BERT FALLS OFF
Bert Bobbsey did not know what had caused that crashing sound any more
than did Nan. For a few moments he was frightened, as was his sister.
Certainly that crash was enough to scare any one, coming as it did in
the midst of the storm. And when you take four children, none of them
very old, and put them in a house all alone, except for Aunt Sallie
Pry, ill in bed, there is some reason for them to be afraid.
“Oh, what was it?” cried Nan again. “There it goes some more!” she went
on, as the banging, crashing sound repeated itself. “What is it, Bert?”
“I don’t know,” he answered. “But I’ll soon find out.”
By this time Flossie and Freddie had been awakened. They, too, heard
the terrifying noise and the banging which jarred the house.
“Maybe that’s Santa Claus coming down the chimney,” suggested Flossie.
“It’s too early for Santa Claus,” called Freddie as he quickly began
to dress. “But maybe it’s an airship, Bert, and it banged into our
chimney. It sounds like a chimney, doesn’t it?”
“It sounds like almost anything,” Bert answered as he made haste in
putting on his clothes.
In her room Aunt Sallie had caught the word “chimney,” spoken by
Flossie and Freddie, but she had not heard what else the small twins
said. She did hear the banging sound, however, and she called:
“Oh, Nan, what is it? Is the chimney on fire? If it is, throw a lot of
salt in the stove. Salt will put out chimney fires,” which was true
enough, only the chimney was not blazing--at least, Bert and Nan hoped
it was not.
Nan answered the old lady, saying:
“We don’t know what it is, Aunt Sallie. I don’t believe the chimney is
on fire. Bert is going to look.”
“Oh, Bert dropped a book, did he?” exclaimed Mrs. Pry. “Well, that’s
all right--you can’t help dropping things once in a while, and you
can’t break a book by dropping it. But it must have been a very large
book to make so much noise.”
“Ho! Ho!” silently laughed Freddie as he was dressing with his brother.
“She thought Nan said a book, but she said you were going to look.”
“Don’t laugh,” whispered Bert. “Aunt Sallie can’t help being deaf.”
And as they did not want to agitate the old lady, neither Nan nor Bert
told her that something worse had happened than the mere dropping of a
book.
That some danger was at hand Nan and Bert were very sure. The crashing,
banging sound kept up, and at times the whole house shivered and shook,
and it was not the wind which was doing this, either.
“Bert, I am afraid!” whispered Nan, as she and her brother met in the
hall outside their rooms. Flossie and Freddie had followed them.
“You needn’t be afraid,” Bert answered, quite bravely for a boy of his
size. “I’ll soon see what it is.”
“Maybe somebody rolled a big snowball on our stoop,” suggested Freddie.
“Or else a big icicle fell,” added Flossie “Is it snowing yet, Nan?”
“Yes, it’s snowing hard, and the wind is blowing. But, Bert,” she
added, “I believe Flossie and Freddie are right--the noise is outside,
it isn’t in the house.”
“It does sound outside,” Bert said. “Let’s listen a minute.”
They stood quietly in the hall. Mrs. Pry, believing it was a book that
had fallen which made the noise, was waiting patiently in bed until Nan
should bring her a cup of coffee.
And as the twins listened there came to their ears that banging sound
again, and this time it clearly came from the front of the house and
not far from where they stood. Mrs. Pry heard the noise too, and she
must have felt the house tremble.
“Is Bert dropping more books?” she called.
“I’ll bring your coffee right away,” Nan answered, thinking this was
the best thing to say, rather than to speak of their fears.
“Yes, my dear, I’ll feel better after some coffee,” said the old lady.
“The noise comes from there,” and Nan pointed, as she whispered, to the
big front “spare,” or guest, room of the house.
“I’ll go in and see what it is,” offered Bert. “You shut Aunt Sallie’s
door so she won’t get nervous.”
It was well Nan did this, for as soon as Bert opened the door of the
guest bedroom, out blew a blast of cold air, followed by a cloud of
snow. In a glance Nan, Bert and the smaller twins saw what had happened.
A big branch from a tree in front of the house had broken off and had
crashed through the front window of the bedroom, breaking out all the
glass. Through this opening the cold wind was blowing the snow, until
there was a pile of the white flakes on the floor. The limb was not
broken entirely off the tree, but hung by a few shreds of wood. It was
as though it was on a hinge, like a door, and each time the wind blew
the branch swayed to and fro, banging against the side of the house
and on the porch roof, which extended across the front of the house,
and beneath the guest-room windows.
“That’s what made the noise!” cried Freddie, pointing.
“And look at the snow on the floor!” exclaimed Flossie. “I’m going to
make a snowball!”
“No you aren’t!” cried Nan, catching her little sister by the arm as
she was about to dash into the room. “Oh, Bert, what are we going to
do?” Nan asked. “The window is all smashed.”
“And maybe that branch will poke a hole in the side of the house,”
added Freddie, as the wind, swaying the limb, banged it up against the
window frame. There was no more glass left to break.
“I’ll soon fix this!” cried Bert. “I’ll get a hatchet and chop the
branch loose. Then it won’t bang any more.”
“But you can’t put in a new window!” said Nan.
“We can tack a blanket or something over it, and that will keep out
the snow and wind,” decided Bert. “I’ll get a hatchet!”
It seemed to be the only thing to do. For, as Freddie had said, the
branch, if left to sway to and fro, would keep hitting against the side
of the house and might in time break the clapboards and smash a hole
through the plaster.
“Can you chop that branch off?” asked Nan, anxiously.
“Sure!” declared her brother. “I’ll just get out on the porch roof, and
I’ll soon cut through that limb. It only hangs by a few shreds. It’ll
be easy.”
Nan saw what Bert meant to do. They went a little way into the guest
room, but it was so cold, now that the window was smashed, and the wind
blew the snow about with such swirling gusts that Nan thought the small
twins might catch cold.
“Come out and we’ll shut the door,” she called, pulling Flossie and
Freddie toward her. “That will keep the rest of the house from getting
freezing cold until we can tack a blanket over the window.”
“I’m going to help! Can’t I, Bert?” asked Freddie.
“I’ll see,” was all Bert would promise. “You go ahead and make the
coffee for Aunt Sallie, Nan, while I get the hatchet.”
“And I want my breakfast!” cried Flossie.
“So do I,” chimed in Freddie.
“Now, just go easy,” advised Nan. “I can’t do everything at once. Oh,
dear,” she sighed, “so many things are happening! I do wish mother and
daddy would come back!”
“Oh, we’ll get along all right,” replied Bert. “This isn’t anything.
’Tisn’t half as bad as if the chimney had fallen down, for then we
couldn’t have any fire.”
“No, I suppose not,” agreed Nan. “But I’ll be glad when you get that
limb chopped off. Listen to it bang!”
As she spoke the wind suddenly whistled around the house in a burst of
freezing air, howling and moaning, while the swaying tree branch banged
louder than ever.
“Nan! Bert! I’m sure that was the chimney blowing down!” cried Aunt
Sallie, for Nan had opened her door when they came out of the cold
guest chamber.
“No, it’s only a tree branch near the house banging against the side,”
Nan answered.
“What’s that you say? You’re going to take the children for a ride? Oh,
I wouldn’t do that so early in the morning, Nan. It must be very cold,”
said Aunt Sallie.
“No, no! I said that noise was a tree branch banging against the side
of the house,” repeated Nan in louder tones.
“Oh, a tree branch,” murmured the old lady. “I thought it was some one
knocking at the door. Is my coffee ready, dearie?”
“I’ll have it for you right away,” was the answer.
So Nan made Aunt Sallie a hot drink while Bert went down in the cellar
to get a sharp hatchet with which to cut loose the dangling tree
branch. Nan managed to keep Flossie and Freddie quiet by letting them
set the table for breakfast.
When she took up Aunt Sallie’s coffee and toast, Bert followed up the
stairs, having put on his rubber boots, mittens, and a warm jacket.
For he would have to climb out on the snowy roof to cut the tree limb.
As soon as he opened the door out rushed more cold wind and snow. But
he quickly closed it again, and Nan waited until he was inside before
she opened Aunt Sallie’s door, which she had gone up to close just
before Bert was ready to begin.
On the carpet beneath the broken window was a pile of glass and snow.
Nearly all the glass was broken out of the window, only a few jagged
pieces remaining, and these Bert knocked out with his hatchet so they
would not cut him as he crawled through.
The dangling branch was half way across the window, but there was room
enough for Bert to dodge through without getting hit by the swaying
limb. Once out on the sloping porch roof, covered as it was by a
blanket of snow, the Bobbsey lad looked up to see the best place to
start cutting.
As he had said, the branch was attached to the part that was not broken
off by only a few shreds of wood. Chopping through these would cause
the branch to fall, and it could then be pushed off the roof. But the
place where he must do the cutting was above Bert’s head.
“I’ve got to get something to stand on,” he decided.
He looked around inside the room and saw a small box. In it Mrs.
Bobbsey had packed away the lace curtains for the guest room. And when
the curtains had been hung the box had not been taken out.
“I’ll stand on that,” Bert decided. He pulled the lace curtains of the
window to one side. The curtains were wet with snow, but Bert thought
he and Nan could take them down and dry them later in the day.
Bert first put the box out on the porch roof in the snow. Then he
crawled out himself. As he did so the wind swayed the branch and it
nearly hit him, but he managed to scramble out of the way.
Then, standing on the box, he began to chop at the shreds of the
swaying branch. It was hard work, but the boy kept at it. The sharp
hatchet shaved through the thin wood.
“One more shot, and down you’ll come!” exclaimed Bert.
He aimed a hard blow at what was left of the shreds. The hatchet cut
through them and the branch fell to the porch roof. No longer would it
bang against the house.
But in making his last stroke, Bert reached over too far. He felt
himself slipping. The box on which he stood slipped on the snow of the
roof.
The next moment Bert toppled over, fell on his side, and went rolling
toward the edge of the slanting roof.
“Here I go!” he cried, trying to hold himself back.
But there was nothing which he could grasp, and an instant later he
slid over the edge of the roof.