and went to the room where Mammy June had been put to bed. The
doctor had already been to see her this morning.

The old colored woman was propped up with pillows and she wore the usual
turban on her head. She smiled delightedly when she saw the white
children and hailed them as gayly as though she were not in pain.

"Lawsy me, childern!" cried Mammy June. "Has you come to see how I is? I
sure has got good friends, I sure has! An' if Ebenezer Caliper
Spotiswood Meiggs was back home yere where he b'longs, there wouldn't be
a happier ol' woman in all Georgia--no, sir!

"For Mistah Armatage say he's gwine have me another house built before
spring. And it'll be a lot mo' fixy than my ol' house--yes, sir! Wait
till my Sneezer comes home and sees it--Tut, tut! He ain't mebbe comin'
home no mo'!"

"Oh, yes, he will, Mammy June," Philly said comfortingly.

"Don't know. These boys ups and goes away from their mammies and ain't
never seen nor heard of again."

"But Sneezer loved you too well to stay away always," Alice Armatage
said.

"And when these Bunkers go back North," put in Frane, Junior, "they are
going to look for Sneezer everywhere."

"You reckon you'll find him?" asked Mammy June of Rose.

"I hope so," said the oldest Bunker girl.

"Of course we will," agreed Russ stoutly. "And Daddy Bunker will look
out for him too. He said so."

According to Russ's mind, that Daddy Bunker had promised to help find
the lost boy seemed conclusive that Sneezer must be found. He and Rose
began eagerly to tell Mammy June what they had already done to make it
positive that Ebenezer Caliper Spotiswood Meiggs would not come back to
the burned cabin some day and go away, thinking that his old mother was
no longer alive.

"You blessed childern!" exclaimed Mammy June. "And has you fixed it dat
way for me? But--but--you says you writ dem letters to Sneezer?"

"Yes," said Rose happily. "Yes, we did, Mammy June. And stuck them up on
poles all about the burned house."

"I don't know! I don't know!" sighed the old woman. "I reckon dat won't
be much use."

"Why not?" demanded Russ anxiously. "If he comes back he'll see and read
'em."

"No. No, sir! He may see 'em," said Mammy June, shaking her head on the
pillow. "But he won't read 'em."

"Why won't he?" Russ demanded in some heat. "I wrote them just as plain
as plain!"

"But," said Mammy June, still sadly, "you see, my Sneezer never learnt
to read hand-writin'!"

CHAP