CHAPTER VIIITOO MANY SHEEP
Grandma Martinat first did not know what to say. She just stood looking at Trouble and at the feathers. She really could not help seeing the feathers because there were so many of them and they were so scattered about the room. Baby William was almost hidden beneath them.
“Oh, my!” gasped Mother Martin. “I never knew there were so many feathers in one bed!”
“Me make cushion for lame boy!” said Trouble again, and he put his chubby hands in through the hole he had cut in the ticking, and pulled out a lot more feathers.
“Make a cushion! I should say you could make two dozen cushions with the feathers you’ve pulled out!” said Grandma Martin. “What does he mean by a cushion for the lame boy?”
“Oh, that must be Hal Chester,” explained Jan. “I gave him a cushion to sit on this morning, and Trouble saw me. He said he liked poor, lame Hal.”
“Me do like him—make Hal two cushions!” declared Trouble, laughing, as he tossed some feathers up in the air so that they fell in a shower on his head.
“Oh, Trouble!” sighed Mother Martin. “Such a mess as you have made! Oh, dear!”
“Never mind,” put in Grandma Martin, soothingly. “We can pick up the feathers, and I’ll sew them back in the bed. It doesn’t matter, as no one wants to sleep on it. Come on, Trouble, we’ll go to get the eggs.”
“He looks like a chicken himself,” laughed Jan. “Oh, what a funny, funny baby!”
Mrs. Martin caught her baby up in her arms, and, as she did so, a cloud of feathers flew all around, and some, getting in Jan’s nose, made her sneeze.
“Ker-choo!” she went, and Trouble laughed.
Then he sneezed:
“Ker-choo-choo!”
“Dat’s just like a choo-choo train!” helaughed, and he tried to sneeze again. But this time it was the turn of Grandma Martin, and, as the feathers tickled her nose, and then Mother Martin’s, they both gave loud “aker-choos!”
Trouble seemed to think this funnier than cutting open the feather bed, for he laughed and clapped his hands in glee. But at last they got him out of the room and closed the door so the stuffing of the “softy-softy” bed would not be scattered all through the house.
Then Jan, Ted and Baby William went to gather the eggs. They each carried a basket—the two Curlytops did, but Trouble was too little they thought. He might drop his and break the eggs.
“But mewanta basket!” he cried. “Me go after eggs too!”
He made such a fuss about it, and seemed to be so unhappy because he could not carry something in which to gather eggs, that Grandma Martin said, with a smile:
“I’ll make it all right for him.”
She got a little basket, and in it put some white china eggs, the kind some farmers leave in hens’ nests to make the chickens believe they have laid more eggs than really they have. At least, maybe that is the reasonthey leave them there, and maybe it is for some other reason.
“There are some eggs for you, Trouble,” his grandmother said. “If he falls and spills them, or drops them, they won’t break,” she whispered to Jan and Ted.
This satisfied Baby William, and with the china eggs in his little basket he set off with his brother and sister to watch them get the real eggs out of the nests. And Trouble was as careful of his china eggs as he could have been of the sort that would break so easily.
That is, he was as careful as Trouble Martin could be. Once he dropped the basket, and the eggs rolled over the ground. Trouble stood still, while Teddy and Janet scrambled around and picked them up. Then, Baby William tipped his basket and the eggs rolled out. But they were again picked up, and very soon the little party was in the chicken yard.
“It will be a little lesson to him,” said Grandma Martin, “and before very long he will be big enough to gather real eggs for himself.”
Jan and Ted soon had their baskets nearly full. They found most of the eggs in nests in the hen-house, but now and then somequeer old “Biddy” of a chicken would slip out of the chicken yard and go off to lay her eggs in a secret place.
It was the work of Ted and Jan to find these places, and they often found them under the barn. There was one place where part of the barn wall had fallen away, making a hole through which a small boy or girl could crawl. On the ground was hay and straw that had sifted down from the floor of the barn above, and this was a favorite place for hens to make their secret nests.
“I’ll crawl under and see how many eggs I can find,” said Teddy. “You stay here and hold my basket, Jan.”
“All right, Ted.”
Under Ted crawled, and pretty soon his sister heard him call:
“Oh, what a lot of eggs!”
“Did you find many?” Jan asked.
“Yes, there’s a big nest full. I didn’t see it the last time I came here. I’ll have to make two or three trips with them.”
Ted crawled back and forth under the barn, bringing out each time a few eggs to Jan, who put them in the baskets.
“There’s three more I want to get,” explained Ted, as he turned to crawl back forthe fourth time. “They’re away at the far end.”
Pretty soon Jan heard him call:
“Oh, I’ve found another nest!”
“That’s good!” answered his sister. “Bring ’em out!”
Ted said nothing for a few minutes, but Jan heard him grunting.
“Why don’t you come out?” she called. “We’ve got to get dressed for supper. Come on out with the eggs!”
“I—I can’t,” answered her brother, and his voice was muffled as though he were down in a cellar.
“You tan, too,” declared Trouble.
“Why can’t you come?” asked Jan.
“’Cause I’m stuck! I crawled in too far and now I’m caught under the barn. I can’t get out!”
For a moment Jan was frightened. She wondered if Ted would have to stay under the barn forever. Or would they have to pull it down to get him out? She remembered that once a cat had gone in a narrow space between two houses, not far from where the Curlytops lived in Cresco, and the firemen had to come with their axes and chop away some boards before the poorpussy, that howled most sadly, could be gotten out.
“Oh, Teddy!” cried Jan, “what shall I do? Do you want me to crawl in and pull you out?”
“No! Don’t you come in!” answered her brother, his voice sounding farther away than before. “You might get stuck, too. Go for grandpa or daddy! Maybe they can get me!”
“All right,” gasped the little girl.
Away ran Jan, setting down the baskets of eggs, and telling Trouble not to touch them, which he promised. But Trouble did something else. Knowing Ted was under the barn, and not wanting to be left alone outside, Baby William started to crawl in after his brother.
“Me come to git eggs,” he announced, wiggling along on his stomach.
“Go back! Go back!” cried Ted, who was not able to turn around. “You’ll be caught, too!”
“Bear in there catch me?” asked Trouble, stopping his crawling.
“No, not any bears, of course,” and Ted could not help laughing. “But you’ll be caught fast on a nail, or something in yourclothes, the same way I am. I guess that’s what’s holding me. Go back, Trouble! Oh, do go back!”
“No, I come in!” was the answer. “Trouble goin’ be a ’ittle worm, an’ crawl under barn. I’s comin’!” And go on he did, wiggling on his little stomach like a “’ittle worm,” as he called it.
Ted could do nothing to stop him and Trouble was soon under the barn near his brother. Just ahead of them, and out of reach of Ted’s hands, was a nest with half a dozen eggs in it.
“Dis nice place,” said Trouble, as he nestled close beside Ted. “We be chickies an’ nobody find us here.”
“I wish they would find us,” said Ted. “This is no fun,” for it was hot and stuffy under the barn.
Then he heard voices outside near the hole by which he had crawled in. Grandpa Martin and Jan were there.
“Oh, where has Trouble gone?” Ted heard his sister ask.
“He’s in here with me,” replied Ted.
Trouble spoke for himself.
“I am a ’ittle worm, an’ I crawled in here on my tummy-tummy,” he said.
“Well, I must get them out,” observed Grandpa Martin.
“Will you have to tear down the barn? Or maybe send for the firemen?” asked Jan, thinking of the poor cat.
“Oh, no. If I were smaller I’d crawl under the barn myself, and pull Ted out by his heels,” said Grandpa Martin. “I expect he wiggled under a beam where he is a pretty tight fit. That happened to me when I was a boy.
“I’ll go inside the barn, take up a board in the floor, right over where Ted and Trouble are lying, and then they can crawl up that way. Don’t worry, Jan. They’ll be all right.”
And so they were. When the floor board was lifted up, right above where Ted lay stretched on the ground under the barn, he could get out, and so could the little “worm,” Trouble.
As Grandpa Martin had said, Ted had tried to crawl under a place where a beam, or a big piece of wood, made such a narrow place that even a cat would have had hard work to get under. But Ted was not hurt, nor was Trouble, and when they had reached down and lifted out the eggs, and the hayand straw had been brushed from Ted and his little brother, they only laughed.
The rest of the eggs were soon gathered, and then came a fine supper with plenty of rich milk for the Curlytops, to give them rosy cheeks as well as curling hair.
The next day Jan and Ted went off in the goat wagon again. They rode to the field where they had seen the lame boy, and there he was once more, waiting for them with smiling face.
“I couldn’t come back that afternoon,” Hal said. “The doctor had to do something to this foot of mine.”
“Is it getting better?” asked Jan softly.
“Oh, heaps better! Why, I believe I could kick a football over the moon!” and he laughed. “You see,” he went on, “they’ve put an extra heavy shoe on this lame foot to make it straight. That’s why I can kick so well with it. And it’s a fine shoe for not wearing out. It’s got iron in the sole. Why, that shoe will last longer than three of the kind I have on my other foot. It isn’t everybody who can have a shoe like that—one that hardly ever wears out!” and he held up the big boot-like shoe and brace he had to wear.
“I’m thinking of joining some football team that wants a good kicker,” he laughingly continued. “If you know of anyone send them my address,” and he smiled at Ted.
“I will,” promised the Curlytop lad. “But tell us about the Home and the party you’re going to have.”
“Our grandma is going to bake a cake,” observed Jan.
“That’s nice!” exclaimed Hal. “I like cakes,” and he told about the affair that would take place in about a month—an affair in which it was hoped all the people in the country round about would take part—to raise money for the Home, where cripples were cured and made well and strong.
“Well, I must be getting back,” said Hal, after a while. “There goes the supper flag,” and he pointed to one fluttering on the pole in front of the Home.
“We’ll drive you over in the goat wagon,” offered Ted. “Nicknack hasn’t done much pulling to-day.”
“Why do you call your goat Nicknack?” asked Hal.
“Oh, he nicks and nacks at so many funny things when he eats,” explained Jan.
They made room for Hal in the wagon, which had plenty of soft cushions in it. These were needed, for the cart had no springs and the road was rough. On the way to the Home, Ted and Jan told how Trouble had cut up the feather bed.
“Well, I’m glad he thought of me,” laughed Hal, “but I’m sorry he made so much work.”
“He was awful funny to see!” giggled Ted. “All feathers!”
When they were a little way from the Home, Hal said:
“You’d better stop now, and let me walk the rest of the way.”
“Oh, no,” objected Ted.
“Yes, it will be better. I’m used to it, and if some of the others saw me having a ride they’d want one, too.”
“We’ll give them all a ride some day,” agreed Jan, who saw that Hal’s idea was a good one.
“Will you? That will be fine!” cried the lame boy. “Let me know when you’re ready to do it, and I’ll tell the Superintendent. It will be great! Some of the boys and girls can’t walk. A goat ride would be fine for them!”
Ted and Jan promised to come the next day in the morning, and give as many rides as they could. But the next day it rained and also the next, so they had to wait about giving a treat to the cripples.
“Before you do it you had better see Hal,” said Mother Martin, when, on the third day, in the morning, the sun shining brightly, the Curlytops said they thought they would go to the Home with Nicknack. “Meet him in the field where you saw him before, and plan to give the rides to the lame children to-morrow.”
So Ted and Jan, taking Baby William, once more set off for the little hill, from the top of which they had such a fine view of the Home.
But Hal was not there in his usual place. Nor could he be seen as the Curlytops looked for him.
“Maybe he’s on his way,” suggested Jan. “We can leave Nicknack here, eating grass, and walk down to meet him. Our goat will be all right.”
“Yes,” agreed Ted.
Off they started, leading Trouble between them. They went into the next field, across which Hal always came and went on histrips from and to the Home, and as they came to the top of a little hill, and looked down they saw what they had not seen before, a big flock of sheep feeding. They came upon the animals very suddenly, and before Jan, Ted and Trouble could go back some of the sheep walked toward them, and formed in a ring around them.
“Oh! I wonder if they’ll hurt us?” asked Jan, her voice trembling a little.
“No,” answered Ted quickly, but he was not sure. Some of the sheep were coming very near, and one or two of them pushed their heads close against the children.
“I don’t like ’em!” cried Trouble, trying to hide behind Jan. “Dey’s too many ob de sheeps!”
There were a large number in the flock, and those that had been feeding at the far end of the pasture now came to join the others, standing about the Curlytops, penning them in.