"You shall all have turns," put in Mother Bunker, who had come out to the garage to see how matters were going. "That is, all except Mun Bun and Margy. I'm afraid they're too little to coast. They might fall off."

"I'll hold 'em on and give 'em a ride," offered Russ, who was very kind to his little brother and sister.

"You can have the first ride," said Laddie to Rose, "'cause it's your roller skate."

"I can't go first," answered the little girl. "I don't know how you do it. You go first, Russ."

Russ was very willing to do this. So he took the skate wagon to the top of the sidewalk "hill," as the little Bunkers called it, and then he put one foot on the flat board, to which were fastened the roller-skate wheels.

"You have to push yourself along with one foot, just the same as when you're skating on one skate," explained Russ. "Then when you get to going fast you put the other foot on the board and stand there, and you hold on tight and down you go."

"Show me!" begged Rose, jumping up and down because she was so excited and pleased.

And then Russ went riding downhill, almost as nicely as he coasted on the snow in winter.

"Is it fun?" shouted Laddie, from where he stood with Rose at the top of the hill--only almost no one would have called such a slight grade a "hill."

"Lots of fun!" answered Russ.

Down to the bottom of the hill he rode, and then he walked up.

"Now it's your turn, Rose," he said, as he handed her the skatemobile.

But the little girl shook her head.

"I'll watch a little more," she said. "Let Laddie go."

So Laddie coasted down. Then Rose took her turn. Down the sidewalk hill she coasted on the skate wagon, and she was just turning around to wave to her mother and her brothers, who were watching her, when all of a sudden out from a gate ran a little dog. Right in front of Rose, and a little ahead of her he ran, and then he stood on the sidewalk and barked at her.

"Look out, Rose! Look out!" cried her mother.

"Steer to one side! Turn out for him!" yelled Russ.

"Stick out your foot and stop the skate wagon, same as you stop yourself on roller skates," cried Laddie.

But Rose, it seemed, could do none of these things. Straight for the little dog she coasted.

What was going to happen?

CHAPTER XVIII

THE SPINNING TOPS

Rose was not able to stop the skate wagon, on which she was coasting down the sidewalk hill in front of Aunt Jo's house. Nor did the little dog seem to want to get out of the way. He just stood in front of Rose, while she was coasting toward him, and barked and wagged his tail. And it was almost as if he said:

"Well, what's all this? Are you coming to give me a ride?"

"Get out of the way! Get out of the way--please!" begged Rose. "I'll b.u.mp into you, same as I b.u.mped into the curbstone, if you don't get out of the way, little dog; and then I'll run over you! Get out of the way!"

But the little dog just stayed right there.

Of course, if Rose had thought about it, she might have jumped off the skate wagon, and let that go on by itself, shoving it to one side.

But she was coasting down the stone sidewalk hill quite rapidly now, and she was so excited that she never once thought of getting off or even trying to turn the skate wagon aside. Straight for the barking little dog she coasted.

"Oh, we must stop her!" cried Mrs. Bunker, running down the slope after the little girl.

"I'll get her, Mother!" cried Russ. "I guess I can run faster than you can."

But there was no chance for either of them to catch Rose before something happened. And the something that happened was that Rose ran right into the little dog. Right into him she ran with the skate wagon.

"Ki-yi-yi-yip! Ki-yi! Yip! Yip!" yelled the little dog.

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" sobbed Rose, for she was crying.

Bang! went the skate wagon over into the gutter.

The little dog--Well, I was almost going to say he laughed to see so much sport, but that little dog is in Mother Goose, if I remember rightly, and this little dog didn't laugh. He was very much frightened, and he was hurt a little, and so was Rose. So the little dog just tucked his tail in between his hind legs, and back he ran into the yard out of which he had come to see what was going on when he heard the skate wagon rattling down the sidewalk hill.

By this time Russ, Laddie, and their mother had come up to Rose.

"Are you much hurt?" asked Mrs. Bunker. "There now, don't cry. We'll take care of you!"

"It--it's my knees!" sobbed Rose. "I sc.r.a.ped 'em! And is my skate wagon all busted?"

"No, it's all right," said Laddie, as he picked it up from the gutter where it had rolled after Rose fell off. "It's as good as ever."

"And your knees aren't hurt much--only scratched," said Mrs. Bunker, as she looked. Rose wore socks, and her legs, above her shoes, and partly above her knees were bare. "See if you can't stand up," urged Mrs.

Bunker, for Rose was as limp as a rag in her arms.

"Stand up and have some more rides!" exclaimed Russ.

"No, I don't want any more rides on the old skate wagon!" cried his sister. "I don't like it."

"Then we can have it all ourselves, Russ!" exclaimed Laddie.

"No, you can't either!" said Rose, and she suddenly stopped crying. "You can't have my skate wagon. I want it myself!"

"But if you can't stand up you can't ride on it----" began Mrs. Bunker.

"But I can stand up, Mother!" cried Rose, and she did, showing that nothing much was the matter with her.

"See, then you're not hurt," said her mother. "Now don't begin to cry again, and you can have some more rides. But perhaps you had better not coast down any more hills. Just ride along the sidewalk as you did on your roller skates. That will be best."

"Yes, maybe I'll do that," said Rose. "Where's the dog that made me run into him?"