“I’m afraid your mother will think you are doing too much for me,” said the old lady, as she said good-bye.

“Oh, no!” exclaimed Bunny.  “She told us to help you all we could.”

“And we like it!” Sue exclaimed.  “It’s fun.”

“Except when you fall into flour barrels!” added Bunny Brown, with a laugh at some white spots that still clung to his jacket.

Mrs. Brown did not mind how much Bunny and his sister helped Mrs. Golden, but she told the children they must not stay in the store too much.

“Your long vacation from school is given you so you may play out in the sunshine and fresh air,” said Mother Brown.  “And though it is all right for you to help Mrs. Golden in her store, I want you to have some fun also.”

“It’s fun in the store,” said Bunny.

“Well, I mean other kinds of fun,” added Mrs. Brown.

So there were days when Bunny and Sue only went to Mrs. Golden’s grocery on some errand for their mother or Mary, but even on these short trips they often were able to help the storekeeper, sometimes making little sales, if she was busy in another part of the house, or by arranging goods on the shelves.

Having learned that she could do more business by having her windows clean and with things nicely piled in them, Mrs. Golden kept this plan up, Bunny and Charlie and Sue often stacking goods where they would show well.

But with all this even the children could see that Mrs. Golden was worried.  Bunny often saw her adding up figures on bits of paper, and she would look at the sum and sigh.

“What’s the matter?” Bunny once asked.

“Oh, I owe so much money I’m afraid I’ll never be able to pay,” she said.  “And it seems to be getting worse, even with all the help you children give me.  If only Philip would get that legacy!”

“Hasn’t he got it yet?” asked Bunny.

“No, not yet,” was the answer.  “And I’m afraid he never will.  I miss him so, too.  If he were here to help me things might go easier.  But there!  I mustn’t complain.  I’m much better off than lots of folks!” she added, trying to be cheerful.

“If more people would come to buy here you’d have more money,” said the little boy.  And that gave him an idea that he did not speak about just then, but turned over and over in his busy little head.

Heeding their mother’s advice, Bunny and Sue played out of doors with their boy and girl chums, sometimes going on picnics and excursions or on walks through the woods and over the fields.  Bunny and Charlie often played at boats in the brook, and more than once they fell in.  Sue and her friends often waded in the water of the brook.

Bunny did not again, though, topple into any flour barrels.  It was Sue who had the next accident at the corner grocery, and this is the way it happened.

The little girl had been sent by her mother to get a yeast cake at Mrs. Golden’s, and when Sue reached the store she found the old lady busy with two women who were matching sewing silk.  At the same time a little boy had come in for some molasses.