"My, they're late!" she exclaimed.

Frank got up and went to the door. He encountered Dr. Morton just coming in.

"When did you say those youngsters were coming? It's snowing like fury."

He paused on the porch to give himself another shake.

"I don't believe they'll try to come out to-night. I guess you've had all your trouble for nothing. I only wish Chicken Little and Sherm had come home with you."

Frank, being a good many years nearer to understanding the rashness of youth than his father, disagreed with him.

"I bet they tried all right, but they may have had to give it up. I wonder how long it's been snowing this way. I haven't been out since supper."

Dr. Morton sat and visited for a half hour, then said he guessed he'd better go back to Mother. She was worrying a little about her baby being out such a night.

"She needn't," he concluded, "even a child like Jane would have sense enough not to start on a nine-mile ride in such weather."

After his father had gone, Frank put on his coat and went down the lane with a lantern. He came back presently and sat down by the fire without saying anything.

Marian saw he was worried. "You don't think they've got lost, do you, Frank?"

"I don't know what to think. I hope Father is right and they had sense enough not to start. But I wish to goodness I hadn't let Jane stay in."

They sat there listening for every sound until the clock struck ten.

Frank had twice gone to the door, imagining he heard sleigh bells. He got to his feet again at the sound of the clock.

"You might as well go to bed, dear. We sha'n't see them to-night, but I'll sit up till eleven myself to make sure."

[Ill.u.s.tration: A half hour later when they were warmed]

Marian waited a little while longer, then took his advice. Frank sat by the fire and pretended to read until five minutes of twelve, then he, too, gave up the vigil as hopeless.

At ten minutes past two they both sat up with a start at the sound of sleigh bells. An instant later there was a vigorous pounding on the door.

Frank stared into the darkness for one confused instant, then leaped out of bed, and wrapping a dressing gown about him, flung open the door.

Twelve numbed and snow-covered figures stumbled into the room. Two of the men were half carrying one of the girls.

"Fire up quick, Frank, we're most frozen! And get some hot water!" Sherm exclaimed, suiting the action to the word by stirring up the coals of the dying fire and piling on wood.

It was not until a half hour later when they were warmed and fed, that the Mortons had time to listen to any connected account of the night's adventures. Frank had speedily summoned his father to prescribe for frosted cheeks and fingers and toes. Later, it was discovered that John Hardy had a badly sprained wrist. Marian and Mrs. Morton made the girls comfortable and finished preparing the belated oyster supper.

"I am glad we didn't lose this oyster supper altogether," said Grant Stowe feelingly. "I never tasted anything better."

"Same here," a half dozen laughing voices echoed.

"I wasn't so darned sure an hour ago that some of us were ever going to taste anything again," said John Hardy soberly.

"Things didn't look exactly rosy, specially when we got spilled out,"

one of the girls added.

"What, did you have an upset?" Dr. Morton looked as if this were the last straw.

"Yes, that's how Hardy sprained his wrist!"

"Chicken Little had just a.s.sured us that if we would drive a little farther west, we should surely find something, when we struck the sidehill and went over as neat as you please." Mamie enjoyed this thrust at Jane.

"Well, we found something, didn't we?" defended Sherm.

"I should say we found out how deep the snow was."

"Yes, and the sidehill made Jane sure we were near the creek, and then she saw the trees and----"

"Yes, and then she found it wasn't the creek at all, but the Wattles'

place."

"Whew!" exclaimed Frank, "you didn't get over to black Charlie's? Why, that was three miles out of your road!"

"Yes, Frank, and you ought to have seen him. He was scared to death when we came pounding on his door in the middle of the night." Chicken Little giggled at the recollection.

"And there was a trundle bed full of pickanninies and they kept popping their heads up. They were so ridiculous--with their little pigtails sticking up all over their heads, and their bead eyes."

"Well, old Charlie warmed us up all right and started us back on the road again," said John Hardy gratefully.

"And there's another thing sure," said Marian, interrupting this flow of reminiscence, "you can't go back to town to-night, and you must be tired to death, all of you. Mother Morton, if you will take the girls over with you, Frank and I will make some pallets by the fire for these boys, and let them get some sleep."

The real sport of this excursion came the next day when Frank Morton hitched an extra team on in front of the livery horses and drove the party back to town himself, to make sure they did not come to grief again in the piled-up drifts. But Chicken Little and Sherm were not along. They watched them drive off with never a pang of envy.

"I have had enough bobsled riding to do me for this winter," said Jane wearily. Her evening at Fatinitza seemed a thousand years away.

"Ditto, yours truly!" And Sherm yawned luxuriously.

CHAPTER XVIII

AN APRIL FOOL FROLIC

Mrs. Morton and Marian were sitting by the great open fire at the cottage sewing for Jilly. Jilly herself had constructed a wonderful vehicle of two chairs. .h.i.tched to the center table, and she was vainly trying to persuade Huz and Buz to occupy seats in this luxurious equipage. Lazy Buz, having once been dragged up into a chair, stayed put, though he looked aggrieved, but Huz had his eye on the braided rag rug in front of the fireplace. The moment Jilly's gaze was attracted elsewhere, he would jump softly down and curl up on the rug.

Marian had risen three times to restore him to Jilly because she mourned so loudly, but she finally began to sympathize with the pup.

"Let him be, Honey, you've got Buz for company. Huz doesn't want to play."

Jilly opened her mouth to wail. Then she suddenly changed her mind, climbed down, and going over to Huz began whispering vigorously into his ear. Her warm breath tickled Huz and he flopped his ear to drive away the annoying insect. Jilly beamed, calling joyfully to her mother: "Huz say ess, Mamma, Huz say ess."