and some of the animals from Grandpa's farm. But a theater show, or one like it, hasn't many animals in it. You ought to do more acting than you do trapeze work."

"Oh, we can do it!" cried Bunny Brown. "They're going to help, aren't you?" and he looked over at Lucile and Mart.