SAM GOES AWAY
“Dose chilluns aren’t lost!” declared Sam Johnson when he heard what
Nan said.
“Are you sure?” asked the Bobbsey girl.
“Cou’se I is!” replied Sam. “Where could dey be losted at?”
“They might have gone away over the fields to roll a big snowball, or
something like that,” suggested Nan. “And then they might have wandered
to the woods and now can’t find their way back.”
“No, I don’t believe dat,” said Sam. “You say dey came out to play in
de garage?”
“That’s what Mrs. Pry says,” answered Nan. “Freddie came in to get some
of her cookies, and when she asked him what he was going to do he said
he and Flossie were going to play in the garage.”
Sam shook his head.
“I been out here ’most all de afternoon,” he said. “I didn’t see
Flossie or Freddie. Cou’se dey might hab slipped in when I went to de
house to git a bucket of hot watah. I’ll take a look around to make
suah!”
He opened the garage again and turned on the electric lights, for it
was so equipped. Then Nan and Sam looked all over the first floor
without finding a sign of the children.
“What’s the matter?” asked Bert, hurrying out to the garage, having
heard from Mrs. Pry and Dinah that Nan had gone to bring in the smaller
twins.
“Oh, Flossie and Freddie are lost!” half sobbed Nan.
“I don’t zackly believe dey’s lost,” Sam stated. “Dey’s jest in some
place we don’t know. I’ll take a look upstairs. Maybe dey went up dere
to play house.”
“Oh, maybe!” eagerly exclaimed Nan. There was a sleeping room over the
garage, but it was seldom used, Dinah and Sam having quarters in the
Bobbsey house. But Flossie and Freddie had often gone to this bedroom
to play.
However, they were not up there now, and Nan cried some real tears when
several more minutes passed and her little brother and sister could not
be found.
“Is anything the matter?” asked Mrs. Pry, who had thrown a shawl over
her head and hurried outside.
“We can’t find Flossie and Freddie,” stated Bert.
“What’s that? Is supper almost ready?” inquired the deaf old lady.
“Why, yes, it will be in a minute. Bring the little ones in and we’ll
eat.”
“We can’t find them! We can’t find Flossie and Freddie!” called out
Bert, this time so loudly that Mrs. Pry heard.
“Oh, my goodness!” she exclaimed. “Why, they came in and got some
cookies--at least, Freddie did. Have you called for them? Maybe they’ve
fallen asleep in the snow. I’ve heard that being out in the snow makes
one sleepy.”
“Say, we haven’t called!” said Bert. “I’ll give a shout!”
He did, several of them. He called at the top of his voice for Flossie
and Freddie, standing outside the garage.
And then, to the surprise of all, Freddie’s voice answered:
“Here we are! What’s the matter?”
“Where are you?” asked Bert, for he could not locate the voice.
“In the dog house!” answered Freddie, and a moment later he and
Flossie, rubbing their eyes--for they had fallen asleep--came around
the corner of the building. Bits of straw were clinging to the children.
“Where in the world have you been?” cried Nan. “We’ve been looking all
over for you!”
“We were in Snap’s kennel,” explained Freddie. “We went in there to
play snowed-in.”
“And we made believe the molasses cookies were turkey and cranberry
sauce,” went on Flossie. “And then we went to sleep.”
“For the land sakes!” cried Mrs. Pry.
Sam Johnson was laughing. He picked up Flossie and Freddie in his
strong arms and carried them to the house. Dinah was just getting
ready to come out and see what the trouble was.
“Mah good land ob massy!” exclaimed the fat colored cook when she heard
the story. “To t’ink ob mah honey lambs bein’ out in de dog house!”
“It was a nice place, with clean straw,” stated Freddie.
“An’ the cookies were awful good!” added Flossie. “But we ate ’em all
up and I’m hungry again.”
“Suppah’s ready,” Dinah announced.
“And you mustn’t go in the dog house again,” said Mrs. Pry. “Next time
we might not find you, or maybe you couldn’t get out.”
“Oh, we could get out easy enough,” said Freddie.
Thus the lost ones were found, and though Nan laughed at how funny the
two twins looked as they came, sleepy-eyed, out of the dog house with
straw clinging to them, she had been anxious for a time.
That evening Flossie and Freddie went to bed early, for they were still
sleepy from having been out in the fresh air nearly all afternoon.
Grace Lavine came over to see Nan, and Charlie Mason called to play
some games with Bert.
“I came past Danny Rugg’s house on the way over,” Charlie said to Bert.
“What do you think he was doing?”
“Breaking more church windows?” asked Bert.
“Breaking church windows? What do you mean? Do you think Danny smashed
the one near our school?” asked Charlie.
“Yes, I do,” said Bert in a low voice. “But don’t say anything about
it. I’m trying to find a way to prove that he did it so I’ll be
cleared.”
“All right, I won’t say anything,” promised Charlie. “But that isn’t
what I saw Danny doing.”
“Was he looking for his lost gold ring?”
“No, it was too dark for that. But he was out in the lots near his
house--he and Sam and Joe and some other fellows--and they’re making a
big snow fort.”
“Getting ready to have a snowball fight, I guess,” suggested Bert.
“Well, I’m not going to fight, if he asks me. I’d rather have a fight
with some other crowd.”
“So’d I,” agreed Charlie. “And I know something else.”
“What?”
“Well, I saw Sam Todd taking a lot of horse-chestnuts into the fort
they’re building. They’re going to put ’em in snowballs to make ’em
harder.”
“It’s just like Danny Rugg and his crowd!” growled Bert. “They never do
anything fair! Well, none of our fellows will take sides against ’em.”
“I guess not!” agreed Charlie.
Grace Lavine laughed when Nan told her about Flossie and Freddie having
been “lost” in the dog house that afternoon.
“Oh, I think they’re the cutest children!” exclaimed Grace. “Don’t you
just love them, Nan?”
“Yes, of course. But they’re always into some mischief or other. I was
glad mother wasn’t here to be worried about them.”
“When is she coming back?”
“I don’t know--not until Uncle Rossiter is better, I guess.”
“And are you twins keeping house all by yourselves?”
“Oh, no, we have Aunt Sallie Pry.”
Just then Charlie, who was playing a game of checkers with Bert, made
such a sudden “jump” with one of his kings that he kicked over a chair
near him. It fell to the floor with a crash.
“What’s that?” asked Aunt Sallie from the kitchen where she was helping
Dinah with the last of the evening’s work.
“It was only a falling chair,” said Nan.
“Somebody combing their hair! Well, they made noise enough about it, I
must say!” exclaimed the old lady, and Grace and Nan had to stuff their
handkerchiefs in their mouths to keep from laughing aloud.
Charlie and Grace went home about nine o’clock, and soon after that the
older Bobbsey twins went to bed. Nan was feeling lonesome and wished
for her mother’s return. However, she said nothing about it.
It was the next afternoon when Bert came hurrying home from school
that more news awaited him and Nan.
“Where’s Sam?” Bert called to Dinah, as he hurried into the kitchen. “I
want him to fix that runner on my sled. It came loose again. Where’s
Sam, Dinah?”
Nan gave a quick look at the colored cook and guessed at once that
something had happened.
“Is anything wrong, Dinah?” asked Nan, for she noticed a sad look on
the kindly black face.
“Yes, honey lamb, dey is somethin’ wrong,” Dinah answered.
“Is it Uncle Rossiter?” asked Bert. “Or is it----”
He was afraid to ask about his father and mother.
“No, honey, ’tisn’t quite as bad as dat,” said Dinah. “But Sam, he done
had to go away.”
“Sam had to go away!” gasped Nan.
“Is he sick?” inquired Bert.
“No, he isn’t sick,” Dinah answered. “But his brother down South is
terrible sick, an’ a tellygram come sayin’ dat Sam mus’ come right off
quick. So he went on de noon train.”
“Oh, well, maybe Sam’s brother will get better,” replied Bert.
“’Tisn’t dat I’s worryin’ so much about,” explained Dinah. “But wif Sam
gone dey isn’t no man around de house now, an’ we’s likely to hab mo’
bad storms. Dey isn’t any man heah!”
“I can look after things!” cried Bert. “I can shovel snow ’most as good
as Sam. And I can shovel coal, too.”
“Oh, we’ll be all right,” added Nan. Though, deep in her heart, she had
a feeling that keeping house with Sam, the big, strong protector gone,
was not going to be as much fun as it had seemed at first.