At first Bunny and Sue fretted a bit, but finally they became interested in playing games under the big tree where the "Ark" had rested for the night, and before they knew it their father came back.
"But he hasn't brought Fred!" cried Bunny.
"Maybe the minstrel boy wasn't the one after all," suggested Mrs. Brown.
"Well, I'm inclined to think he was," said her husband.
"Did you see him?" eagerly asked Bunny.
"No, he had run away. That's why I think it was Fred."
Then Mr. Brown explained:
"When I got to the hotel," he told Bunny, Sue and the others, "I saw Dr. Perry walking around rather nervously. I asked him about the boy, and he said that when he and his medicine van reached the hotel after closing the show last night, he found that his banjo player had packed his valise, taken his banjo, and gone off."
"Nobody knows. He left no word. That's what makes me think it was Fred. He must have seen us in the crowd. And, as soon as he could wash the black off his face, he hurried to the hotel ahead of Dr. Perry, got his bag and ran away. Very likely he did not want to see us and hear us give him the message from his parents. His heart must still be hard against them. It is too bad, if that was Fred, for I had begun to think I had found him. Still it may have been some other young fellow. Dr. Perry said they often came and went without giving any reasons. But we'll still be on the lookout for the missing boy."