“All—­all right!” answered Bunny.  He did not want to talk much, for it took nearly all his breath and strength to hold on to the ladder.  But he was glad Sue had thought of the hay.  He was going to tell her to get it, but she guessed it herself.

Putting her doll carefully in a corner, on a little wisp of hay, Sue ran to the edge of the mow, where there was a big pile of the dried grass, which the horses and cows eat.

With both her chubby hands, Sue began to pull the hay out, and scatter it on the barn floor under Bunny.  Her brother hung right over her head now, clinging to the ladder.

“Haven’t you got ’most enough hay there now, Sue?” asked Bunny.  “I—­I can’t hold on much longer.”

“Wait just a minute!” called Sue, as she ran back to the mow.  This time she managed to gather up a lot of hay in her two arms.  This she piled on the other, and she was only just in time.

“Look out!” suddenly cried Bunny.  “Here I come!”

And down he did come.  Plump!  Right on the pile of hay Sue had made for him.  And it was a good thing the hay was there, or Bunny might have hurt his legs by his tumble.  He did not try to turn a somersault as Ben did, the time he fell.  Bunny was glad enough just to fall down straight.

“Oh, Bunny!  Bunny!  Did you hurt yourself?” cried Sue, as she saw her brother sit down in the pile of hay.

Bunny did not answer for a minute.  He looked all around, as though he did not know exactly what had happened.  Then he glanced up at the ladder to which he had clung.

“That—­that was a big fall,” he said slowly.  “I—­I’m glad the hay was there, Sue.  I’m glad you put it under me.”

“So’m I glad,” declared Sue.  “I guess you won’t want to be in a circus, will you, Bunny?”

“Sure I will.  Men fall in circuses, only they fall in nets.  But hay is better than a net, ’cept that it tickles you,” and Bunny took from his neck some pieces of dried grass that made him wiggle, and “squiggle,” as Sue called it.

“Hello!  What happened here?” asked a voice, and the children looked up to see, standing in the door of the barn, Grandpa Brown.  “What happened?” asked the farmer.  “Did you fall, Bunny?”

I think he must have guessed that, from seeing the way Bunny was sitting on the little pile of hay.

“Yes, I—­I slipped off the ladder,” said the little boy.  “But I didn’t get hurt.”

“’Cause I spread hay under him,” said Sue.  “I thought of it all by myself.”

“That was fine!” said Grandpa Brown.  “But, after this, Bunny, don’t you climb up on any ladders, or any other high places.  If you are going to use my barn for your circus, you must not get hurt.”

“We won’t!” Bunny promised.

“Then keep off ladders.  Your little low trapeze is all right, for you will fall in the hay if you slip off that.  But no more ladder-climbing!”

“All right, Grandpa.”  Bunny got up.  Sue picked up her doll, and Grandpa Brown put back the hay into the mow, for he did not like his barn floor covered with the dried grass, though, of course, he was very glad Sue had put some there for Bunny to fall on.