The Bobbsey Twins at Cedar Camp Part 7

"Yah! Yah! Why don't you wear girls' dresses!" taunted Nick. "You're a girl-boy! Girl-boy!"

"I am not!" declared Freddie, while the other coasters gathered around.

"You go on away!"

"I'm going to have a coast! Here, I guess I'll take this sled!" cried Nick, and before Freddie could stop him the bad boy caught Flossie's sled from the ground and ran with it toward the top of the hill.

"Here! You come back! You let my sister's sled alone!" shouted Freddie, racing after Nick.

Now Freddie was a good runner, but Nick had the start of him, and reached the top of the hill first. However, Freddie was not far behind, and no sooner did Nick throw himself flat on the little Bobbsey girl's sled, face down, than Freddie made a jump, and right on top of Nick's back he landed!

"Hi! Get off!" cried Nick, his breath rather knocked out of him, for Freddie was a fat, chubby little fellow.

"You get off my sister's sled!" demanded Flossie's brother.

But it was too late for this. It was impossible for Nick to stop now, and down the hill he coasted on Flossie's sled, with Freddie on his back, both boys coasting together!

It was a trick the children often did on the hill, and there was nothing hard about it. Only this time it happened to be an accident, and the two boys were enemies and not friends.

Freddie was so surprised at the sudden and unexpected coast that he just had to hold fast to Nick and he could say nothing more. But when the bottom of the hill was reached, Freddie, being on top, began to pound Nick's back with his two st.u.r.dy fists.

"Hey! Quit! Let me up!" begged the bad boy.

"Not till you give me my sister's sled!" insisted Freddie.

"Well, how can I give it to her when you're sittin' on me?" yelled Nick.

With that Freddie got off the other lad's back, allowing him to get up.

The other boys gathered around, thinking there might be a fight. But Nick had had enough. He found Freddie braver than he had thought, and turned away, muttering:

"Aw, I only wanted a ride an' I got it!"

"Yes, and Freddie had one too!" laughed Sam Miller.

Nick walked away, and then the younger Bobbsey twins again started coasting, Freddie taking Flossie's sled back to her.

It was still snowing when noon came, and Flossie and Freddie had to go home to lunch. They found Bert and Charlie busy making a bobsled in the back yard. The older boys were fastening together their sleds by a long plank, and Nan was helping by tacking some strips of carpet on the plank.

"Oh, can we ride on that?" asked Freddie.

"Maybe," said his brother. "How's the little hill?"

"Nice," Freddie answered.

"An' you ought to've seen Nick Malone take my sled and Freddie jump on his back!" cried Flossie.

"Is that fellow bothering you two again?" demanded Bert, looking up with a hammer in his hand. "I'll get after him, that's what I will!"

"Freddie got after him," explained Flossie. "Oh, I'm so glad it snows!

We're going coasting some more after dinner."

"Sure!" added Freddie.

At the dinner table Bert and Nan noticed that their father seemed worried over something. He went to the window several times to look out at the storm.

"If this keeps up the s.h.i.+pment will never arrive," he said to his wife.

"You mean the Christmas trees?" she asked.

"Yes," answered Mr. Bobbsey. "They are late now, and something seems to be wrong up there in the woods."

"Shan't we have any Christmas tree?" asked Freddie, who did not know just what was being talked about.

"Oh, I guess so," his father said, and again he went to look at the snow.

"Are you going to sell Christmas trees?" Bert asked. He had caught the word "s.h.i.+pment," and knew it had to do with some part of his father's lumber business.

"Yes, I am going into the Christmas tree business this year," said Mr.

Bobbsey. "That is, I have bought a large s.h.i.+pment of them to be sent here to me from the North Woods. If they get here in time I can sell them and make some money. But if this snow keeps up, the carloads of trees, or the s.h.i.+pment, will be delayed, and if they don't get here at least a week before Christmas they will be of little use to me. But perhaps the snow will not be as heavy as I fear."

"I didn't know you sold Christmas trees," remarked Nan.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CHILDREN HAD GREAT FUN COASTING.]

"I never did before," her father said. "It's a new business for me, and I may make a failure of it."

Then the older Bobbsey twins began to understand how it is that snow can bring pleasure to boys and girls, but may often mean trouble for older people in business.

"Well, we'll hope for the best," said Mr. Bobbsey, as he started back to the office after dinner, when the white flakes were still falling steadily. "I may have to go up to the North Woods to see about that s.h.i.+pment of trees if they don't get here soon."

"Could we go?" asked Bert, having a joyful vision of a mid-winter trip to one of his father's lumber camps.

"Well, I'll see," answered Mr. Bobbsey, and Nan and Bert looked at each other in delight.

Some strange adventures were ahead of them, though they did not know it.

CHAPTER VI--OFF TO CEDAR CAMP

Bert and Charlie, with Nan's help, finished the bobsled in time to use on the coasting hill that afternoon and early in the evening. And it is a good thing they had hurried with it, for the next day there came a thaw and the snow began to melt. It melted so fast that by noon there was scarcely enough for Flossie and Freddie to have any fun on even the small hill, and what snow there was had mostly turned to slush.

"Oh, dear," sighed Nan, when she found that she and her brothers and sister had to give up their pleasure, "this isn't any fun!"

"That's right," agreed Bert. "But the winter isn't over. We always have a lot of snow after Christmas."

"And I suppose we ought to be glad there isn't a big storm," went on Nan, when it had been decided to give up coasting and the older Bobbsey twins were dragging home the new bobsled.