The Curlytops and Their Playmates Part 10

"All right, I guess you can watch the machine," said Mr. Bardeen.

"Skyrocket will help you keep guard over it."

"Who's Skyrocket?"

"This dog," and Uncle Toby pointed. Skyrocket had been holding back, for he did not like strangers, especially ragged ones, and this boy was rather ragged. But when Uncle Toby made it plain that the boy was to be regarded as a friend, the dog wagged his tail in welcome and curled up on the front seat.

"What are you going to do with the quarter I'm to give you for watching the car?" asked Uncle Toby.

"I'm going to get something to eat with part of it," was the answer.

"I'm hungry. The rest I'm going to turn in to my mother. She needs it."

"Hum," said Uncle Toby, thoughtfully. "That's stretching a quarter rather too much, I think. Now you sit out here in the car, and I'll have the waiter bring you something to eat on a tray. Oh, don't worry!" Mr.

Bardeen hastened to say, with a smile. "It won't come out of your quarter. I'll put it on my bill. And I'm going to have a bone sent out for Skyrocket. He'll keep you company."

"Yes, sir. I like dogs," said the boy, with a smile. "I'm much obliged to you. I'll watch your car good."

"Yes. I think you will. Well, children, run in and get started on your lunch. I don't want to get to Pocono after dark, and it looks as if we might get caught in a snow storm, but it may hold off."

The Curlytops and their playmates were ushered to their seats by a waiter who smiled at them.

"Do you remember us?" asked Ted, while Uncle Toby was giving orders to another waiter about sending something to eat out to the boy, and also a bone for Skyrocket.

"Of course I remember you," the waiter answered, as he pushed the chairs under Janet and Lola. "And I haven't forgotten what that little chap did," and he pointed to William, who was staring about the room as if trying to remember where he had seen it before.

"What did Trouble do?" asked Lola.

"He turned the faucet of the water-cooler and let the ice water run all over the floor," explained Janet with a laugh. "Mother's feet were in the puddle of water before we knew what had happened."

"Oh, Trouble!" chided Lola. "Did you do that?"

"Well--well, I didn't do it on pur--now--on purspuss!" stammered Trouble, as they all laughed.

Uncle Toby came and sat down at the table with the children, and the waiter who remembered the Curlytop party from their other visit was soon busy serving them. A good meal on a tray was taken out to the boy in the automobile and a juicy bone was sent to Skyrocket.

"This is jolly good fun!" declared Tom, who had not traveled about as much as had the Curlytops.

"Wait until we get out to Crystal Lake!" exclaimed Ted. "Then we'll have more fun. I hope school won't be very hard," he added in a whisper to his playmate.

"Oh, teachers aren't very strict around the holidays," answered Tom.

The meal was almost over when Lola, glancing out of the window, uttered an exclamation and cried:

"It's snowing!"

Surely enough, a flurry of the white crystals was falling.

Uncle Toby looked a bit anxious.

"I don't want to hurry you children," he said. "But as soon as you have finished we'd better be on our way. We don't want to be stuck in the snow."

And as they went out to get in the automobile again the air was thick with the white flakes.

CHAPTER VII

IN THE STORM

Seeing the Curlytops and their playmates coming from the restaurant with Uncle Toby, the boy who had been watching the automobile got out, followed by Skyrocket.

"Well, I see you didn't let any one take the car," said Uncle Toby with a smile, as he paid the boy, giving him more money than the lad had asked for.

"Oh, no! They couldn't take this car while I was in it," was the reply.

"Though I guess your dog would make a fuss, too, if anybody tried it.

Two or three men just sort of stepped up to look at the car, and Firecracker growled."

"Firecracker?" exclaimed Ted, with a laugh.

"Yes. Isn't that the name you called your dog?" asked the boy.

"No; it's Skyrocket," answered Jan.

"Well, I knew it had something to do with fireworks," laughed the ragged lad.

"But this is too much money," he said to Uncle Toby.

"That's all right, I guess you've earned it," was the reply. "Sitting in a car doing nothing isn't much fun."

The snow flakes kept on sifting down, swirling faster and faster as the automobile started off, the children calling their good-byes to the boy who had watched the car. They had left him much better off than when they first met him, for he had had a good meal and earned some money.

"Sit tight now, everybody!" ordered Uncle Toby, as they left the busier part of the village where they had stopped for a meal, and drew near the open country. "Sit tight, for I'm going to drive faster, and I don't want you falling off the seats."

"What you goin' to drive fast for?" Trouble wanted to know. "Is you goin' to have a race, Uncle Toby?"

"A sort of race, yes, Trouble," was the answer. "I'm going to race and see if we can get home ahead of the big storm that I'm afraid is coming down on us."

"Do you think it will be a very big storm?" asked Ted, and he looked with laughing eyes at Tom.

"I shouldn't wonder," was the answer. "And, though we have a strong car here, we don't want to get stuck in a snow drift and have to stay all night."

"I should think that would be lots of fun," said Tom.

"What? With nothing to eat except a few chocolate cakes Jan and Lola have in a bag?" exclaimed Uncle Toby. "That is if they have any of the cakes left."

"Oh, yes, we have them," Jan hastened to say, for she and her girl chum had bought some just before reaching the restaurant, and had not eaten them.

"Well, that's all we'd have in the way of 'rations,' as the soldiers call them, if we got stuck in the storm," declared Uncle Toby.