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The weather was warm, it being early in July, soon after the Fourth, and a more delightful time of year would be hard to find during which to spend a vacation in the woods on the shore of Lake Sagatook. "May we go down and paddle in the water?" asked Russ of his mother, after he and the other little Bunkers had wandered out to the barn and had seen Zip, the dog, and Muffin, the cat.
"First we'll stick up four posts in the sand, one for each corner of the bungalow." The children had made playhouses before, not only at their home in Pineville, but while they were at Grandma Bell's house, near Lake Sagatook, Maine; so they knew something of what they wanted to do. Of course the bungalow was rather rough. It could not be otherwise with only rough driftwood with which to make it.
The six little Bunkers even Mun Bun, the smallest of them all could wade out quite a distance from shore on the smooth, sandy bottom, and not be in danger. All that day except when it was time to go in to eat the children played on the shore of Lake Sagatook. They saw boats come and go some with fishermen in them, like Mr. Hurd, and others that carried lumber and other things from shore to shore.
They were getting near the end of the trip, and the children were counting the time before they would get to the station where they could start to drive to Lake Sagatook and Grandma Bell's house, when the conductor came through the coach and told Mr. Bunker that if he changed cars, and took another train at a junction station, he could save all of an hour.
A little later the family got aboard another train, and started off on a short ride that would bring them to Sagatook, whence they could drive to the lake where Grandma Bell lived. This part of the railroad journey was not very long, and they rode in an ordinary day coach, and not in a heavy sleeping car with big seats.
"Oh, yes, Zip is a good puller," said Russ. "He gave us this ride from Lake Sagatook." "And he ran after a rabbit!" added Laddie. "And he might 'a' got it, only the bunny went down a hole." "They mostly do that when a dog chases 'em," said the gate-man.
"It's Russ, and his is Laddie," and Russ pointed to his brother. By this time the cat, seeing that Zip was not going to chase her any more, had taken the arch out of her back and her tail looked like a small frankfurter sausage, and not like a big bologna one. "Well, Russ and Laddie Bunker, I'm glad to see you," said Mr. Gannon. "And so you live over at Lake Sagatook, and not here at Green Pond.
I'm going to sew some yellow buttons on now, and black ones too, 'cause you lost some of the yellow ones." "Well, we won't shuck her any more," promised Russ. These were happy days at Grandma Bell's. Something new could be played by the children all the while. They loved it in the woods, and on the shores of beautiful Lake Sagatook.
The red-haired man in the boat rowed nearer and nearer to the sandy point in Lake Sagatook. He did not seem to see the two small boys who were so anxiously waiting for him. "What's he doing?" asked Laddie, for the man now and then would stop rowing and handle something he had in front of him. "He's fishing," said Russ. "I can see his pole." Laddie saw it too, a moment later.
And when the dog got tired of splashing out in the water to bring back the stick and tow the raft, Laddie and Russ, in their bare feet, pulled it themselves, giving Rose, Vi, Margy and Mun Bun rides along the shore. They had lots of fun, and thought Lake Sagatook the nicest place in all the world to spend part of their vacation. Daddy Bunker and Mother Bunker liked it, too.
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