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When she reached the bars, she shook Jonathan until he woke up. He stared at her in a surprised way, but never cried; he was a good baby.

“Put your arms round sister’s neck,” ordered Mirandy; and Jonathan obeyed.

Mirandy tugged him out of his little wagon, and they both rolled over under a berry bush. Still Jonathan did not cry. He only gurgled a little, by way of laugh. He thought Mirandy was playing with him.

The bars were close together, and Mirandy could not stir one. Jonathan gurgled again when his sister rolled him, like a ball, under the lowest bar, and then rolled under herself. But it was harder for her to tug Jonathan across to the other bars which guarded Cap’n Moseby’s berry pasture; he could only toddle feebly when led by a strong hand. It was quite a puzzle for six-year-old Mirandy, but she got him across and under the other bars; then she set him down in a sweet-fern thicket, and bade him keep still; and he fell asleep again.

Mirandy picked until she had filled her bucket and rounded it up. Her heart beat faster and faster; her face was flushed and eager; she looked a year older than when she started that morning. She had seen no great black dog, and Cap’n Moseby, with his gun, had not appeared. In the distance she could see the hipped roof and squat chimney of the Moseby house; but nobody molested her.

When her bucket was full, she tugged Jonathan across the field again. This time he rebelled; a blackberry vine had scratched his little legs, and his peace was too rudely disturbed. Mirandy tugged him into his little wagon, and he lay there kicking and screaming. She flew back across the field for her bucket of berries. She had been forced to leave it while she brought Jonathan over, and the bucket was gone. She had set it close to the bars, and there could be no mistake about it.

Mirandy went back across the field; Jonathan wailed louder than ever. Her four sisters were gathered about his little wagon, and Daniel and Abijah were coming through the bushes. Then they all turned on her.

“Now, Mirandy Thayer, I’d like to know this minute where you’ve been?” demanded Eliza.

Mirandy jerked her head backward.

“You ‘ain’t been over in Cap’n Moseby’s pasture?”

Mirandy nodded.

“She’s been over in Cap’n Moseby’s pasture,” announced Eliza to the others.

They all stared at Mirandy, and paid no heed to Jonathan’s wails.

Suddenly Mirandy flung her little blue apron over her face and began to weep.

“Did you get scared?” asked Harriet.

“Did the dog chase you?” asked Mary Ann, very excitedly.

Mirandy shook her head, and sobbed harder.

“Did you see Cap’n Moseby with his gun?” asked Daniel.

Mirandy shook her head.

“I wouldn’t be such a baby for nothing, then,” said Daniel.

“I’ve lost my bucket!” sobbed Mirandy.

“Lost your bucket!” repeated Eliza. She was the oldest sister there.

Mirandy nodded.

“You’re a wicked girl!” Eliza said, severely. “I don’t know what mother’ll say. Here’s Jonathan all scratched up, too. Did you take him over there?”

“Yes,” sobbed Mirandy.

“You’re a dreadful wicked girl! Didn’t you know ’twas stealing?”

“Harriet said–it wasn’t,” returned Mirandy, in feeble defence.

“It was. I shouldn’t think you’d said such a thing, Harriet.”

“Of course it’s stealing,” said Daniel, soberly.

“Here you’ve been stealing,” scolded Eliza; “and your bucket’s gone, and Jonathan is all scratched up with blackberry vines. I don’t know what mother’ll say.”

She took Jonathan out of his wagon and hushed him, and then they had a consultation as to what was best to be done. Mirandy related, with tearful breaks, the story of her well-filled bucket and its mysterious disappearance.

“Of course Cap’n Moseby was watching out there with his gun and took it,” said Daniel.

It was finally agreed that they would all go in a body to Cap’n Moseby’s, and try to recover Mirandy’s bucket, that she might not have to face her mother without it. When they reached the Moseby house the doors were closed and the windows looked blank. They knocked as loudly as they dared, and there was not a sound in response. They looked at one another.