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"The bobsled bumped over these hammocks, gatheringspeed."]
THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS SNOWBOUND
HOW THEY WENT AWAY WHAT THEY DISCOVERED AND HOW IT ENDED
BY GRACE BROOKS HILL
Author of "The Corner House Girls," "The Corner House Girls on a Tour," Etc.
_ILLUSTRATED BY THELMA GOOCH_
NEW YORK
BARSE & HOPKINS
PUBLISHERS
BOOKS FOR GIRLS
By Grace Brooks Hill
The Corner House Girls Series
_12mo. Cloth. Illustrated._
THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS AT SCHOOL THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS UNDER CANVAS THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS IN A PLAY THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS' ODD FIND THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS ON A TOUR THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS GROWING UP THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS SNOWBOUND
BARSE & HOPKINS
PUBLISHERS--NEW YORK
Copyright, 1919, by Barse & Hopkins
_The Corner House Girls Snowbound_
Printed in U. S. A.
CONTENTS
I--A Ghost and a Goat II--The Straw Ride III--Twins--And Trouble IV--Anticipations V--Merry Times VI--On the Wings of the Wind VII--The Scooter VIII--The Village on the Ice IX--A Cold Scent X--Into the Wilderness XI--Embers in the Grate XII--Mystery and Fun XIII--The Timber Cruiser XIV--By the Light of the Moon XV--A Variety of Happenings XVI--The Key XVII--All Down Hill XVIII--Figure It Out XIX--Sammy Takes the Bit in His Teeth XX--Following Another Trail XXI--Rowdy XXII--In the Cave XXIII--Anxiety XXIV--Rafe Is Cross XXV--Holidays--Conclusion
ILLUSTRATIONS
The bobsled bumped over these hummocks, gathering speed Even Ruth could scarcely keep a sober face He fairly dragged her from under the flapping sail The housekeeping arrangements of the cave were primitive
THE CORNER HOUSE GIRLS SNOWBOUND
CHAPTER I
A GHOST AND A GOAT
There was a vast amount of tramping up and down stairs, and littlefeet, well shod, are noisy. This padding up and down was by the twoflights of back stairs from the entry off the kitchen porch to the bigheated room that was called by the older folks who lived in the oldCorner House, "the nursery."
"But it isn't a nursery," objected Dot Kenway, who really was not yetbig enough to fit the name of "Dorothy." "We never had a nurse, didwe, Tess? Ruthie helped bring us up after our own truly mamma died.And, then, 'nursery' sounds so _little_."
"Just as though you were kids," put in Master Sammy Pinkney, who livedin the house across the street, and nearest, on Willow Street, fromthe Kenway sisters' beautiful home in Milton, but who felt that he,too, "belonged" in the old Corner House.
"No. It should be called 'the playroom,'" agreed Tess, who was olderthan Dot, and considerably bigger, yet who no more fitted the name shewas christened with than the fairylike Dot fitted hers. Nobody butAunt Sarah Maltby--and she only when she was in a most severemood--called the next-to-the-youngest Corner House girl "Theresa."
It was Saturday morning, and it had begun to snow; at first in adesultory fashion before Tess and Dot--or even Sammy Pinkney--were outof bed. Of course, they had hailed the fleecy, drifting snow withdelight; it looked to be the first real snowstorm of the season.
But by the time breakfast was well over (and breakfast on Saturdaymorning at the old Corner House was a "movable feast," for the Kenwaysisters did not all get up so promptly as they did on school days)Sammy Pinkney waded almost to the top of his rubber boots in comingfrom his house to play with the two younger Kenway sisters.
Of course, Sammy had picked out the deepest places to wade in; but thesnow really was gathering very fast. Mrs. MacCall, the Kenways' dearfriend and housekeeper, declared that it was gathering and drifting asfast as ever she had seen it as a child "at home in the Hielands," asshe expressed it.
"'Tis stay-in-the-hoose weather," the old Scotch woman declared."Roughs and toughs, like this Sammy Pinkney boy, can roll in the snowlike porpoises in the sea; but little girls would much better stayindoor and dance 'Katie Beardie.'"
"Oh, Mrs. Mac!" cried Dot, "what is 'dancing Katie Beardie'?"
So the housekeeper stopped long enough in her oversight of Linda, theFinnish girl, to repeat the old rhyme one hears to this day amid theclatter of little clogs upon the pavements of Edinburgh.
"'Katie Beardie had a grice, It could skate upon the ice; Wasna that a dainty grice? Dance, Katie Beardie!
Katie Beardie had a hen, Cackled but and cackled ben; Wasna that a dainty hen? Dance, Katie Beardie!'
And you little ones have been 'cackling but and cackling ben' eversince breakfast time. Do, children, go upstairs, like good bairns, andstay awhile."
Tess and Dot understood a good deal of Mrs. MacCall's Scotch, for theyheard it daily. But now she had to explain that a "grice" was a pigand that "but" and "ben" meant in and out. But even Sammy knew how to"count out" in Scotch, for they had long since learned Mrs. MacCall'sdoggerel for games.
Now they played hide and seek, using one of the counting-out rhymesthe housekeeper had taught them:
Eenerty, feenerty, fickerty, faig, Ell, dell, domen, aig. Irky, birky, story, rock, Ann, tan, touzelt Jock.
And then Sammy disappeared! It was Dot's turn to be "it," and shecounted one hundred five times by the method approved, saying veryrapidly: "Ten, ten, double-ten, forty-five and fifteen!" Then shebegan to hunt.
She found Tess in the wardrobe in the hall which led to the other ellof the big house. But Sammy! Why, it was just as though he had flownright out of existence!
Tess was soon curious, too, and aided her sister in the search, andthey hunted the three floors of the old Corner House, and it did notseem as though any small boy could be small enough to hide in half theplaces into which the girls looked for Sammy Pinkney!
Dot was a persistent and faithful searcher after more things than one.If there was anything she really wanted, or wanted to know, she alwaysstuck to it until she had accomplished her end--or driven everybodyelse in the house, as Agnes said, into spasms.
With her Alice-doll hugged in the crook of one arm--the Alice-doll washer chiefest treasure--Dot hunted high and low for the elusive SammyPinkney. Of course, occasional household happenings interfered withthe search; but Dot took up the quest again as soon as these littlehappenings were over, for Sammy still remained in hiding.
For instance, Alfredia Blossom and one of her brothers came with thefamily wash in a big basket with which they had struggled through thesnowdrifts. Of course they had to be taken into the kitchen and warmedand fed on seed cookies. The little boy began to play with Mainsheet,one of the cats, but Alfredia, the little girls took upstairs withthem in their continued hunt for Sammy.
"Wha' fur all dis traipsin' an' traipsin' up dese stairs?" demanded adeep and unctuous voice from the dark end of the hall where theuncarpeted stairs rose to the garret landing.
"Oh, Uncle Rufus!" chorused the little white girls, and:
"Howdy, Gran'pop?" said Alfredia, her face one broad grin.
"Well, if dat ain' de beatenes'!" declared the aged negro who was theKenways' man-of-all-work. "Heah you chillen is behin' me, an' I sho'thought yo' all mus' be on ahaid of me. I sho' did!"
"Why, no, Uncle Rufus; _here_ we are," said Dot.
"I see yo' is, honey. I see yo'," he returned, chuckling gleefully."How's Pechunia, Alfredia? Spry?"
"Yes, sir," said his grandchild, bobbing her head on which the tightlybraided "pigtails" stood out like the rays of a very black sun."Mammy's all right."
"But who's been trackin' up all dese stairs, if '
twasn't yo' chillen?"demanded the negro, returning to the source of his complaint. "Snowjes' eberywhere! Wha's dat Sam Pinkney?" he added suddenly.
"We don't know, Uncle Rufus," said Tess slowly.
"Sammy went and hid from us, and we can't find him," explained Dot.
Uncle Rufus pointed a gnarled finger dramatically at a blob of snow onthe carpet at the foot of the garret stairs.
"Dah he is!" he exclaimed.
"Oh!" gasped Tess.
"Where, Uncle Rufus?" begged Dorothy, somewhat startled.
"Fo' de lan's sake!" murmured Alfredia, her eyes shining. "He mus' adone melted most away."
"Dah's his feetsteps, chillen," declared the old man. "An' dey comeall de way up de two flights from de back do'. I been gadderin' uplumps o' snow in dis here shovel--"
He halted with a sharp intake of breath, and raised his head to lookup the garret stairs. It was very dark up there, for the door thatopened into the great, open room extending the full width of the mainpart of the old Corner House was closed. In winter the children seldomwent up there to play; and Uncle Rufus never mounted to the garret atall if he could help it.
"What's dat?" he suddenly whispered.
"Tap, tap, tap; tap, tap, tap!" went the sound that had caught the oldman's attention. It receded, then drew nearer, then receded. UncleRufus turned a face that had suddenly become gray toward the threelittle girls.
"Dat's--dat's de same noise used to be up in dat garret befo' yourUnc' Stower die, chillen. Ma mercy me!"
"Oh!" squealed Alfredia, turning to run. "Dat's de garret ghos'! I'sheard ma mammy tell 'bout dat ol' ha'nt."
But Tess seized her and would not let her go.
"That is perfect nonsense, Alfredia!" she said very sternly. "There isno such thing as a ghost."
"Don' you be too uppity, chile!" murmured Uncle Rufus.
"A ghost!" cried Dot, coming nearer to the attic stairs. "Oh, my! WhatI thought was a goat when I was a very little girl? I remember!"
"Dat's jest de same noise," murmured Uncle Rufus, as the tapping soundwas repeated.
"But Ruthie laid that old ghost," said Tess with scorn. "And it wasn'tanything--much. But this--"
Dot, who had examined the wet marks and lumps of snow on the lowertreads of the garret stairs, suddenly squealed:
"Oh, looky here! 'Tisn't a ghost, but 'tis a goat! Those are BillyBumps' footsteps! Of course they are!"
"Sammy Pinkney!" was the chorus of voices, even Uncle Rufus joiningin. Then he added:
"Dat boy is de beatenes'! How come he make dat goat climb all desestairs?"
"Why," said Dot, "Billy Bumps can climb right up on the roof of thehen houses. He can climb just like a--a--well, just like a goat!Coming upstairs isn't anything hard for Billy Bumps."
"Sammy Pinkney, you come down from there with that goat!" commandedTess sternly. "What do you suppose Ruthie or Mrs. MacCall will say?"
The door swung open above, and the wan daylight which entered by thesmall garret windows revealed Sammy Pinkney, plump, sturdy andfreckled, stooping to look down at the startled group at the top ofthe stairs.
"I spy Sammy!" cried Dot shrilly, just remembering that they wereplaying hide and seek--or had been.
But somebody else spied Sammy at that moment, too. The mischievous boyhad led Billy Bumps, the goat, up three long flights of stairs andturned him loose to go tap, tap, tapping about the bare attic floor onhis hard little hoofs.
Billy spied Sammy as the youth stooped to grin down the stairs atUncle Rufus and the little girls. Billy had a hair-trigger temper. Hedid not recognize Sammy from the rear, and he instantly charged.
Just as Sammy was going to tell those below how happy he was becausehe had startled them, Billy Bumps dashed out of the garret and buttedthe unsuspicious boy. Sammy sailed right into the air, arms and legsspread like a jumping frog, and dived down the stairway, while Billystood blatting and shaking his horns at the head of the flight.