However he was well out of it, and promised never again to try such a trick.
"I could make a riddle up about it, but I'm not going to," said Laddie. "Anyhow it's hard to guess the answer, so I'll think up one that's easier."
"Now this," said Uncle Fred, as they stood about the big spring, "is what I was telling you about. You all see what a nice lot of water there is here. Sometimes it overflows, there's so much. Then, within a few hours, it will go dry."
"And where does the water go?" asked Daddy Bunker.
"That's what none of us has been able to find out. The water just seems to sink down into the ground, as if the bottom had dropped out and let it all through. Then again, in a day or so, the water comes back again."
"It is queer," said Mrs. Bunker.
"And the worst of it is," said Uncle Fred, "that I may lose most of what I put into this ranch on account of this spring."
"How?" asked Daddy Bunker.
"Well, I bought this ranch partly because it had such a fine spring of water on it. There is none better for miles around. But if I wanted to sell the ranch again, and people heard that the spring went dry every now and then, they wouldn't pay me as much as I paid. So I would lose. That's one reason why I'm so anxious to get to the bottom of the puzzle. As I said, it's like one of Laddie's riddles—I don't know the answer."