"Maybe she's got little chickens in her nest," said Sue. "If she has she'll peck you if you go close to her—grandma said so."
"Maybe she has," agreed Bunny. "But I'll get a long stick and poke my ball out. Then she can't peck me."
But it was not easy to make the ball roll out of the way of the hen. The stick would slip off it when Bunny reached for it, and whenever the stick came near the hen she would peck at it. Once she almost knocked it from Bunny's hand.
And, all the while, the hen made that queer clucking noise, and fluffed up her feathers so that she looked twice as big as she really was.
"Oh, come away! Come away!" begged Sue. "She'll bite you, Bunny!"
Bunny Brown was a little afraid of the hen. And when he found he could not roll the ball out of her way he ran to the house, with Sue, and told his mother and grandmother what had happened.
"Why, that must be the old gray hen, sitting on her nest that she went off and made by herself," said Grandma Brown. "I wondered where she was hiding, but I never thought to look under the currant bush. I'm glad you found her, Bunny. I'll get your ball for you."
The hen did not seem to mind when Grandma Brown went close to her. Very carefully Grandma reached for Bunny's ball. Then she gently lifted up one of the hen's wings, and showed the children the eggs under her feathers.
"Soon some little chickens will hatch out of the eggs," said grandma. "Some of the shells are already cracked, and the chickies may be out to-morrow."
"Oh, I'll just love to see them!" cried Sue.