“Shut your eyes and you won’t see the dark,” Bunny went on.  His mother had often told him that when she wanted him to go to sleep in a dark room, or when only the hall light was dimly burning.  So Bunny thought that would be a good thing to tell Sue.  “Shut your eyes, and you won’t see the dark,” said Bunny Brown.

But, really, it was not very dark in the tent, after the two children had stood there awhile.  The moon was brightly shining outside, and, as the tent was of white canvas, some of the light came through.  So as Sue looked around she could begin to see things a little better now.  There was not much to see.  Just the ground, and a box or two in the tent.  During the day Bunny and Sue had been playing with the boxes, and had left them in the tent.

“Come on, now,” said Bunny.  “We’ll spread our blankets out on the ground, Sue, and go to sleep.  Then we’ll make believe we’re camping out, just as we’re going to do up at the lake.”

As he spoke Bunny spread his two blankets out on the ground under the tent.  He folded them so he could crawl in between the folds, and cover himself up, for it was rather chilly that spring night.

“I—­I want a pillow, Bunny,” said Sue.  “I want something to put my head on when I go to sleep.”

“Hush!” cried Bunny in a whisper.  “If you speak out loud that way, Sue, mother or daddy will hear us.  Then they’ll come and get us and make us sleep in our beds.”

“Well—­well,” answered Sue, and Bunny could tell by her voice that she was trying hard not to cry, “well, Bunny Brown, I—­I guess I’d better like sleepin’ in my bed, than out here without no pillow.  I want a pillow, an’ it’s dark an’ cold, an’—­an’——­”

Sue was just ready to cry, but Bunny said: 

“Oh, come on now, Sue!  This is fun!  You know we’re making-believe camp out!”

“All right,” Sue answered, after thinking it over a bit.  “But can I—­can I sleep over by you, Bunny?”

“Yes.  Put your blankets right down here by mine, and we’ll both go to sleep.  Won’t daddy and mother be s’prised when they find we’ve camped out all night?”

“I—­I guess they will,” Sue said.  “It kinder s’prises me, too!”

Sue was dragging her blankets over toward the place when Bunny had his spread out on the ground, and she was just going to lie down, when the flaps of the tent were suddenly shoved to one side, and something came in.

“Oh! oh!” cried Sue, as she threw herself down in her blankets, and wrapped herself up in them, even covering her head.  “Oh, Bunny!  Bunny!  What is it?  What’s after us?”

“I—­I don’t know,” said Bunny, and his voice trembled a little.

Then Sue raised her head and peeped out from under her blanket.  She saw something standing in the front door of the tent, half way in, and half way out.  The moon was still shining brightly, and Sue cried: 

“Oh, Bunny!  It’s a bear!  It’s a bear!”