NICKNACK SEES HIMSELF
The snow was just right for making snow houses, or for rolling big balls
that grow in size the more you push them along. For the snow was
wet--that is, the flakes stuck together. Sometimes, when the weather is
cold, the snow is dry and almost like sand. Then is not a good time to
try to make snow houses, snow men or big snowballs.
"But it's just right now!" cried Teddy, as he ran into the back yard
with his sister and the other girl and boy. "We'll make a fine snow
house!"
"First we'll make some big snowballs," said Tom Taylor.
"I thought we were going to make a snow house!" exclaimed Ted.
"So we are," agreed Tom. "But the way to start is to make big snowballs.
Roll them as big as you can and they'll make the sides of the house.
We'll pile a lot of snowballs together and fill in the cracks between.
That's the way to start."
[Illustration: "FIRST WE'LL MAKE SOME BIG SNOWBALLS," SAID TOM TAYLOR.
_Page 52_]
Ted and the others saw that this was a good way, and so they began.
First they each made a little snowball. But as they rolled them along
around the big yard the balls gathered the snow up from the ground,
packing it around the little ball that had first been started, until
Ted's was so big that he could hardly move it.
"It's big enough now!" called Tom. "Put it over here, where we're going
to start the snow house, and I'll roll my big ball next to yours, Ted."
This was done. Then Jan's snowball, and that of Lola were put in a row
and the four walls of the snow house were started. There was plenty of
the snow to be had and the children worked fast. Before dusk they had
the four walls of the house made, with a doorway and windows cut, but
there was no roof on, though the walls of the white house were above
Tom's head, and he was the tallest.
"Aren't we going to make a roof?" asked Ted.
"We'll do that to-morrow," answered Tom. "We ought to have some boards
to lay across the top, and then we could pile snow on them. It's easier
that way, but you can make a roof of just snow. Only it might fall in on
our heads."
"We don't want that," said Janet. "Boards are better, Tom."
When it was too dark to see to do any more work on the snow building,
the Curlytops went into the house and their playmates hurried to their
home for supper.
"We'll finish the house to-morrow," called Teddy to Tom.
The next afternoon, when they came home from school, the children
started to make the roof. Ted had asked his father to get him some
boards, and this Mr. Martin had done. They were laid across the top of
the four walls, and snow was piled on top of them, so that from the
outside the house looked as if made entirely of snow. From the inside
the boards in the roof showed, of course, but no one minded that.
The snow house was large enough for five small children to get in it and
stand up, though Tom's head nearly touched the roof.
"But that doesn't count," laughed Ted. "You can pretend you're a giant
and you could lift the roof off with your head if you wanted to."
"Only you mustn't want to!" cautioned Jan.
"I won't," promised Tom.
"We ought to have a door so we could close it, and then it would be like
a real house," Lola said.
"Couldn't we make one?" asked Ted.
"It would be hard to make a door fast to the snow sides of the house,"
answered Tom. "If we had a blanket we could hang it up for a
curtain-door, though."
"I'll get one!" cried Janet, and she ran in to ask her mother for one.
The blanket was tacked to the edge of one of the boards in the roof, and
hung down over the square that was cut out in the snow wall for the
door. When the blanket was pulled over the opening it was as cozy inside
the snow house as one could wish.
"And it's warm, too!" cried Ted. "I guess we could sleep here all
night."
"But I'm not going to!" exclaimed Jan quickly. "Anyhow we haven't got
anything to sleep on."
"We can make some benches of snow," Tom said. "Let's do it!"
"How?" asked Ted.
"Well, we'll just bring in some snow and pile it up on the floor along
the inside walls. Then we can cut it square and level on top, as high as
we want it, and we can sit on it or lie down on it and make-believe go
to sleep."
"That'll be fun!" cried Lola.
With their shovels the Curlytops and the others were soon piling snow up
around the inside walls of the white house. Then the benches were cut
into shape, and they did make good places to sit on; though it was too
cold to lie down, Mrs. Martin said when she came out to look at the
playhouse, and she warned the children not to do this.
"We ought to have a chimney on the house," suggested Tom, after he had
gone outside to see how it looked.
"We can't build a fire, can we?" asked Jan, somewhat surprised.
"No, of course not!" laughed Ted. "A fire would melt the snow. But we
can make a chimney and pretend there's smoke coming out of it."
"Let's do it!" cried Lola.
"All right," agreed Tom. "You're the lightest, Teddy, so you get up on
the roof. You won't cave it in. I'll toss you up some snow and you can
make it square, in the shape of a chimney."
This Ted did, and with a stick he even marked lines on the snow chimney
to make it look as if made of bricks.
"That's fine!" cried Tom. "It looks real!"
"It would look realer if we had something like black smoke coming out,"
declared Janet.
"Oh, I know how to do that!" exclaimed Lola.
"How?" asked her brother.
"Get some black paper and stick it on top of the chimney."
"Maybe my mother's got some," said Ted. "I'll go and ask her."
Mrs. Martin found an old piece of wrapping paper that was almost black
in color, and when this had been rumpled up and put on top of the snow
chimney, where Ted fastened it with sticks, at a distance it did look as
though black smoke were pouring out of the white snow house.
"Now we ought to have something to eat, and we could pretend we really
lived in here," said Janet, after a bit, when they were sitting on the
benches inside the house.
"You go and ask mother for something," suggested Ted. "I got the paper
smoke. You go and get some cookies."
"I will," Janet promised, and she soon came running from the house with
a large plate full of molasses and sugar cookies that Nora had given
her.
"Um! but these are good!" cried Tom, as he munched some with the
Curlytops and his sister.
"This is a fine house!" exclaimed Teddy. "I'm glad you helped us build
it," he said to Tom.
"Only it wants some glass in the windows," said Ted, looking at the
holes in the snow walls of the house.
"We don't need glass," immediately put in Tom.
"Why not?" asked Jan. "If we put wooden windows in we can't see through
'em."
"We can use sheets of ice!" cried Tom. "My father said that that's the
way the Eskimos do up at the north pole. They use ice for glass."
"You can see through ice all right," said Ted. "But where could we get
any thin enough for windows for our snow house?"
"All the ice on the pond and lake is covered with snow," added Lola.
"We can put some water out in pans," went on Tom. "If it's cold to-night
it will freeze in a thin sheet of ice, and then to-morrow we can make
windows of it for our snow house."
"Oh, that'll be fun!" cried Ted.
"It will be almost like a real house!" added Jan.
Mrs. Martin said, when the Curlytops asked her, that Tom's plan might
work if the night turned cold enough to freeze. And as after dark it did
get colder she put some water out in large shallow pans. In the morning
the water was frozen into thin sheets of ice, clear as crystal, and Ted
and Jan could see right through them as well as they could see through
glass.
"They're great!" cried Tom when he saw them, and that afternoon when
school was out, the ice windows were set in the holes in the walls of
the snow house.
"'Dis nice place!" Trouble said, when he was taken out to it. "I 'ikes
it here! I stay all night!"
"No, I guess you won't stay all night," laughed Tom. "You might freeze
fast to the snow bench."
"How plain we can see out of the windows," said Lola. "Oh, see, Ted,
here comes your goat! I guess he's looking for you."
"He must 've got loose and 've run out of his stable," said Teddy. "I'll
go to fasten him up. Here, Nicknack!" he called as he walked out of the
snow house toward his pet.
Nicknack kept on coming toward the white house. He walked up to one of
the windows. The sun was shining on it and as Ted looked he cried:
"Oh, I can see Nicknack in the glass window just as if it was a looking
glass. And Nicknack can see himself!"
This was true. The goat came to a sudden stop and looked at his own
reflection in the shiny ice window. Nicknack seemed much surprised. He
stamped in the snow with his black hoofs, and then he raised himself up
in the air on his hind feet. At the same time he went:
"Baa-a-a-a! Baa-a-a-a-a!"
"Oh, Nicknack's going to buck!" cried Ted.
"Who's he going to buck?" asked Tom, sticking his head out of the
blanket door of the snow house.
"I guess he thinks he sees another goat in the shiny ice window," went
on Ted, "and he's going for that. Oh, look out! Come back, Nicknack!
Come back!" Teddy yelled.
But with another bleat and a shake of his head Nicknack, having seen
himself reflected in the ice window, and thinking it another goat,
started on a run for the snow house, inside of which were Jan, Tom, Lola
and Trouble.