He pulled out the bottom parts of two seats, until they met in the middle.  Then he fastened them together, pulled down what seemed to be a big shelf overhead, and from this recess, or closet, he took blankets, curtains, sheets, pillows, cases and everything needed for nice, clean beds.

As Mrs. Bunker was afraid the children might roll out of the upper berths in the night if the train went fast or swayed, they all had lower berths.  Soon the children with their heaviest clothing taken off, were stretched out and, a little later, lulled by the clickity-click-clack of the wheels, they were deep in slumber.

The younger children did not awaken all night, but Rose and Russ both said they did once during the hours of darkness.

“And I heard a baby cry,” said Rose.  “Was it the one I took for my doll?”

“I guess it was, Little Helper,” answered her mother, the next morning when Rose told about it.

After breakfast, eaten at little tables in the dining car, the lady brought the baby down for Rose and all the other little Bunkers to see.

“Oh, isn’t she cute?” cried Rose, “I wish we could keep her!”

“I’m glad you like her,” said the baby’s mother, “but I want to keep her for myself.”

Once more it was daylight, and as the train rumbled on toward Lake Sagatook, the Bunkers looked from the windows, or looked again at the picture books their father had bought for them.

“When shall we be there?” asked Russ, for perhaps the tenth time.  He was getting a bit tired of train travel.

“We’ll get in at the station about noon,” his father told him, “but we have to drive about five miles in a wagon or an auto to get to Grandma Bell’s place.  That is on the shore of Lake Sagatook.”

“And I hope none of you fall in,” said Mrs. Bunker.

“We’ll get a boat,” said Russ.

“And I hope it won’t sink,” added Vi, remembering her last boat ride.

“Oh, say!  I’ve thought of a new riddle!” shouted Laddie.  “Why don’t the tickets get mad when the conductor punches ’em?  Why don’t they?”

“I don’t know—­I give up,” said Daddy Bunker.  “What’s the answer?”

“Oh, I haven’t thought of a good answer yet,” said Laddie with a laugh.  “I just thought of the riddle!”

And he sat by the window, murmuring over and over to himself: 

“Why don’t the tickets get mad when the conductor punches ’em?”

On and on rumbled the train.  They were getting near the end of the trip, and the children were counting the time before they would get to the station where they could start to drive to Lake Sagatook and Grandma Bell’s house, when the conductor came through the coach and told Mr. Bunker that if he changed cars, and took another train at a junction station, he could save all of an hour.

“We’ll do that,” decided the children’s father.  “We’ll change at Clearwell, and get on a train there that will take us to Sagatook earlier.”  The name of the station where they were to start to drive to grandma’s was Sagatook.  The lake was five miles back in the woods.