"I'll give you some for your pussy," said the agent, after he had telegraphed for the snow shovelers.

I wish you could have seen Fluff lap up the milk, which was warmed for him and put in a saucer on the floor of the automobile. He was hungry—was the little stray kitten that had come down out of the evergreen tree—and his little sides seemed to swell out like balloons as he lapped up every drop of milk.

"I hope your cat Choo-Choo won't get hungry," said Jan, as the last of the milk disappeared.

"I can get him some more," said the agent. "Anyhow, he isn't as hungry as your pussy was."

"Good-bye!" called Uncle Toby, as he started off once more. "I hope the stalled passengers will soon be shoveled out."

"I guess they will be," the agent said.

It was almost dark when the big automobile reached the village of Pocono where Uncle Toby lived.

"Now we'll soon be snug and warm," he told the children. "I have more of a load than when I started, but I'm glad I found you two," he said to Mary and Harry. "You're going to have a good time with my Curlytops."

Harry and Mary, who had never had much of a good time in all their lives, were beginning to be happy. They had been very small when their father went off to war—they hardly remembered him, in fact. Mr. Benton need not have gone, had he wished to stay at home, for he could have been excused, or have done some other war work than fighting. But he was a brave man and wanted to do his best for his country. So he had gone to France. After awhile he was missing, and though his wife was helped by her friends and by the government, still she had hard work to get along and there was not much money with which to give Mary and Harry good times. But happier days were ahead of them.

"There's Uncle Toby's house!" cried Ted, as the automobile turned into the driveway.

"Oh, but something has happened!" exclaimed Jan. "Look! There's a crowd out in front!"

And surely enough, a throng of people could be seen standing in the dusk and storm in front of Uncle Toby's home.



CHAPTER X

AMONG THE PETS

As the automobile driven by Uncle Toby and containing the Curlytops and their playmates came to a stop near the side entrance to Mr. Bardeen's house, the door opened, letting out a stream of light on the white snow.

"Is that the police?" asked a voice which Ted remembered as that of Mrs. Watson, or "Aunt Sallie," as Uncle Toby called her.

"No, this isn't the police," Uncle Toby answered, through the half-opened door of the car that Ted had unlatched, ready to leap out.

Aunt Sallie did not seem to know Uncle Toby's voice, for she asked another question.

"Is it the firemen then?"

"Good gracious!" cried Uncle Toby, opening the automobile door wider, so that a swirl of snow drifted in. "What in the world is the matter? Why do you want the firemen and policemen, Aunt Sallie?"

"Oh, thank goodness! It's you, is it, Uncle Toby?"

"Yes! Yes!" was the quick answer. "You stay in the car a moment, children," said Mr. Bardeen, as he got out on the side of the steering wheel. "Something must have happened. I'll see what it is."

Just then the crowd, which stood partly in the street and partly in the yard of Uncle Toby's house, but up at the farther end, away from the driveway, gave a shout.

"There he goes!" cried several voices.

"What can have happened?" exclaimed Janet, greatly excited.

"It's a fire, I guess," said Ted. "Aunt Sallie was asking for the firemen."

"And she asked for the policemen, too," said Tom. "Maybe it's a burglar up on the roof."

"That's right!" chimed in Harry, the new boy. "And maybe he's trying to go down the chimney."

"Like Santa Claus," added his sister Mary, whom Jan and Lola had begun to like very much.

"I want to see Santa C'aus!" cried Trouble, and he made a wiggle to get out of the open door by which Uncle Toby had left.

"No! No!" cried Ted, catching hold of his little brother.

"Something has happened, anyhow," decided Tom. "This crowd wouldn't be here for nothing. But I don't believe it's a fire, for there isn't any smoke. I guess the reason Aunt Sallie wanted the firemen was because they have ladders to get somebody down off the roof."

"Who could be up on the roof?" Jan wanted to know.

No one answered, but as both front doors of the closed automobile were now open the children could hear what Uncle Toby and Aunt Sallie were saying.

"What in the world has happened?" asked Uncle Toby.

"It's Jack, your monkey," was the answer. "He got loose a little while ago and scrambled up on the roof. He's perched there now, near the chimney. First I knew of it was when I saw a lot of boys in front of the house, looking up. I thought the chimney was on fire."

"Was that why you wanted the firemen?" asked Uncle Toby.

"Partly," answered Aunt Sallie. "I telephoned for the fire department, and when I heard your automobile in the side yard I thought it was the firemen."

"But why did you send for the firemen when you found out the chimney wasn't burning?" Uncle Toby asked.

"I thought they could get the monkey down with ladders," was the housekeeper's reply.

"Then why did you send for the police?" went on Uncle Toby.

"To keep the crowd in order," sighed Aunt Sallie. "Oh, I've had such a time! Some of the boys cut up so, and threw snowballs at Jack."

"My goodness! That's so, it is snowing!" cried Uncle Toby, as if, for the time, he had forgotten all about it. "Poor Jack will catch his death of cold up there on the roof in the storm. How did he get out? Never mind; don't tell me now! I must get him down before he gets pneumonia. Monkeys are very likely to get that if they get a chill."

"I don't believe he'll get cold," said Aunt Sallie. "He has a coat on."

"A coat on? Whose coat?"

"One of your old ones," answered Aunt Sallie. "He grabbed it up off the rack as he scrambled out of the window and climbed the rain-water pipe to the roof. If any one can get him down, you can, Uncle Toby."

"Yes, I guess I can. Jack always minds me. But it's hard to see him in the dark."

"Oh, the electric light in front shines right on the roof," replied Aunt Sallie. "And as the roof is white with snow, Jack shows quite plain. Do get him down so the crowd will go away."

"Are the rest of the pets all right?" asked Mr. Bardeen.

"Yes," said Aunt Sallie, and the listening children were glad to hear this.

"Come on in, Curlytops!" called Uncle Toby from the side porch. "There isn't anything serious the matter. Jack has just gotten up on the roof, that's all. It isn't the first time, for he often does it in summer, but I never knew him to go out in the cold before. I guess he wants to show that he'd be all right for taking out to Crystal Lake, but I'm not going to humor him. Come on in Curlytops and the rest of you children!"

Out of the car scrambled the children, eager to see and hear all that was going on. They had hardly more than reached the porch than out in front of Uncle Toby's house sounded a rapidly clanging bell.

"Oh, here comes firemans! Here comes firemans!" shouted Trouble, jumping up and down in delight.

And, surely enough, in the electrically lighted street could be seen the glittering fire engine and the hook and ladder truck, with prancing horses which seemed to delight being out in the storm.

There was a roaring murmur from the crowd, and Uncle Toby looked at Aunt Sallie and shook his head.

"You surely have caused some excitement around here," he said, but he could not help laughing.

"I go see fire engines!" cried Trouble. "I go!"

"You'll stay right here with me!" declared Jan, taking a firm hold of her little brother's arm.

"No! Don't want to!" shouted Trouble. "Wants go see fire engines! I 'ikes fire engines!"

He squirmed and struggled so that it seemed as if he would break away from Janet. Uncle Toby and Aunt Sallie had gone around to the front of the house to meet some of the firemen who were asking where the blaze was as they did not see any smoke.

"Be good, Trouble!" begged Lola, trying to help Janet manage the little fellow, who was tired and cross from the long day's ride.

"Want to see fire engines!" he insisted, for the engine and truck were now out of view from the side porch, having drawn up farther along the street.

"Oh, maybe the police wagon will come and you can see it from here," added Mary, trying to do her best to aid in soothing William.

This seemed to quiet him at once. He was just a little afraid of a policeman.

And, surely enough, just then the police patrol wagon, with its clanging bell, not quite as loud as the fire engine, though, came up and a number of officers jumped out. There was another roar from the crowd as this added excitement was provided. Never had there been such an evening in Pocono, with the big storm getting worse all the while.

But Uncle Toby took charge of matters. He explained to the police and the firemen what had happened—that Aunt Sallie had become so excited she had summoned more help than she had really needed.

"But is there really a monkey up on the roof?" asked a policeman.

"Yes, my monkey Jack is up there near the chimney," said Mr. Bardeen. "You can see him. He's got on one of my coats."

Without a doubt there was Jack, sitting on the ridge of the roof, one hairy paw thrust through an arm of the coat, clinging to the bricks of the chimney.

"I'd like to get him down," said Uncle Toby, "for he is a valuable animal, and he may take cold and get pneumonia even if he has on a coat."

"Well, we're the boys to get him down," laughed one of the firemen. "But will he bite?" he asked anxiously. "I don't know much about monkeys, but I guess they can bite."

"Jack won't; that is, not after I speak to him," said Uncle Toby. "I'll call him to come down, and you can go up on a ladder and get him if you will."

"Oh, we'll do it all right," said the fireman. He and the police officers knew and liked Uncle Toby.

Shortly afterward a ladder was raised to the roof, and a fireman went up. He had to be careful on the sloping roof, on account of the slippery snow that covered it. But another ladder, laid on the shingles, gave him a firm footing.

Nearer and nearer he crawled to the crouching monkey. The crowd, which had been laughing and joking, kept quiet now so Uncle Toby could talk to Jack.

"Come on down, old fellow! Let the fireman bring you down. And don't bite him!" called Uncle Toby to his pet.

Jack seemed to understand. He chattered a little, and then, when the fireman was near enough, the monkey put his arms around the man's neck and clung tightly.

"Now you're all right, old chap!" said the fireman, who was fond of animals. "I've got you!"

A little later man and monkey were safe on the ground, while the crowd cheered. Uncle Toby took Jack from the fireman, and the monkey nestled in his master's arms, seemingly very glad to be down off the roof and out of the storm.

"I must get him some hot milk to drink," said Uncle Toby, as the firemen and police started back to their quarters. The crowd, seeing that there was to be no more excitement, melted away out of the storm.

"Come, Curlytops, get in the house! All of you get in the house out of the storm!" cried Uncle Toby, for the children had gone around to the front to watch the rescue of Jack.

"Yes, yes! Come in!" cried Aunt Sallie. "You'll all get your deaths of sneezes! Talk about hot milk for a monkey! I guess these children need it more than Jack does!"

"We'll all have some hot milk!" declared Uncle Toby. "Here, Aunt Sallie, you look after the Curlytops and their friends while I put the car away, and then I'll come back and we'll have a cozy supper," went on Mr. Bardeen. "I'll put Jack by the fire to thaw him out."

"I'm hungry!" announced Trouble.

"Bless your heart! you shall have something to eat as soon as I can get it on the table," said Aunt Sallie. "That bad old Jack made a lot of work!"

She shook a finger at the monkey, who whimpered a little.

"Oh, don't scold him!" begged Lola.

"Will he do tricks?" asked Tom.

"He's done enough tricks for one night," replied Aunt Sallie, as she bustled about to get supper, while Uncle Toby put the car out of the storm.

"Take off your hat, Mary," suggested Jan to the new girl, who stood about a bit shyly.

Before the little girl could do this her hat was suddenly snatched from her head, and a harsh voice cried:

"Eat 'em up! Eat 'em up! Eat 'em all up!"

"Oh! Oh!" screamed Mary. "What is it?"

"Don't be afraid!" laughed Ted. "You're just among Uncle Toby's pets!"



CHAPTER XI

WHERE DID TROUBLE GO?

Mary Benton, the little girl whose father had gone to the Big War and had never been heard of since, was really frightened by the screeching voice and by feeling her hat snatched off in that strange way. Even what Ted said about being among Uncle Toby's pets did not seem to make her feel any better.

She turned quickly around, and saw her hat that had been snatched off in the black beak of a big red and green bird which was perched on the back of a chair.

"Dat's Mr. Nip!" announced Trouble. He knew the parrot from the previous summer.

"Eat 'em up! Eat 'em up! Eat 'em all up!" croaked Mr. Nip in his harsh voice.

"Well, please don't eat Mary's hat up!" laughed Jan. "She'll want it to wear when we go to Crystal Lake."

"Is that parrot going to the Lake with us?" asked Lola.

"If he does I'll have to be careful of my hat," added Mary, who was getting over her fright. "It's a new one," she went on, and the other girls rightly guessed that, being very poor, Mary did not have many hats. Then and there Lola and Jan made up their minds to be kind to Mary, whose mother was in the hospital and whose father—well, no one knew what had happened to him.

"Here are some more pets!" cried jolly Uncle Toby, as he came in out of the storm, having put the car in his barn. He was followed by Skyrocket, who barked and leaped about, shaking snow-flakes all about. In his arms Uncle Toby carried Fluff, the little kitten that had been rescued from a "Ch'is'mus tree," as Trouble called the evergreen.

"Oh, we forgot all about him!" exclaimed Jan, as she took the little stranger from Uncle Toby.

"It wouldn't be wonderful if you forgot even your names," laughed Uncle Toby, "considering all the excitement that was going on when we got here. But we're all right now, I guess."



Skyrocket went over to sniff around Jack, the monkey, with which pet the Curlytops' dog was well acquainted, so the two soon became friendly.

"I guess he misses Tip and Top," observed Ted, speaking of the two valuable trick poodles, which had been sold since the children found them in the show, after they had been stolen.

"Well, there are plenty of other animals," said Aunt Sallie, as she finished setting the table and called to the children to take their places.

Such a jolly time as followed! The Curlytops and their playmates, the new as well as the old ones, were all hungry from their ride through the cold. Even Trouble forgot about being sleepy while he ate, and if Mary and Harry remembered about their mother in the hospital that thought did not chase away the smiles from their faces.

At times, on the trip, Ted and Jan had given some thought to matters at home, and had wondered if Daddy Martin would lose so much money as to make the family poor. But now Ted and his sister were having a good time with the others.

Jack, the monkey, seemed to have gotten over the slight shivering caused by foolishly going up on the roof in the storm, and he and Skyrocket ate their meal behind the warm stove on one side, while Snuff, Uncle Toby's big cat, and Fluff, the new kitten, lapped warm milk from the same saucer on the other side of the stove.

As for Mr. Nip, the parrot, he seemed satisfied after he had pulled off Mary's hat, and he was now asleep with his head under his wing, perched on his stand in one corner.

"How did Jack get out, Aunt Sallie?" asked Uncle Toby, as knives and forks began to slow up a little in the supper race, the children becoming less hungry the more they ate.

"I had left a window open, and he seemed to know it," was the answer. "I never knew it to fail that if I left a window open so much as a crack but what he'd find it. He's the smartest monkey I ever saw! But he's a rascal just the same!"

"Well, you'll have a little rest from all the pets, except maybe Skyrocket," said Uncle Toby. "We'll take him with us out to Crystal Lake, but the other pets we'll leave here."

Uncle Toby's house was a large one and had plenty of beds in it for the children. It was warm and cozy, and Aunt Sallie had seen to it that everything should be comfortable for the Curlytops and their playmates.

"I thought you two were coming by train," she said to Mary and Harry, when supper was over and the plans for the night began to be talked about.

"They were on the train. But I took them off when it became stuck in the snow," explained Uncle Toby. "I hope they have dug the engine out by this time. If they haven't it may have to stay there a long time, for this storm is getting worse."

The children thought so too, as they listened to the wind howling around the corners of the house and down the chimney, while the hard flakes of snow beat against the windows.

But they were snug and warm in Uncle Toby's house, and Jan and her brother, with Lola and Tom, were so jolly, suggesting so many games to play and talking about the good times to come at Crystal Lake, that though Mary and Harry had begun to feel homesick this soon wore off, and the strange playmates laughed with their new friends.

Trouble was to sleep in a big bed with Jan in a room next to Aunt Sallie. And in the same room with Jan and her little brother, Mary and Lola would sleep, but in separate beds.

The three older boys had a room to themselves, each with a single bed, so they would not disturb one another.

"And mind!" cried Uncle Toby, when the time came to "turn in," as a soldier or a sailor might say. "Mind! No pillow fights!"

"Oh, no!" cried Tom and Ted, winking at each other.

And I think Uncle Toby must have known that they would have a little fun in this way. For he did not come up to stop them when they began tossing about at each other the soft, fluffy pillows. At this game there was a jolly good time for half an hour.

But even boys can get tired sometimes, and these boys had had a long automobile ride that day. So they finally gave up tossing the pillows about and settled down snugly in their beds. The girls and Trouble had gone to sleep long before this.

"Well, you certainly have quite a houseful, Uncle Toby," said Aunt Sallie that night, when locking-up time came, "with seven children, to say nothing of the animals."

"Oh, I like 'em all!" exclaimed the old sailor, with a laugh. "And I just had to take the Curlytops. There was no place for them to go when their father and mother had to start off on that trip. As for Tom and Lola, I wanted the Curlytops to have some playmates over the holidays. And about Mary and Harry—well, I couldn't leave them in the big city all alone, with their mother in the hospital."

"No, I suppose not. Poor children! Poor Mother! I hope she gets better!"

"I hope so, too," said Uncle Toby. "And I hope the Curlytops' father doesn't lose his money."

Janet was awakened early the next morning by feeling something cold on her face. She was dreaming that Jack, the monkey, was still up on the roof, but that he had a long tail which reached all the way to the ground. And she dreamed that Jack was dipping his tail in ice water and tickling her on the cheek.

Something almost like this was happening as Janet opened her eyes, for she saw Trouble bending over her with a lump of snow in his fist, rubbing the cold stuff on her nose.

"Oh, Trouble! Stop it!" cried Janet, rolling over in bed and giving her brother a little push. He dropped some of the cold snow down her neck. "Oh!" screamed Jan. "You're freezing me!"

"You shouldn't have jiggled me!" complained Trouble, whose grasp on the snowball had been loosened as his sister moved. "I wanted you open your eyes," he added.

"I guess you made her open them all right," laughed Lola from her bed, next to Janet's.

The talking aroused Mary, who sat up, rubbing her eyes.

"Oh, where am I?" she exclaimed. "I—Oh, I remember!" she said. "I was dreaming I was back home!"

"And I was dreaming Jack was slapping me with his tail wet in ice water," laughed Janet. "Then I wake up and find Trouble with a snowball. Where did you get it?" she asked, tossing the half-melted lump into the water basin near by.

"It blowed in the window," Trouble explained, pointing to more of the white flakes on the sill. They had drifted in around a crack.

"You mustn't get out of bed and run around in your bare feet," said Janet. "I wonder what sort of a day it is?" She slipped on her little robe and slippers and went to the window, meanwhile covering Trouble warmly in bed. "It's stopped snowing," she said, "and the sun is out. We can make snowmen, big snowballs, and everything."

"Oh, what fun it will be!" cried Lola.

"Snow in the country is much nicer than in the city where I live," said Mary. "It seems to stay clean longer out here."

Meanwhile Ted, Tom, and Harry had also discovered that there was a chance for plenty of fun out of doors. They were soon up and getting dressed, and when Aunt Sallie had seen that Trouble was washed and dressed all the children went down to breakfast.

"Where are all the pets?" asked Mary, seeing only Mr. Nip perched on his stand, cracking seeds in his strong beak.

"They're having their breakfasts out in their room," said Aunt Sallie, for a special room had been provided for the animals.

A little later the Curlytops and their playmates were having fun in the snow outside, Skyrocket romping around with them. There were sleds at Uncle Toby's house, and not far from it a little hill, and on this the children were soon coasting.

"It's more fun than our toboggan," cried Ted.

"Yes, it is. But the snow isn't going to last long," observed Tom. "It's too warm."

"It's melting now," added Harry.

Indeed the warm sun would soon make short work of this first snow, which had come much earlier than usual. The children made up their minds to have as much fun as they could while it lasted.

So they coasted, they made snowmen, rolled big snowballs and the boys even started to build a snow fort, for the white flakes were wet enough to pack well and stay in place once they were piled up.

Trouble played with the others, sometimes getting in the way and toppling down, to pick himself up again and fall down once more.

"I havin' 'ots of fun!" he laughed.

In fact all the children were—so much so that they hardly wanted to come in to lunch. But playing out in the air made them hungry, and soon they were eagerly eating.

"How soon are we going to Crystal Lake?" asked Ted of Uncle Toby, as the Curlytops and the others prepared to rush out in the snow once more.

"Oh, we'll go in a few days," was the answer. "Might as well wait for this snow to melt, as it's bound to if this weather keeps up. It will be easier going for the auto then, as the roads to the Lake are rather rough."

"Well, we're having fun here," chuckled Ted, as he ran out to join his playmates.

"Let's make a big fort!" proposed Tom, for they had made a little one, and trampled it down in having a "battle."

"All right," agreed the other boys.

"I he'p!" offered Trouble.

"No you'll only be in the way," Ted replied. "You go over and help sister make a snowman," he added, for this is what Jan and the other two girls were trying to do.

This was a bit selfish on Ted's part, for he must have known that Trouble would annoy his sister as much as the little fellow would be in the way of himself and his chums. But brothers are this way sometimes, I suppose.

Anyhow, Trouble toddled off to see if he could not play with Jan, Lola, and Mary. He saw them shaping the snowman.

"I he'p!" he offered, trying to put a little ball on the snowman's coat to serve as a "button."

"Oh, Trouble! Don't!" begged Jan. "Go over and play with the boys! You'll spoil our snowman!"

"Ted telled me come here!" announced William.

Poor Trouble! No one seemed to want him!

"Oh, let him stay," begged Mary, "I'll watch him."

"All right," sighed Jan. She was trying to make the snowman's face, and it was not easy work.

Just how it happened no one seemed to know but the boys forgot all about Trouble in the excitement of making their fort. And though Mary had promised to keep watch over the little fellow she forgot when she went to the shed to get two pieces of coal to make eyes for the snowman.

It was not until after the snowman was finished and Ted had shouted what fun it would be if they could put him in the fort that Trouble was missed.

"Where is he?" asked Janet, looking around the yard.

"He was here a little while ago," said Lola.

"I saw him too," added Tom.

But now Trouble was not in sight.

"Maybe he went into the house to get something to eat," suggested Mary.

Jan ran to the door and asked Aunt Sallie.

"Why, no," she answered. "Trouble didn't come in here!"

"Oh, where can Trouble be?" half sobbed Janet.



CHAPTER XII

OFF TO CRYSTAL LAKE

This was not the first time Trouble Martin had been lost or missing. It happened more or less often at home in Cresco, and once when the Curlytops had come to Uncle Toby's. But he had never before been lost after a big snow storm—that is, as far as Janet or Teddy could remember. What Janet was afraid of was that her little brother might wander off and fall into some drift. For the snow was deep in places not very far from Uncle Toby's house.

"Oh, we'll find him!" declared Ted. "He can't be far off. We didn't want him playing around our fort for fear he'd spoil it."

"And I sent him away from our snowman on the same account," sighed Janet. "I wish I had kept him by me."

Aunt Sallie came out of the house, her apron thrown over her head.

"Did you find Trouble?" she asked.

"No'm," chorused the children.

"Dear me!" exclaimed the old lady. "You must call Uncle Toby and tell him. He's out in the barn working over the auto, getting ready for the trip to Crystal Lake. Go tell him Trouble is missing."

Janet and the others thought this would be the best thing to do, and Uncle Toby soon heard the latest happening regarding the Curlytops.

"If Trouble isn't in the house nor around where you are playing, he must have wandered off down the street," said Uncle Toby. "The walks have been pretty well cleaned off by this time. The snowplow has been along." For in Pocono the street cleaning department sent out a big snowplow, drawn by horses, after every big storm, and thus the sidewalks were made easy to walk on without waiting for each householder to clean his own space.

"But where would he go?" asked Janet, hardly able to keep back her tears.

"That's what we must find out," said Uncle Toby. "Don't worry. We'll find him. I'll ask the police if they've seen him. A little chap like Trouble would be sure to be noticed."

"Unless maybe he fell in a snowdrift," suggested Janet.

"If he fell in he'd shout and cry until some of us came to help him out," said Uncle Toby. "Now we'll start a searching party. I'll go with you girls up the street, and the three boys can go down the street. Ask every one you meet if they have seen Trouble."

"Only," suggested Jan, "we'd better give him his right name of William."

"That's so!" laughed Uncle Toby. "If we go along asking every one we meet if they have seen Trouble, they'll think we are trying to make fun of them. Yes, we must ask for news of a little boy named William."

So they started out, Ted, Tom and Harry going one way, and Uncle Toby and the three girls the other way. Aunt Sallie remained behind in the house, but she was very anxious, and she said she would call up police headquarters, asking that each officer be told to be on the lookout.

At first the question asked by the searchers had no effect. No one seemed to have noticed Trouble toddling along the streets, which, as Uncle Toby had said, were now quite free from snow, which was piled high on either side.

"Maybe he wandered off toward the woods," suggested Lola, for there was a clump of trees, called "woods" not far from Uncle Toby's house.

"I don't believe so," was Mr. Bardeen's answer. "I think he wouldn't go there alone. But here comes Policeman McCarthy. I'll ask him."

And, to the delight of the girls, Policeman McCarthy said he had seen a little boy going along the street a few minutes before.

"I don't know what his name was," the officer said. "But he was dressed just as you say. He seemed to know where he was going, so I didn't stop him, though he was pretty little to be out alone."

"Where did he go?" asked Uncle Toby.

"Right down that way," answered the policeman, pointing. "He was standing in front of that barber shop the last I saw him."

"Oh, now I know where he's gone!" suddenly cried Janet.

"Where?" asked Uncle Toby.

"In the barber shop," answered the little girl. "Trouble was in the bathroom this morning, Uncle Toby, getting washed," Janet explained. "He found some of your shaving soap, and he liked the smell of it. He was rubbing it on his face when I stopped him. He asked me where you got your soap and I told him in a barber shop, I thought. Then he wanted to know what a barber shop was like, and I told him it was a place that had a red, white, and blue pole in front of it. So that's where he's gone—to the barber shop to get some of that nice smelling soap."

"I shouldn't wonder," agreed Uncle Toby. "I hope the barber kept him there, if he went in."

They hurried to the shop in front of which was a gay red, white, and blue pole, and there they found Trouble. But they found him more than just inquiring for scented soap, for he was up in the chair, kept specially for children.

In front of Trouble, draped around his neck, was a white apron, and the barber, with comb and scissors, was just about to cut the little fellow's long hair.

"Trouble! What are you doing?" cried Uncle Toby, his voice causing the barber to turn around in surprise.

"I goin' get hair cut!" announced the little fellow.

"Oh, no! You mustn't!" exclaimed Jan.

"I wants hair cut an' nice smelly stuff on my face," announced the little fellow, holding tightly to the arms of the barber's chair, lest he be made to come out.

"No, no!" said Janet. "Not now, Trouble!"

"Didn't some of you send him to have his hair trimmed?" asked the barber, in some surprise.

"No, indeed!" laughed Uncle Toby, who knew the barber quite well. "He ran off by himself. I'm glad we reached here in time to stop you. He's a little tyke; that's what he is!"

"Well, he came in here as bold as you please," said Mr. Miller, the barber. "He climbed up in the chair himself, and though he didn't tell me so exactly, I thought he wanted a hair cut, as it's pretty long. He did say he wanted some nice perfume on him, but all the children say that when they come in here. And I've often had them as young as he is come in here alone. But of course their fathers or mothers sent 'em. And you didn't send this little chap?" he asked, as he helped Trouble down out of the chair, much to William's disgust.

"No, we didn't send him," chuckled Uncle Toby. "He just took the notion himself. Tried some of my shaving soap this morning, so his sister says. Well, I am glad he's found. We'd better take him back so the boys will know we've come to the end of the search. You mustn't do anything like this again, Trouble," said Uncle Toby, a bit sternly, shaking his finger at William.

"Nope!" he readily promised. "Maybe I have some nice smelly stuff take home?" he added hopefully.

"Here you are!" laughed the barber, and he gave Trouble a little cake of scented soap.

"You gave us a big scare," said Janet, when they were on their way back to Uncle Toby's house.

"You make big snowman?" asked Trouble, and that's about all he seemed to care. Janet wanted to laugh, but she did not think it wise.

They met the boys coming back, Ted and the other two being anxious, as of course they had heard no word about the missing wanderer. But they saw William in Uncle Toby's arms, and knew everything was now all right.

"I'll keep my eye on you after this," said Janet when the children were once more playing in the snow around Uncle Toby's house.

But it was one thing to say she would keep watch over a little chap like Trouble, and another thing actually to do it. And William made more trouble before the day was over.

Evening came, when it was time to stop playing out of doors and come into the house. And it was after supper when the children were sitting in the living room, listening to Uncle Toby tell a story, that Aunt Sallie came running in from the kitchen.

"Oh, Uncle Toby!" she cried. "There's a leak in one of the pipes. There's a big puddle of water in the middle of the kitchen floor. It was dry when I went up to see if the beds were ready, and when I came down, just now, I found a lot of water there."

"A broken pipe? That's too bad!" exclaimed Uncle Toby. "I may be able to fix it myself; but if I can't, we'll have hard work getting a plumber this time of night. I can shut off the water in the cellar, though, I suppose. However, I'll take a look."

The children followed Uncle Toby and Aunt Sallie out to the kitchen. Surely enough there was a large puddle of water in the middle of the oilcloth. Uncle Toby looked up and around, and said:

"I can't see what pipe has burst. If it was one in the kitchen the water would be spurting out now. It seems to come from under the sink."

By this time Trouble was toddling across the room toward the sink, under which was a sort of cupboard with two swinging doors. The little fellow was trying to open one of these doors.

"Here, Trouble! Let Uncle Toby look!" said Ted.

"I wants get my snowball," announced William.

"Your snowball!" cried Jan.

"Yep! I put big snowball there when I comed in. Wants to get it now," and William tugged at the sink door.

"Ha! Maybe that's where the water came from!" cried Uncle Toby.

And it was. As the sink cupboard was opened more water was seen, and in the midst of the puddle there floated what was left of a large ball of snow. Trouble had brought it in, put it under the sink when no one was looking, and there the warmth of the kitchen stove had slowly melted it, causing the water to run out under the doors.

"What in the world made you put a snowball in there, Trouble?" asked Ted, as Aunt Sallie mopped up the water.

"Maybe I wants make snowman in night," was Trouble's answer.

That may have been his reason—no one could tell. At any rate, no great harm was done, as the snow water was clean and the oilcloth was soon wiped dry.

"I guess you'd better go to bed before you get into any more mischief," said Janet.

And soon the Curlytops and their playmates were all sound asleep.

The next day it rained, and as the weather turned warm the snow was soon nearly all melted or washed away.

"So much the better for making the trip to Crystal Lake," said Uncle Toby. "I don't care what it does after we get there, but I like good going though the woods."

"Oh, what fun we'll have at Crystal Lake!" cried the Curlytops and their playmates.

They started three days later, in the big automobile. Uncle Toby, Aunt Sallie, the children, and Skyrocket. Uncle Toby hired a colored man and his wife to come and live in his house and look after the pets, including the new kitten, Fluff, while he was at camp for the holidays.

"Hurray! Here we go!" cried Ted and the others, as Uncle Toby started the automobile.

As they were turning out of the drive a boy came riding up the street on a bicycle, waving a yellow envelope in his hand.

"Wait a minute! Wait a minute!" he shouted. "Here's a telegram!"



CHAPTER XIII

THE LONELY CABIN

Uncle Toby brought the automobile to a stop and looked at the boy.

"A telegram?" repeated Uncle Toby. "For whom is it?"

"You," answered the boy, and Ted and Jan wondered if it could be about their father and mother. Suppose one of them were ill, or suppose Daddy Martin had lost all his money, and Ted and Jan had to go back home? It doesn't take much to worry children, just as it doesn't take much to make them happy.

Tom and Lola, too, knew that telegrams often bring bad news, and as Uncle Toby was opening the yellow envelope which the boy handed him, these two playmates of the Curlytops thought perhaps something had happened at their home.

And, in turn, Harry and Mary began to fear that the message might be bad news about their mother in the hospital. A few tears began to form in Mary's eyes, but they soon dried away when Uncle Toby, after reading the message, gave a hearty laugh.

"Ha! Ha! Ha!" chuckled Uncle Toby. "This is funny! The idea of sending me a message like this!"

"What is it?" asked Ted, while the messenger boy waited to see if Uncle Toby wanted to send an answer to the telegram.

"Oh, it's from an old friend of mine, Hezekiah Armstrong. He says he has a chance to buy an elephant cheap, and he telegraphs to ask me if I don't want it."

"Want an elephant!" repeated Jan.

"Yes, for a pet, I suppose. It may be one of his jokes, or he may mean it, but I certainly don't want an elephant, in winter time especially."

"Would you want one in summer?" asked Tom, with a laugh.

"Well, an elephant is easier to take care of in summer than in winter," answered Mr. Bardeen. "In warm weather I could turn the elephant out in the meadow and let him eat grass. But in winter I'd have to keep him in a barn and let him eat hay, and they eat a big lot of hay—enough to keep me poor, I guess. So I'll just telegraph back to Hezekiah that I don't want an elephant. We couldn't take it to Crystal Lake, anyhow. Here you are, son!" he called pleasantly to the boy. "You take back this message for me."

Uncle Toby wrote it on a blank of which the boy had a number in his pocket. As Mr. Bardeen paid the lad and was about to start the automobile again, the boy asked:

"Where you going?" He was acquainted with Mr. Bardeen.

"Out to Crystal Lake," answered Uncle Toby, and the children in the automobile wondered if the messenger lad did not wish he were going.

"Crystal Lake!" exclaimed the boy. "Are you going out there to catch the burglar?"

"Catch the burglar? What burglar?" asked Uncle Toby. "This is the first I've heard a burglar was out there. What do you mean?"

"It was in the paper this morning," the boy went on. "It said some of the cabins and camps out at the Lake had been broken into and robbed. They haven't any police out there, so it said the police from Pocono had been asked to see if they could catch the burglar. I thought maybe that's why you were going out."

"Oh, no!" replied Uncle Toby. "I'm not a policeman. And though I wouldn't want a burglar to get into my cabin, he wouldn't find very much to take if he did get in. I guess, most likely, it's some tramp that has broken into some of the cabins. We'll not worry about that, shall we, Curlytops?" chuckled Uncle Toby. "If we find any burglars out there we'll make Skyrocket bite 'em—sha'n't we, Trouble?" and he playfully pinched William's cheek.

"We make elephant run after 'em!" laughed Trouble.

"That's right!" said Uncle Toby.

Once more they started off in the big comfortable car that so well kept out the cold. Most of the snow from the recent storm was gone, though Uncle Toby said there would probably be some left in the woods around Crystal Lake, where it did not melt as fast as in Pocono.

"I'm glad that telegram wasn't bad news from home," said Ted. "It isn't any good to get bad news just when you start to have fun."

"That's right," agreed Tom. "My father wasn't feeling very well when we started, and I thought maybe the message was to say he was worse."

"Mary and I haven't any father to get messages from," said Harry, rather sadly. "We hardly remember him, for we were little when he went away to the war."

"And he never came back?" asked Jan softly.

"No, he never came back," repeated Mary, trying to keep the tears from her eyes.

Uncle Toby saw that the children might be made sad by this sort of talk, so, as they were passing a meat market on the edge of town, he stopped the car and began to get out.

"What are you going to do?" asked Aunt Sallie. "I have everything we need for getting supper out at the Lake, and we have our lunch with us."

"It isn't for us," said Uncle Toby. "It's for Skyrocket. I want to get him a nice bone to gnaw. It will keep him quiet on the ride," he explained. "I'm going to get a fine, juicy bone for Skyrocket."

This took the children's mind off what might have been a sad subject to think about—the ill mother and missing father of Harry and Mary. And when Uncle Toby made Skyrocket sit up in the automobile and "beg" for the bone, the dog did it in such a funny way that the children all laughed.

"Now they'll be all right," said Uncle Toby to himself, as he again sent the big car forward.

Soon they were out in the country. The weather was pleasant after the storm, though it was cold, and would soon be more frosty, for winter was at hand, and the children had already begun to think of Christmas.

As Aunt Sallie had said, there had been placed in the automobile a number of boxes of lunch to be eaten on the way, as it would be night, or very near it, before the cabin in the woods could be reached. Uncle Toby had written to a lumberman to build a fire in it so the place would be warm for the children. It was a large roomy cabin, with many comforts and conveniences. Having the lunch in the automobile, the next thing to think about was the time to eat it.

Possibly the boys thought more about this than the girls; at any rate that must have been the reason why Tom and Ted so often asked Uncle Toby what time it was, for the clock on the instrument board of the automobile was not going.

"Well, it will soon be eating time, if that's what you want to know," answered Uncle Toby, with a laugh, after this same question had been asked many times. He seemed to be always laughing.

"In fact we may as well get the lunch out now, I guess, Aunt Sallie," he went on. "We had an early breakfast and—"

He suddenly stopped talking, for there was a loud hissing sound from beneath the automobile, as if a big snake had had its tail run over.

"Puncture!" cried Tom and Ted, for they knew enough about cars to tell this.

"Well, I'm glad it isn't a blow-out!" Uncle Toby exclaimed. Had there been a blow-out the noise would have been much louder, like the bang of a gun. "As long as it's only a puncture we can easily mend it, and I'll do that while the rest of you eat."

"Oh, let me help!" begged Ted. "I often help daddy when he has tire trouble."

"I want to help, too," cried Tom.

"So do I," added Harry. "We never had an auto," he went on, "so I don't know anything about them. But I'll do what I can."

"Well, you boys can hand me the tools," said Uncle Toby, "and I'll do the hard work. This is a heavy car and I don't want you getting into any danger around it. You can be getting out the lunch, Aunt Sallie. We'll be ready to eat after we finish putting in a new rubber tube."

"We'll help," offered Jan and the other two girls, while Trouble cried:

"I want to see punchure! Want to see punchure!"

"No, you stay in here," said his sister, for she knew he would only get in the way if allowed to run about. "I'll let you open some of the boxes."

This satisfied Trouble, who was now content to stay in the big car. Skyrocket, though, went out with the boys and nosed about in the woods near which the stop had been made.

It did not take Uncle Toby long to jack up the car, take off the tire, put in a new tube, and be ready to start again. But before doing that they halted a bit longer to eat lunch. Hot chocolate had been brought along in thermos bottles, and Uncle Toby thought the chocolate would spill on the children if they tried to drink it while the automobile was moving.

"There! I feel better!" exclaimed Ted, after the lunch.

"So do I!" cried Tom and Harry.

Once more they were on their way, journeying now along some country road, and again through some lonely stretch of wood. They were almost at Crystal Lake, and in another quarter of an hour would be at Uncle Toby's cabin, when Mr. Bardeen began sniffing the air.

"The engine's getting too hot," he said, and then, as he noticed some steam coming out of the radiator cap he added: "Water's getting low. I'll have to stop and get some."

"Where can you get any water around here?" asked Ted.

"I'll try at that cabin," answered Uncle Toby, pointing to a lonely one a short distance ahead on the road. "I guess it will be safe to run the car that much farther."

"Who lives there?" asked Ted, as the automobile went along more slowly, for Uncle Toby did not want to overheat it.

"Nobody lives there now," was the reply. "It's deserted. But there's a well near it, and it's such a deep one I don't believe it will be frozen. I can get some water from the well."

Uncle Toby stopped the car in front of the lonely cabin. He got out a folding canvas pail from the tool-box, and was going toward the cabin when Ted exclaimed:

"I thought you said nobody lived here, Uncle Toby!"

"So I did," was the answer. "No one has lived here for several years."

"Well, look at him!" cried the boy, and he pointed to a man running away over the field from the back door of the lonely cottage.



CHAPTER XIV

AT CRYSTAL LAKE

Uncle Toby was much surprised at what Ted called to his attention. Turning around, as he was going toward the well, Uncle Toby looked to where the Curlytop boy pointed. He saw the form of a man vanishing from sight over the top of a little hill just behind the lonely cabin.

"Hello there!" cried Uncle Toby, in such loud tones that Skyrocket began to bark fiercely. "Hello there! Who are you? What are you doing?"

The man did not stop, turn around, nor answer. Instead he ran into a little clump of trees and was soon lost to sight. With another loud bark Skyrocket took after him.

"Oh, don't let our dog go!" cried Jan. "Make him come back, Uncle Toby. That man might hurt him."

"Just what I think," said Uncle Toby. "Here, Sky!" he called, for sometimes the Curlytops' dog was given that short name. "Here, Sky! Come back. Come back!"

Skyrocket didn't want to. He dearly loved a chase, and this man seemed willing to run. That the man was out of sight made no difference to the dog. Skyrocket loved a game of hide and go seek, and perhaps he thought that was what the stranger was playing.

"Come back here, Sky!" called Uncle Toby.

"Here, Skyrocket! Here!" shouted Ted.

Janet added her voice to that of her brother and Trouble chimed in. Perhaps all these had an effect on the dog, or he might have thought that Uncle Toby would punish him if he did not mind. At any rate, after a few more barks and some growls, looking meanwhile toward the clump of trees into which the man had disappeared, the dog came back, wagging his tail and seeming a bit disappointed.

"Who was that man, Uncle Toby?" asked Janet.

"I don't know," was the answer. "No one has lived in that cabin for years. I guess he is some tramp who didn't have any other place to stay."

"He didn't look like a tramp," observed Tom.

"No, his clothes weren't ragged," added Ted.

"That's so," agreed Uncle Toby. "From the little look I had of him he wasn't very ragged. But then maybe he hasn't been a tramp very long, and it takes quite a while to make one's clothes ragged."

"It doesn't take Trouble long!" laughed Jan. "He can go out with a good new suit on and come back in half an hour with it all full of cuts and holes."

"Oh, well, Trouble is different," said Uncle Toby, with a chuckle.

Uncle Toby stood for a few moments looking toward the woods into which the strange man had run, and then, going to the well, filled the pail with water and put some in the radiator of the automobile. After that Uncle Toby went around to the back of the old cabin.

"Are you going to see if anybody else is there?" asked Jan, while Lola and Mary waited with curiosity for an answer.

"Let me come and help look!" cried Ted.

"So will I!" added Tom.

"If you fellows are going I might as well go, too," said Harry.

"No, you children stay where you are," called Uncle Toby. "I'm just going to take a look around, and then we'll go on to Crystal Lake. Stay where you are!"

Ted, Janet, and the others remained in the automobile, waiting for Uncle Toby to come back. Aunt Sallie was almost ready to doze off in a little sleep when Mr. Bardeen was seen coming around the corner of the cabin. No one was with him, and there was no further sight of the man.

"Was anybody else in there?" asked Ted.

"No one," replied Uncle Toby. "The cabin was empty as far as I could see. I guess the man just stopped in there for shelter, and when he saw us he thought we owned the place and ran out."

"Who does own it?" asked Tom.

"It belongs to a lumberman named Newt Baker," answered Uncle Toby. "He used to stay here in the summer, and sometimes part of the winter. But he went away and since then no one has lived here—except that tramp," he added with a laugh. "Poor man," he went on, "I hope he finds some place to stay this winter. It looks as if it might be a hard one from the early snow we had."

Once more they started off; and a little later, nothing more having happened, they arrived safely at Crystal Lake.

"Oh, what a fine place!" cried Tom Taylor, as he saw the big body of water, on the shore of which was perched Uncle Toby's cottage. The lake was not frozen, except with a "skim" of ice here and there in little coves.

"It would be lovely in summer for picnics," said Lola. Neither she nor her brother had been to Crystal Lake before, but the Curlytops had visited it once or twice with Uncle Toby, though they had almost forgotten.

"Well, here we are, children!" called Uncle Toby, as he stopped the automobile near his "shack" as he often called it. "Now if you'll see that they get safely inside, Aunt Sallie, I'll soon be with you and we'll look after supper and get the beds ready."

"I not goin' to bed now!" cried Trouble. "I not goin' to bed now! I goin' to stay up an' see—an' see—Santa C'aus!" he burst out, after a moment of thought.

"Oh, you little tyke!" laughed Lola, catching him up in her arms. "Santa Claus won't be here for over a month."

"And you don't have to go to bed right away," added Janet.

Out of the auto piled the boys and girls, Skyrocket scrambling ahead of them to smell around and find out what sort of place this was that he had been brought to.

As Aunt Sallie, the Curlytops and their playmates went toward the front door of the cabin, the door was opened and a smiling man looked out.

"Hello, folks!" he called. "I've got it good and warm for you, though it isn't as cold as it was." He was the man Uncle Toby had engaged to start the fires and to have everything in readiness for the coming of the Curlytops.

"Well, we're glad to get here, Jim Nelson," said Aunt Sallie, for she knew the man.

Uncle Toby put the car in the barn and came in with some of the boxes and bundles that had been piled in the automobile—bundles of clothes and things for the children.

"Well, you got here all right, I see," remarked Jim Nelson. "Have any trouble on the way?"

"Not to amount to anything," answered Uncle Toby. "Funny thing, though, down at Newt Baker's cabin. I stopped there to get some water from his deep well. And as I got near the cabin a man ran out and down the hill."

"A man!" exclaimed Mr. Nelson, while the children listened to the talk. "I didn't know anybody was living there."

"There isn't—that is, not living there regularly," said Uncle Toby. "But a man ran out. I took him for a tramp at first, only he wasn't ragged. But after he ran away I went and looked in."

"What did you see?" asked Mr. Nelson, and this the Curlytops and others wished to hear about.

"Well, it looked as if he'd been living there and doing his cooking for some time," went on Uncle Toby. "There were a lot of tin cans and odds and ends of loaves of bread, cracker crumbs, and the like on the table in the kitchen. Looked to me as if this man had been camping out in Newt Baker's shack."

"Very likely," said Mr. Nelson. "I don't like such characters hanging around Crystal Lake. We'll have to keep watch for him. If there are tramps around they may take things. As a matter of fact, food and little comforts of small value have been taken from some of the cottages and camps. Fred Tuller's son Tom wrote to the Pocono paper and made a whale of a story out of it. But from what you say the matter may be of more importance than we thought. At any rate, we'd better look into it."

"We'll keep a lookout, then," said Uncle Toby. "And I'll take another run down to the cabin some day, after I get the Curlytops settled here having fun," and he laughed at the boys and girls so they would not be afraid of the talk of tramps and men who might take things.

Mr. Nelson left a little after this, promising to come over the next day to see how they were.

Then came busy times in Uncle Toby's cabin at Crystal Lake. Aunt Sallie and the three girls got ready the supper, while the boys opened boxes and bundles. Skyrocket ran about here and there, poking his nose into everything, and Trouble was almost as bad, for he, too, wanted to see everything that was going on.

At last, however, things began to get "straightened out," as the Curlytops' mother would have said, and they sat down to a fine supper. Every one had a good appetite, even Skyrocket, who had gnawed clean the bone Uncle Toby got him at the butcher shop.

"Let's play hide and go seek before we go to bed," proposed Jan, as they sat about the open fireplace in the big living room after supper.

"Will it be all right?" asked Mary.

"Will what be all right?" Jan wanted to know.

"I mean won't your uncle be mad if we play in his house?" went on Mary.

"Oh, dear no!" laughed Jan. "That's what he brought us up here for; didn't you, Uncle Toby?"

"Didn't I what, Jan?" he asked, for he had been talking to Aunt Sallie about the beds.

"Didn't you bring us up here so we could have a good time?"

"Of course I did!" exclaimed Mr. Bardeen. "What do you want to do now?"

"Play hide and go seek. May we?"

"Yes, go ahead. Run about as much as you please, but don't get hurt. There isn't any fancy furniture here to break."

This was true, for everything in the cabin at Crystal Lake was heavy and strongly made to stand rough handling. So the children could do no harm racing about the cabin.

Soon a merry game was in progress, even Trouble taking part, though he could hardly be said to play it right. His idea was to hide and keep on yelling for some one to come and find him, his voice easily telling where he was. The only thing to be done in his case was to pretend not to know where he was, even if one saw him. This always made Trouble scream with delight, and he would say, over and over again:

"You couldn't find me, could you?"

And of course they always said they couldn't, though they could if they had wished.

So the game went on, Trouble taking his part in it. Finally came the turn of Mary to "blind," and as she covered her face and began to count slowly, the others tiptoed into the different rooms to hide. The cabin was built on the bungalow style, with a number of rooms on the first floor, and there were many fine hiding places.

Janet went into a room at the far end of the cabin, a room that no one, so far during the evening, had entered. It was where Uncle Toby was going to sleep.

"No one will find me here," thought Janet, as she crouched down behind a chair near one of the windows. She looked through the glass, and dimly saw the dark forest all around the cabin. "No one will think of coming here," said Janet to herself.

She cuddled herself into as small a nook as possible down behind the chair, in a place where she could look out through the other rooms and could see the lamplight and firelight in the big living apartment.

It was in this living apartment that Mary was counting with her eyes shut and soon she would call: "Ready or not I'm coming!" Then she would walk around and try to find the hiding ones.

"But she won't find me," thought Janet, "and I can get in home free."

From the distance Janet heard Mary say she was coming, and then suddenly the little girl was startled by a tapping on the window just back of the chair behind which she was hiding.

At first Janet thought it was the brushing of some tree branch against the glass that had made the tapping sound. But when it came again, several times, and very regular, the little girl knew some hand must be doing it.

"Maybe Tom or Ted has gone outside and is trying to scare me," thought Janet. "I'll take a peep and see."

Slowly she raised herself up from her crouching position behind the chair. And then the tapping sound on the glass came again. Janet looked out and gave a scream as, looking in through the window, she saw the face of a man on which the moon faintly shone.



CHAPTER XV

ON THE SLIPPERY HILL

Janet Martin had only a glimpse of the face of the man looking in through the window at her after he had tapped on the glass. As soon as he saw some one peering out at him, and as soon as he heard Janet scream—as he must have heard—the man sprang away.

He was soon lost to sight in the woods around the cabin. The moon shone faintly—had it not been for this Jan would never have seen the man's face—but it was not bright enough in the forest to see him after he leaped away from the cabin.

"Oh! Oh! Oh!" screamed Janet. Her voice rang out in the empty room and was heard by Uncle Toby, Aunt Sallie and the children playing hide and go seek.

"What's the matter? What's the matter?" asked Uncle Toby, who was putting wood in the fireplace.

"Oh, it's a man! A man!" cried Janet, running out from Uncle Toby's bedroom into the living apartment where they were now all gathered. "A man looked in the window at me and he tapped on the glass!"

"Who was he?" asked Uncle Toby, grasping a heavy stick of wood. Tom, Ted and Harry at once began to think they had better take some sticks, too, in case there might be a fight. "Was it Jim Nelson?" went on Uncle Toby. "Sometimes he taps on my window when he comes around by the side path."

"I—I couldn't see who it was—except that he was a man," stammered Janet. "As soon as he saw me looking at him he ran away."

"Jim Nelson wouldn't do that unless he was playing a trick," decided Uncle Toby. "And Jim isn't that kind of a man. He wouldn't scare children. I must see who this is!"

"Maybe he's the tramp we saw over at the place where you got the pail of water this afternoon," said Ted.

"Maybe," agreed Uncle Toby. "Well, if he's a poor man and in trouble I'm sorry for him. But he hasn't any right to come sneaking around my cabin, tapping on the window. I'll see about this!"

Uncle Toby went outside, and the boys followed. Trouble wanted to go with Ted, but Janet held back her little brother.

In the moonlight, which was brighter now, as the clouds had blown away, Uncle Toby made a trip around the cabin, taking Skyrocket with him, while the boys, each with a chunk of wood as a weapon, followed Mr. Bardeen.

Uncle Toby called loudly to know who was in the woods, and the dog barked, but no man answered.

"I can't find any one," Uncle Toby announced, coming back into the cabin with the boys. "It's too dark to see if there are any strange footprints in the snow, and I don't believe we could tell by them anyhow, as Jim Nelson and some of his friends have been tramping around here the last few days, bringing in wood and things. Are you sure you saw a man at the window, Janet?"

"Sure, Uncle Toby. And I heard him tapping on the glass, too."

"Well, I don't believe he meant any harm. Maybe he was the tramp we saw at the lonely cabin, or it may have been another. He may have wanted shelter for the night, and something to eat. But when he heard you scream it must have frightened him off, as he may have had an idea he'd be scolded for frightening a little girl. Anyhow, no harm is done, and there will be no danger. Go on with your game."

However, the children were too excited over what had happened to do this. Janet was trembling, and the others wanted her to tell over again just what had happened. And as Janet told and retold it she became less frightened, until finally she was laughing as though it had been a joke.

"But if I'd 'a' got that man I'd 'a' hit him with a stick of wood!" threatened Ted.

"So would I!" declared Tom and Harry.

"Perhaps it's just as well you didn't find him then," said Uncle Toby, with a laugh.

After the children had gone to bed—and Uncle Toby said the look of them all tucked in made him think of a boarding school—he and Aunt Sallie sat up a bit longer.

"Do you really think Janet saw a man?" asked Aunt Sallie. "And if so, who was he?"

"That's more than I can tell," Uncle Toby answered. "Janet isn't the kind of girl to imagine things. I believe it was a man. Probably the same fellow we saw running away from the lonely cabin. To-morrow I'll take Jim Nelson and some of the men and we'll have a look around. I don't want rough and strange men roaming these woods when I have a lot of children out here for the holidays."

"I should say not!" exclaimed Aunt Sallie. "I wouldn't like it myself! And maybe he's the man who's been taking things."

"Maybe," agreed Uncle Toby.

However, there were no more alarms nor any trouble that night, and after a few minutes of lying awake Janet went to sleep as soundly as the other children. They slept rather late the next morning, for they were tired with the travel of the day before, and when Jan and Lola came down to the kitchen they found Aunt Sallie getting breakfast.

"Oh, we said we'd get up and help!" exclaimed Jan. For she had promised her mother, on leaving home to visit Uncle Toby and Aunt Sallie, that she would help with the housework.

"And I used to get breakfast all alone," said Mary. "That is after mother was sick," and she could not keep back a few tears, though she turned her head away so the other girls would not see them.

"Never mind, my dear," said Aunt Sallie, with a laugh. "I didn't want you to get up early. Uncle Toby told me to let you girls and the boys sleep."

"Oh, aren't the boys up yet?" asked Jan, with a laugh.

"Don't tell me we've beaten!" added Lola, with a giggle.

"They said they were going to get up and see the sun rise," remarked Mary.

"I guess they forgot it, or else they thought they could see the sun some other morning," laughed Aunt Sallie. "For they aren't down yet, though it's almost time to call them, for I'm going to start to bake the pancakes soon."

"Oh, are you going to have pancakes?" cried Jan.

"Yes, and with maple syrup," Aunt Sallie answered.

"Oh, I love them!" exclaimed Lola. "Don't you, Mary?"

"I—I don't know," was the hesitating answer. "I—I guess I never had any."

"Oh my, just—" but Lola stopped. She was going to say "just fancy a girl never having eaten pancakes with maple syrup!" But she thought it would not be polite to say that, so she changed it to:

"Just you wait until you try them! You'll love them!"

"I know Ted does, so I'm going to call him!" exclaimed Janet. "He wouldn't want to keep on sleeping and miss the cakes."

"Tom wouldn't, either," declared Lola.

So they called the boys, who soon rushed downstairs, as hungry as ever any boys were. And the girls were quite as hungry. As for Trouble, he always thought he was hungry whether he was or not.

Uncle Toby came in, having been out to do the chores, he said. He had also been over to Jim Nelson's cabin to talk about the man who had tapped on the window, scaring Janet. But Uncle Toby said nothing about this. Instead he said:

"Getting colder, boys and girls. Hope you brought your skates."

"Why," asked Ted, "is there skating?"

"No; but there will be. Shouldn't wonder but what part of the lake would freeze over by to-morrow. But don't any of you go on until I try the ice to see if it's safe."

"Guess there isn't any danger of me going on," remarked Harry Benton.

"Why not?" asked Ted. "Don't you like to skate?"

"Sure I do!" Harry answered. "But I haven't any skates."

"I brought some extra pairs along," remarked Uncle Toby. "I think I have some that will fit you and Mary."

"Oh, goodie!" cried Mary, for she felt she could now have fun like the other girls.

"But it hasn't frozen yet, though it soon will be," said Uncle Toby. "Well, I'm going to leave you youngsters to amuse yourselves for a while, as I have some things to look after."

Uncle Toby paused for a moment and then went on.

"Now about school."

"Yes," said Ted, in a low voice. "I s'pose we'll have to go," he added, with a sigh.

"No!" exclaimed Uncle Toby. "That's the queer part of it. You can't go. I told your folks you could, but you can't."

"Why not?" asked Jan, and neither she nor any of the others seemed disappointed.

"The teacher they had here was taken sick, I've just heard, and they can't get another until after the holidays. So it doesn't look as though you could go to school. I'm sorry—"

"Oh, ho!" cried the Curlytops and their playmates. "No school! Hurray!"

"Now we'll go out and have some fun!" shouted Ted, as Uncle Toby left the cabin.

"Me come!" cried Trouble.

"Yes, we'll take you," answered Lola.

"Take good care of Trouble!" called Aunt Sallie to the boys and girls as they started from the cabin. They were warmly dressed, as it was getting colder, just as Uncle Toby had declared.

"We'll watch him!" called back Jan.

Off through the trees, under which, here and there, were patches of snow, wandered the Curlytops and their playmates. They laughed and shouted, running here and there until they were nearly as warm as on a summer's day. It was sheltered under the trees, but out in the open was getting colder, and in places thin ice was forming on Crystal Lake.

They walked along, sometimes all together and again with the boys running ahead of the girls, until they came to a little hill, covered with pine trees. The wind had swept the ground bare of snow here, or else it had melted, and in places were patches of the long, smooth and slippery pine needles.

Tom, Ted, and Harry had run off to one side, for Skyrocket had scared up a rabbit and the boys wanted to see the bunny, though they would not have let the dog harm it. Trouble started to follow his brother and the other two lads, but as he reached the top of the pine-needle-covered hill Janet called him back.

"Trouble, come here!" she exclaimed.

"No!" he answered. "I go see bunny rabbit!"

"No, you must stay with me," said Janet, starting after him. Trouble gathered himself to spring away on a run, but suddenly there was a queer screeching call in a tree over his head, and a moment later the little fellow went sliding and slipping down the hill and out of sight.

"Oh, dear!" cried Janet

"Was it an eagle that screamed?" asked Lola, who did not know much about birds.

"Maybe the eagle carried him off," suggested Mary, who knew even less about the creatures of the woods.

"There aren't any eagles around here, I hope," said Janet. "But something happened to Trouble! I hope he isn't hurt!"

Again came that shrill, harsh call. It sounded like:

"Hay! Hay! Hay!"

"Somebody is laughing because Trouble fell downhill," said Lola. "I wonder if it's that horrid old man?"

A moment later there was a rustling in the bushes, and a large bird with bright blue feathers marked with patches of white flew up into a tree harshly crying:

"Hay! Hay! Hay!"

"Oh, it's a blue jay!" exclaimed Janet, as she ran to the top of the hill to see what had happened to William. It was nothing serious. He had merely slid down on the smooth brown pine needles which covered the ground and made it almost as slippery as a coasting hill. Perhaps the sudden cry of the blue jay had made Trouble give a nervous jump and this had thrown him off his balance, causing him to fall.

"Was that bird chase me?" he asked, as he heard the blue one cry and saw it flitting about.

"Oh, no," answered Lola. "You chased yourself, I guess. Are you hurt?"

"I—I'm all—bumped," explained Trouble.

And this, really, was all that had happened to him. The pine hill was so smooth that no one could have been hurt on it. The girls found it so slippery that they could hardly stand up on it while helping Trouble up.

"Let's try—" began Mary. She was about to say "try a slide," when her feet suddenly went from under her and she did as Trouble had done. She burst out laughing, as did William and the other two girls, and the woods echoed to the merry sound, bringing the boys over on the run. They had not seen the rabbit after the first fleeting glimpse.

"What's the matter?" asked Ted.

"We've found a slippery place," answered his sister.

"Come on, let's try it!" suggested Tom.

They all did, making efforts to go down the slippery pine-needle hill standing up. But every one toppled before reaching the bottom of the hill. However, this was part of the fun, and Trouble enjoyed it with the others.

Now and then the blue jay would flit to and fro, alighting on the trees or bushes, and shrilly cry:

"Hay! Hay! Hay!"

"Maybe he wants to play, too," suggested Mary, who liked to look at one of our most brilliantly colored winter birds.

"He's making enough fuss about it, anyhow," said Tom.

The children had lots of fun in the woods that day and the next. No more tappings on the window were heard, and the Curlytops and their playmates forgot all about the little scare. The weather grew colder and colder. One morning Uncle Toby came in from the barn. He rubbed his red hands before the fire and said:

"Lake's frozen over! Now you can go skating!"



CHAPTER XVI

A REAL TOBOGGAN

"Let's have a race!" cried Ted, as soon as his skates were fastened on his shoes, for as soon as breakfast was over the children had gone out on the ice with their skates.

"All right!" shouted Tom, who was quite ready for this sort of fun. "I can beat you, Ted Martin!"

"And I can beat you, Tom Taylor!" exclaimed Lola, his sister, who was a very good skater.

"Oh, wouldn't it be fun if we two could beat them?" suggested Jan to Lola.

"We'll try," was the answer.

Meanwhile, though Mary and Harry had put on their skates, they took no part in this talk and stood about on the ice as if they hardly knew what to do.

"Will you join in the race?" asked Lola of Mary. "We three girls against the boys."

"I don't believe I can skate well enough to race," Mary answered, and her brother joined in with:

"You see we never had much chance to skate, and about all we can do is to move along in a straight line." He laughed good-naturedly over his own lack of skill.

"Oh, that's all right!" cried Ted, in jolly fashion. "We won't have any race then—that is, until after you two get more used to your skates."

"Oh, don't let us stop you from having fun!" exclaimed Mary.

"We can have just as much fun not racing. I don't care much for it, anyhow, do you, Jan?" said Lola.

"No, indeed!" answered the Curlytop girl. Thus did they try to make Mary and Harry feel happier, and they succeeded.

"I tell you what we can do," suggested Tom Taylor. "Ted and I can show you a few easy tricks on skates, Harry, and Jan and Lola can do the same with Mary."

"That will be fine!" exclaimed Harry. "Then, when we know more about it, we can have a race."

So it was decided, and then and there began lessons for the two poor children whom Uncle Toby had brought to Crystal Lake so they might have a good time over the holidays. Harry and Mary were quick to learn, and though it would be some time before they could beat any of the other four children in a race, they did very well for beginners.

"See if you can do this!" cried Ted, after having shown Harry how to "grind the bar" backward, a trick Harry soon learned.

"Watch me!" cried Ted, as he began doing what he called a grapevine twist. To do it he darted farther out from shore than any of them had yet gone, and just as he was dong some fancy skating there was a loud booming, cracking sound that sent a shiver all through the ice on which the others were standing.

"Oh, come! Come back!" cried Jan to her brother. "The ice is going to break! We'll fall in!"

"That's right!" yelled Tom. "Come on back, Ted!"

Ted needed no urging, but skated as fast as he could toward shore, whither the others were fleeing as fast as they could strike out on their skates. They reached land safely, and, to their surprise, no big cracks or holes appeared in the ice. It seemed as solid as ever.

"I wonder what made that?" asked Janet, whose heart was beating fast.

"The ice broke somewhere," declared Lola.

"We'd better not go on it any more," said Mary.

"Well go up and ask Uncle Toby about it," suggested Ted. "I don't want to stop skating."

As the children were about to take off their skates to go back to the cabin, Aunt Sallie was seen coming down, dragging Trouble on a sled. There were patches of snow here and there so it was not hard to pull the sled along. And Trouble was not very heavy.

"Oh, Aunt Sallie, you ought to hear the ice crack!" called the children in a chorus.

"Is it dangerous?" asked Mary.

Uncle Toby came out of the bungalow and heard what was asked.

"That rumbling, cracking sound isn't anything dangerous," he said. "The ice often does that, and often big cracks come in it out in the middle of the lake. But it is thick enough, and it won't break through with you or I shouldn't have let you go skating. But, even with all I have said, don't go too far out."

The children felt safer, now that Uncle Toby had told them this, and Ted again started to show Harry how to do a grapevine twist. Aunt Sallie gave the sled and Trouble over in charge of the girls, and they skated up and down pulling William to and fro, to his great delight.

The boys, now that Harry felt more at home on his skates, began to try to outdo each other in tricks, and when Harry said he would be the judge, Tom and Ted had a race, Ted winning.

Once Jan and Lola skated so fast, pretending they were a team of horses pulling Trouble on his sled, that Jan stumbled and fell down, also tripping Lola. The girls were not hurt, and they slid along over the ice laughing. But the sled was upset, Trouble fell off, and though he was so bundled up that he didn't get hurt, he began to cry.

"I guess we'd better take him in," suggested Jan. "He may be cold. Anyhow, I've had enough skating."

"So have I," said Mary and Lola.

They went up to the cabin, taking Trouble with them. But the boys remained on the ice a while longer, and Harry was rapidly becoming a good skater.

The three lads did not take off their skates until it was time for dinner, and after the meal they went back on the frozen lake again, though the girls stayed in to play with their dolls.

"Make the most of your skating," said Uncle Toby, as he watched the three lads circling around on the ice.

"Why?" asked Tom.

"Because I think we are going to have another storm," was the answer. "It is going to snow, and then all the ice will be covered. Of course you can scrape clean a small place, but it will be hard work. So get all the skating you can while it's good."

This the boys did, that day and the next. But the following morning, when they awakened and looked from the windows, they saw the ground white with snow, and more flakes coming down.

"Hurray!" cried Tom. "Now we can have fun coasting!"

"And maybe we can make a toboggan slide!" added Ted.

"I've seen them," remarked Harry, "but I was never on one."

"We had a wooden one in our yard, but we had to put candle grease on our sled runners first," Ted explained. "It would be great if we could make a regular toboggan slide."

"Let's ask Uncle Toby," suggested Janet.

Uncle Toby laughed in jolly fashion as the Curlytops and their playmates swarmed around him in the cozy cabin.

"A toboggan slide, eh?" he cried. "Well, I don't see why you can't have one, and you don't need to build it of wood, either, for there's a good hill not far away. But how would you like to coast on a regular toboggan instead of your sleds?"

"Oh, could we?" shouted Ted.

"I guess so," was the answer. "There's a French Canadian who lives not far away, and he has a big toboggan. We'll go over in the auto and see if he'll let us take it. I used to have one out here, but I find that it's broken."

"Oh, what fun we'll have!" sang Janet, and the others joined in the chorus of joy.

It kept on snowing, but they could journey out in the big, closed automobile even with the storm all about, and this they soon did.

"But if we get the toboggan how can we get it in here? There isn't much room," remarked Ted, for the children and Uncle Toby almost filled the big machine.

"Oh, we'll tie it on behind and pull it over," said Uncle Toby. "A toboggan can go faster than any auto."

"I ride on it!" said Trouble, and the others laughed, for of course he didn't know what he was talking about.

The road to the cabin of the French Canadian lumberman who owned the big toboggan ran past the lonely shack where Uncle Toby had once stopped for water and from which the strange man had run away. As they neared this cabin again Ted asked:

"I wonder if that man is in there now?"

"I don't know," said Uncle Toby. "But I think I'll take a look. Jim Nelson and I meant to do it before this, but we haven't had a chance. We don't want any tramps living in our woods."

He stopped the machine near the cabin and got out. The boys wanted to follow him, but he told them to remain with the girls.

"I'm just going to look in the window," said Uncle Toby.

He did this, first at the front windows, and evidently saw nothing, for he soon went around to the rear. And suddenly the children in the automobile heard shouting, and the shouts came from inside the cabin.

"Somebody's there!" cried Ted, starting to get out.

"You stay here!" cried Janet, catching her brother by the coat. "Uncle Toby told you to stay here!"

As Ted sank back in his seat they could all hear Uncle Toby saying:

"Who are you? What are you doing in there?"

The man in the lonely cabin answered, but what he said the Curlytops and their playmates could not tell. There was more shouting to and fro between Uncle Toby and the unknown man, and then Mr. Bardeen came around to the front of the cabin.

"Is he there? Who is he? What does he want?" The children quickly asked these questions.

"Oh, he's just a tramp I guess," answered Uncle Toby. "I couldn't make much out of him. But I'll tell Jim Nelson and some of the lumbermen, and we'll see what he's doing there. He can't do much harm, for there isn't anything of value in the old shack. But it's just as well not to have a tramp in there."

Once again Uncle Toby started the machine, and soon they were at the cabin of the French Canadian.

"Could we borrow your toboggan, Jules?" asked Uncle Toby.

"Oh, of a sure yes!" was the answer, Jules doing his best to speak what to him was a new language. "I bring she out to you!"

He ran around to the back of his shack, and soon came into view again with a real toboggan, at the sight of which the children set up a joyous shout.



CHAPTER XVII

THE SNOW HOUSE

The Frenchman's toboggan was a large one. It would hold all of the Curlytops and their playmates, with room to spare. I suppose most of you have seen toboggans, or pictures of them, and know what they are. Instead of being made like a sled, with steel runners, a toboggan is like a thin, flat board, with the front end curled up like the old fashioned Dutch skates. Only instead of being made of one flat piece of wood, a large toboggan is made of several strips fastened together so it will not so easily break.

On the side of Jules's toboggan were hand rails, to which the riders could hold. There was also a cushion on which to sit, and altogether it was a very fine way of coasting downhill.

"Oh, what fun we'll have on this!" cried Jan.

"Will it go fast?" asked Lola.

"It'll go like an express train!" cried Ted.

"And we fellows will take turns sitting on the back and sticking our feet out to steer," added Tom, for that is how a toboggan is guided, you know.

"If it's going as fast as an express train I don't believe I want to ride," said Mary, who was rather more timid than the other children.

"Don't let those boys scare you," advised Janet. "They're only talking to hear themselves talk. Tom and Ted are always that way—aren't they, Lola?"

"Yes," answered Tom's sister, with a laugh.

The boys were now clustered around the big toboggan, and Trouble had taken his seat in the middle of the cushion.

"You give me wide!" he demanded of his brother.

"Not now—a little later," promised Ted. He wanted to listen to what the Canadian was saying, telling Uncle Toby how the big toboggan was best managed on a hill.

"I'll go down with the children the first few times," said Uncle Toby, "to make sure it's all right. Our hill isn't so very steep, and I don't believe there's much danger."

"On little hill not—no!" exclaimed Jules, with a smile that showed all his white teeth. "But on big hill, steep so like roof of house, toboggan her go like what you say—fifty-nine?"

"I guess you mean like sixty," laughed Uncle Toby.

"Mebby so. Her go very fast. I like for childrens to have good time, but not too fast!"

"I'll see that they are careful," promised Uncle Toby.

After much teasing the three boys were allowed to sit on the toboggan after it was tied to the rear of the automobile for the trip home.

"I won't go very fast," said Uncle Toby. "But if I should have to stop you boys will need to stick your feet down in the snow suddenly to put on the brakes, you know, or you'll bump into my rear wheels."

"We'll do that," promised Tom, Ted, and Harry.

Trouble wanted to ride with the boys on the toboggan as it was drawn along over the snow behind the auto, but he was not allowed to do this, as it was thought his brother and the other two lads would be so full of fun that they would forget to watch him, and he might fall off and be left behind.

The toboggan was made fast with a long rope, the boys took their places, and with many thanks to Jules for his kindness, the trip home was begun.

"Hurray!" cried Ted. "Here we go!"

"Talk about fun!" shouted Tom. "We're having it all right!"

"I never had such a good time in my life," said Harry, his eyes shining with pleasure. He wished his mother might have shared in some of his and his sister's enjoyment, and how he wished that he had a father, such as the other boys had, only he himself knew. But he said nothing of this.

"Hold on tightly now, boys!" called Uncle Toby.

"We will!" they answered, and away they went.

At first everything was all right. The road was slightly uphill and the toboggan kept well back from the wheels of the automobile, so there was no danger of bumping into them. But when the automobile started down grade toward Uncle Toby's cabin, the wooden sled slid faster than the automobile was pulling it.

"Put on brakes! Put on brakes!" shouted Ted.

"Stick your feet in the snow!" echoed Tom.

The three boys thrust their feet out on either side of the toboggan, digging their heels into the snow, and in this way they made themselves slow up, so they did not hit the wheels. Even if they had done so no harm would have resulted, because the wheels had large rubber tires on them, and the front of the toboggan came up in a big curve.

Soon they were going uphill again, and the boys did not have to "put on brakes." But as Uncle Toby made the automobile go a bit faster, when they were near his cabin, he and the girls suddenly heard laughing shouts from the boys behind them.

"Oh, something has happened!" exclaimed Jan, looking out of the rear window of the closed car.

"They've fallen off!" added Mary. "I hope they aren't hurt!"

"Can't be much hurt, falling off in the snow," laughed Uncle Toby, as he brought the car to a stop, got out, and went back, followed by the girls. The toboggan had turned upside down, but was not damaged. The boys, laughing so joyously that they could hardly walk, were coming along, covered with snow.

"What happened?" Uncle Toby wanted to know.

"Oh, the toboggan struck a big lump of snow in the middle of the road and turned right over. It spilled us off!" explained Ted.

"But it was fun!" added Harry. And so it was.

"Well, we're almost there. Better walk the rest of the way," advised Uncle Toby. "Take the toboggan off and pull it."

This was done, two of the boys taking turns pulling the third over the short distance remaining.

"And now for some real tobogganing!" cried Ted, as the cabin was reached.

Uncle Toby, however, would not let the children go down alone for the first few times. He wanted to be sure the boys knew how to manage the big sled, which, though large, was very light, as all toboggans are, and thus are much safer than a sled with steel runners.

There was a long, but not too steep, hill near the cabin, and the Curlytops and their playmates were soon at the top of this, with Uncle Toby and the toboggan.

"All aboard!" called Mr. Bardeen, and they took their places on the cushion, holding to the hand rails. Trouble was not allowed to go down the first time, but Aunt Sallie had all she could do to keep him with her as she stood at the top of the slope watching the coasting party.

"You shall soon have a ride, Trouble," Aunt Sallie promised. "As soon as the hill is made a little smooth."

"All ready?" cried Uncle Toby.

"Let's go!" cried Ted.

Uncle Toby gave a push with his foot, which he had thrust out behind to steer with, and down the snow-covered hill went the toboggan with its happy load. They did not go very fast on this first trip, as the snow needed to be packed down smooth and hard. But after the second or third voyage the toboggan moved more swiftly.

"Do you like it Mary?" asked Janet.

"Oh, I just love it!" cried the other, with shining eyes.

Uncle Toby, finding that everything was safe, allowed the boys, one after another, to try steering the light, wooden sled. Finding that they could manage all right, he let them have charge of the toboggan, and at last Trouble was allowed to coast down, sitting between Lola and Janet.

Of course Trouble wanted to take his turn at steering with the other boys, but that was out of the question, even though he teased very much. It would not have been safe, of course.

And such fun as the Curlytops and their playmates had! The toboggan was much better than a sled, and safer, even though it went faster. It was almost like flying with the snowbirds, Lola said.

Of course there were little accidents and upsets. Once, when Harry was steering, the toboggan turned completely around when half way down the hill and began sliding backward. And as the back end was blunt, having no curve to slip easily over the snow, there was a turnover, and the children were spilled all the way down the hill.

But they never minded that, only rolling over and over to the bottom, or nearly there, laughing and shouting meanwhile. It was fun for Skyrocket, too, the dog leaping here and there, barking and chasing snowballs which the girls threw for him to race after.

Once they took Skyrocket down on the toboggan with them, or, rather, they took him half way, for midway on the hill Skyrocket decided he didn't like that way of traveling, and with a howl he leaped off. It was too swift for him, I suppose.

But the children had great delight in it, and would have kept on with the toboggan fun all day if Uncle Toby had let them. He did not want them to get too tired, however, nor did Aunt Sallie want Trouble to stay out in the cold too long, though he was a sturdy little chap.

After lunch, when Trouble was having his usual nap, Lola and Jan said they would like to try steering the toboggan, and Uncle Toby said they might.

"Well, we fellows won't ride if you girls steer," declared Ted. "You'd upset us first shot."

"Pooh! You don't need to ride!" laughed Janet. "We can do better without you."

The girls learned to steer, after a lesson or two from Uncle Toby. Even timid Mary managed to do quite well, though Janet and Lola, being more used to outdoor life in the country, did better than Mary. The girls had their little accidents, too, upsetting more than once, but they did not mind this.

For several days, while the snow lasted, the Curlytops and their friends had fun in the snow. The weather was bright and sunny, and not too cold. One day Janet, going out to the kitchen where Aunt Sallie was busy, found the table covered with packages and bundles that Uncle Toby had brought from the village store.

"What's going on?" asked Janet.

"Thanksgiving will soon be going on," answered Aunt Sallie. "I must get my mincemeat made, and do a lot of planning for the big family I expect to have at dinner."

"Oh, I didn't know Thanksgiving was so near!" exclaimed Janet. At first she was joyous, and then a little feeling of sadness came to her. This would be the first Thanksgiving she remembered when daddy and mother were not present. The other children, too, when they were told about the coming feast at Uncle Toby's cabin, looked a little serious when they realized that none of their grown-ups would be with them. Of course Mary and Harry did not expect this, for they knew their mother could not come from the hospital for a long time, and as for their father—they had given him up as dead, long ago.

"But maybe daddy and mother will be here for Christmas!" said Janet.

"Maybe!" agreed Ted.

"I'm going to write and ask our father and mother to come here for Christmas. May I, Uncle Toby?" asked Lola, for in common with the Curlytops she called Mr. Bardeen by this name.

"Of course!" Uncle Toby answered. "The more the merrier! And if your mother is able to come from the hospital, we'll have her here for Christmas," and he nodded at Mary and Harry. This made that boy and girl very happy, for it is often happiness just to think of something pleasant that may happen.

One morning, several days after the first of the toboggan riding, the boys, who had gotten up ahead of the girls for once, began shouting outside the cabin.

"What's going on, I wonder?" asked Janet.

"Oh, I guess they're just yelling for the fun of it," answered Lola.

"They're saying something about a house," said Mary.

Janet raised the window and listened. Just then Ted shouted:

"Come on out, girls, and help us build a snow house. We're going to make the biggest snow house you ever saw!"

"And when it's finished you can have a tea party in it," added Tom.

"Oh, what lovely fun that will be!" cried Mary.

Soon the boys and girls, with Skyrocket frolicking around them, began making the snow house. The sun had so warmed the snow that it packed well.

First a number of big snowballs were rolled and placed one after the other in the form of a square on the ground. This was to be the foundation of the house.

Other snowballs were lifted on top of the first large ones, and snow packed in the cracks until, when afternoon came, there were four walls of snow, much higher than the heads of the children.

"It looks more like a fort than a snow house," said Lola.

"We've got to put the roof on," Tom answered. "How we going to do that, Ted?"

"I don't know," was the reply. "I never made such a big snow house. If we make the roof only of snow it will fall in on us."

"You'd better ask Uncle Toby," suggested Janet, and this they did.

"I'll show you how to make a good roof," Uncle Toby told the children. "Just get me a lot of poles from that pile over there. I used them to raise beans this summer. Bring me a lot of those long poles."

The children ran to carry them to him, wondering how Uncle Toby could make a roof on a snow house out of poles.



CHAPTER XVIII

THANKSGIVING

Perhaps if the Curlytops and their playmates had thought about it a little harder they might have guessed how Uncle Toby intended to make the roof of their snow house with the bean poles. It was very simple.

When the boys and girls had brought a number of the long, thin poles to him, Uncle Toby took the poles, one at a time, and laid them carefully across the tops of the white walls. Each end of the pole rested on the wall, and when all were in place, laid close together, there was the beginning of the roof.

"But it's full of holes," objected Ted, as he went in through the doorway that had been left, and, looking up, could see the sky in between the spaces of the poles.

"Yes, of course it's full of holes," laughed Uncle Toby. "All you have to do is to plaster some snow in the cracks, and then cover the poles with more snow and you'll have a roof to your house that won't fall in on you."

"Why, how easy!" cried Tom. "It's a wonder we didn't think of that ourselves."

"You'll know how next time," replied Uncle Toby. "Bring a few more poles."

This the children did, even Trouble dragging over some of the smallest ones from the pile. Then the roof was ready for its coating of snow, and the children began tossing it on with their hands and from shovels.

At first the snow dropped through some of the larger cracks between the poles, but these were soon filled, and then a solid mass of white was spread over the roof of the snow house.

"I'm going to see if I can't plaster some snow over the poles from inside, so they won't show," decided Ted, when the outside top of the roof was finished. "Then it will look like a solid snow roof."

The other boys helped with this, but it was not as easy as they had thought it would be. For often after they had stuck a handful of snow on the ceiling inside, it would fall down, once or twice right in their faces.

But at last they had the inside poles pretty well plastered over with snow, and the house was finished. There was a doorway, and two windows, and over the door a blanket was hung. Uncle Toby put some sheets of ice in the windows, and they looked just like glass.

"Oh, this is the nicest snow house I ever saw!" cried Janet.

"It's like a fairy one!" exclaimed Mary. "I never dreamed of one so nice as this."

"It's the best one we ever made," said Ted, and the other boys agreed with him.

But the fun was only beginning. The girls had been promised, if they helped with the making of the snow house, that they could have a play party in it for themselves and, if they chose, their dolls.

"We'll ask Aunt Sallie for something to eat and have the play party now," decided Janet, when some boxes had been put in the snow house to serve as tables and chairs.

"Will the dolls eat everything?" asked Tom, with a smile.

"What do you mean—eat everything?" his sister wanted to know.

"I mean will there be anything left for us?" and Tom winked at the other boys.

"Oh, I guess Aunt Sallie will give enough for everybody," said Janet, and Aunt Sallie did.

As she was getting ready for Thanksgiving, there was plenty to eat in Uncle Toby's bungalow, and soon sandwiches and cake, and a tin pail full of hot chocolate were carried out to the snow house.

"It's a regular picnic in the snow!" cried Mary, in delight. "I never knew anything as nice as this."

The girls took their dolls out to the snow house, Mary having brought hers from home with her, and though it was not as well dressed or as costly as the dolls of Janet or Lola, still Mary loved her "child" just as much.

Janet wanted to make Trouble a rag doll to play with, but he insisted that he was an "Indian," for that is what the other boys were pretending to be.

"An' Injuns don't have dolls!" declared Trouble, as he sat on a box in the snow house and sipped his warm chocolate.

For two or three days the children played in the snow house, the weather being mild, so that it was quite comfortable in the white "igloo," as Uncle Toby called it. The children wanted to know where that name came from, and he told them it was what the Eskimos of the Polar regions called their egg-shape huts of ice and snow.

The pole roof was a great success, for it did not fall in on the heads of the boys and girls. And there is nothing worse, when you are having fun in a snow house, than to have the roof cave in on you.

Of course there were little accidents, caused by the snow which the boys had plastered to the inside of the poles. More than once little chunks of snow fell, but they were so light they did no harm, even when they hit Janet or Lola on the head.