"If I'd been there," he cried as Sue finished, "I'd a given that trunk one kick and busted her clean open, Sue! I wouldn't have waited for no carpenter."
One look at Tom's big feet seemed to indicate that he could easily have "busted the trunk clean open."
"But it was better to saw a little door, to make a kennel for Splash," said Sue. "Anyhow I wasn't in there very long, and I could breathe a little."
"Well, be careful about getting into trunks again," said her mother, and Sue said she would.
The children played in the woods about the camp with Tom after supper, while Mr. and Mrs. Brown sat off to one side talking earnestly.
"I guess they're talking about you," said Sue. "About your going away, Tom."
"Well, I'm not going back to Mr. Bixby!" declared the lad.
"And we're not going to let you!" cried Bunny. "If he comes after you we'll get in a boat and go down the lake and hide in that cave. We'll take something to eat with us, and some fish lines to catch fish, and we'll cook 'em over a campfire and we'll live in the big woods forever."
"What'll we do when Winter comes?" asked Sue.
"Oh, then daddy and mother will be back in the city and we can go and live with them," replied her brother.