some of his red stuff on the ladder and we got it on us."

"Oh, dear!" sighed Sue. "Now after my dress is dry and I brush the mud
off mother will see the red paint. Course I'd tell her, anyhow, but I
wish she wouldn't see it first!"

However, there seemed no help for it. All three of the children had red
paint on their clothes, and paint, you know, can't be brushed off. When
it's on it stays, unless turpentine, or something like that, is used to
take it off.

Sue, and the boys, too, had hoped that Mrs. Brown would not know what
had happened. It wasn't that they wanted to deceive, or fool, her, but
Sue wanted to tell of the accident at the brook in her own way and time.
She really did not want to cause her mother worry when Mrs. Brown had
company. And Mrs. Brown would certainly begin to ask questions when she
saw those red spots on Sue's dress.

"Oh, dear!" sighed Sue again, and she seemed about to burst into tears.
Neither Bunny nor Charlie knew what to do.

"Oh, dear!" sighed Sue for the third time.

Suddenly the three children saw the upper end of the ladder--the part
that was raised up over the roof of the sun parlor. They saw this part
of the ladder moving.

"Oh, somebody's coming up!" exclaimed Charlie.

"Maybe it's mother!" wailed Sue. "Oh, help me get in the window! I don't