Eagerly Bunny and Sue watched to see Mrs. Golden open the letters.

CHAPTER XVIII

BUNNY HAS AN IDEA

Mrs. Golden read first the letter from her son, sent to her from the distant city.  But if Bunny and Sue thought to see a look of joy spread over the store owner’s face they were disappointed.

“Did he—­did your son send you the legacy?” asked Bunny, as the letter was folded and put back in the envelope.

“Well, no, not exactly,” was the answer.  “It seems there is some trouble about it.  I hoped Philip could come home to help me, but he can’t, and it will be some time before we’ll get any money from that legacy—­if we ever get it.  Oh, dear!  So many troubles!”

Mrs. Golden sighed and opened the other letter.  Her troubles seemed to be more now, for she sighed again as she laid this letter aside.  Sue could not help asking: 

“Is it a bill?”

“Something like that, yes,” answered the old lady.  “It’s from Mr. Flynt’s grocery company.  It says if I don’t pay soon I’ll be sold out.”

Mrs. Golden sighed again.  The children did not know exactly what it was all about, but they knew there was trouble of some kind and they wanted to help.  But they felt, too, that it was time they went home.

Mrs. Golden must have seen the worried looks on their faces, for she tried to smile through the clouds of her own trouble as she said: 

“Never mind, my dears!  Run along now, for I’m sure your mother will be getting anxious about you.  You have been a great help to me.  I guess I’ll find some way out of my troubles—­I hope so, anyhow.  Run along now!  It was good of you to help me.”

So Bunny and Sue, taking the things they had bought, started out of the store.

“If she could only sell more things she’d have more money and then she could pay that grocery bill,” said Bunny to his sister.

“Yes,” agreed Sue.  “We’ll tell daddy about it and see what he says.  Daddy has lots of money.”

“But maybe he needs it,” suggested Bunny.  And very likely Mr. Brown did.

However, children of the ages of Bunny and Sue are not unhappy for very long at a time, and trouble seems to roll away from them like water off a duck’s back.  On the way home they met some of their playmates, and in talking over a picnic that was to be held in a few days Bunny and Sue forgot about Mrs. Golden for a while.

“You stayed rather a long time,” said Mrs. Brown, when Bunny and Sue finally reached home with the groceries she had sent them for.

“You said we could stay,” said Bunny.

“And we helped Mrs. Golden by tending store,” added Sue.

“Did you really tend store?” Uncle Tad asked, and he was much surprised when the children told what they had done.

“I guess she doesn’t do much business,” remarked Uncle Tad.  “She has a store on a corner, which is the best place for one, as people on two streets pass it.  But I’m afraid she isn’t enough of a hustler.”