"But I'm not a man, and I'm not colored, Bunny."
"We'll have to pretend that, too. You'll be my man Friday, and we'll go to live in the little tent over there," and Bunny pointed toward the leafy bower he had found. "And you can be colored, too, if you want, Sue," he said. "You could rub some mud on your face and hands."
"Oh, let's! That's what I'll do!" and Sue laid aside the stick to which Bunny had tied the fishline and the bent pin. "That will be fun!" Sue said. "It will be better than the Punch and Judy show with the lobster claw on your nose."
"But you mustn't get your dress muddy," Bunny cautioned his sister.
"Mother wouldn't like that."
[Illustration with caption: FOR A MOMENT SUE LAY THERE, STILL CHOKING
AND GASPING]
"I won't," promised Sue. "And when we get through playing I can wash the mud off my face and hands."
"Yes," said Bunny. "Now I'll go over to my cave—we'll call the place where the vines grow over the stump a cave," he went on, "and I'll be there just like Robinson Crusoe Was in the cave on his island. Then I'll come out and find you, all blacked up with mud, and I'll call you Friday."
Sue clapped her hands in delight, and, when Bunny went off to the cave, which, he remembered, was the sort of place where the real Robinson Crusoe lived, in the story book, Sue found a place where there was some soft, black mud.
Very carefully, so as not to soil her dress, the little girl blackened her hands and face, rubbing on the dirt as well as she could.
"Bunny! Bunny!" she called after a bit.