“All right.  I’ll let you do it once, and then it’s my turn again,” Sue said.  “I guess she’s had enough bath now.  I’ll have to feed her.”

“And we’ll get some bread and jam ourselves, Sue.”

Just how it happened neither Bunny nor Sue could tell afterward, but Bunny either did not get a good hold of the string, or else it slipped through his fingers.

Anyhow, just as Sue was passing the cord to him, it slipped away, and down into the well went doll, string and all.

“Oh, Bunny!  Bunny Brown!” cried Sue.  “You’ve drowned my lovely doll!  Oh, dear!”

CHAPTER IX

THE STRIPED CALF

Bunny Brown was so surprised at seeing the rubber doll and string slip back with a splash into the well, that, for a moment, he did not know what to do or say.  He just stood leaning over, and looking down, as though that would bring the doll back.

“Oh, dear!” sighed Sue again.  “Oh, Bunny!”

“I—­I didn’t mean to!” pleaded Bunny sadly enough.

“But I’ll never get her back again!” went on Sue.  “Oh, my lovely rubber doll!”

“Maybe—­maybe she can swim up!” said Bunny.

“She—­she can not!” Sue cried.  “How can she swim up when there isn’t any water ’cept away down there in the bottom of the well?”

“If she was a circus doll she could climb up the bucket-rope, Sue.”

“Yes, but she isn’t a circus doll.  Oh, dear!”

“And if I was a circus man, I could climb down the rope and get her!” Bunny went on.

“Oh, don’t you dare do that!” Sue fairly screamed.  “If you do you’ll fall in and be drowned.  Don’t do it, Bunny!” and she clung to him with all her might.

“I won’t, Sue!” the little fellow promised.  “But I can see your doll down there, Sue.  She’s floating on top of the water—­swimming, maybe, so she isn’t drowned.

“Oh, I know what let’s do!” Bunny cried, after another look down the well.

“What?” Sue wanted to know.

“Let’s go tell grandpa.  He’ll get your doll up with the long-handled rake.”

“With the rake?” cried Sue.

“Yes.  Don’t you remember grandpa told us how once the bucket of the well got loose from the rope, and fell into the water.  He fished the bucket up with the rake, tied to a long pole.  He can do that to your doll.”

“But he might stick her with the teeth of the rake,” said Sue.  She knew the iron teeth of a rake were sharp, for once she had stepped on a rake when Bunny had left it in the grass, after raking the lawn at home.

“Well, maybe grandpa can tangle the rake in the string around the doll, and pull her up that way.  It wouldn’t hurt then.”

“No,” agreed Sue.  “That wouldn’t hurt.”

“Then let’s go tell grandpa,” urged Bunny once more.

Leaving the doll to swim in the well as best she could, the two children ran toward the house.  They saw their grandpa coming from it, and at once they began to cry: