"So you're going exploring to-day, are you?" said Daddy Horton, when he kissed him good-bye the next morning. "Well, good luck to you, old man. I hope you have an exciting adventure. And don't lose either of your handsome boots!"

Sunny Boy laughed and went out on the front steps to wave to Daddy.

"It feels so nice," he said to his mother, when she came to tell him that Mrs. Dunlap had telephoned that Oliver was going to call for Sunny Boy. "I like spring, don't you, Mother?"

"I love the spring, precious," she answered, smiling. "Now come and get your cap and the lunch Harriet has packed for you. I believe Mr.

Nelson is going to walk out to the car with you. Where are you going to meet the other boys?"

"At the corner," replied Sunny Boy, s.n.a.t.c.hing up his cap and struggling into his sweater as he heard Oliver's whistle. "Thank you for making me the lunch, Harriet," he cried, running toward the door. "Good-bye, Mother," he said, running back to kiss her.

Oliver and Nelson and Mr. Baker were waiting for him on the sidewalk, and when they reached the corner where the interurban trolley car stopped to take on pa.s.sengers, they found Perry Phelps and Jimmie b.u.t.terworth and Leslie Bradin and Carleton Marsh, each with a box of lunch under his arm.

"Going to Europe?" said the conductor, as he watched them climb into his car. "Let them off at Lane's Corners," he repeated, as Mr. Baker told him how far the boys were going. "All right, sir. Lane's Corners it is. All aboard."

He pulled the bell and the car started. The seven little boys found seats together at one end of the car, and the conductor made them laugh all the way to Lane's Corners. There were only two other people in the car, an elderly man and a man who read his newspapers and did not look up. The conductor pretended half the time that the trolley was a boat and that the boys were sailors. And then he would pretend that he was the conductor on a train and that the motorman was the engineer. It was not a long ride to Lane's Corners and the merry conductor made it seem only a few minutes.

"Who wanted to get off at Lane's Corners?" he called, when he had stopped the car at the big white sign post. "Why, goodness, all my pa.s.sengers are leaving me! Here, lad, catch this," he shouted to Bob, picking up Sunny Boy and pretending to toss him to Bob, who was waiting for them.

"It's a good thing you wore boots and rubbers," said Bob, as the trolley car went on, leaving the boys, who waved to the conductor as long as they could see him on the platform. "The mud is up to the hub of the wagon wheels."

CHAPTER XV

ANOTHER RESCUE

A horse and wagon stood at one side of the road, and Bob led the boys over and told them to "hop in."

"Isn't this the horse and wagon that was lost in the blizzard?" asked Sunny Boy, scrambling up to a seat beside Bob. Indeed all the boys tried to get near Bob, and when he turned the horse's head toward the farmhouse, there were boys on every side of him.

"Same horse, same wagon," said Bob. "Only difference is the weather.

Feel how warm that sun is?"

"Where we going?" asked Carleton Marsh.

"Down to the house, first, to pick up Father," replied Bob. "He is going to tinker up and whitewash some of the fences this morning. And Ma said she wanted to say 'h.e.l.lo' to you all. I thought you'd like to play down along the brook, and I can drive you there, because Father wants to work on the pasture fence."

Mrs. Parkney came out, followed by the Parkney children, when she heard Bob driving up to the farmhouse door. The road was so soft and muddy that she couldn't hear the horse's feet or the wagon wheels, but she could hear eight boys talking and laughing. That made a noise that could be heard some distance away.

"Now mind," said Mrs. Parkney, when she had spoken to the boys and her husband had come out with his tools and two buckets of whitewash and climbed into the wagon with them. "Mind! If you eat your lunch up before noon, or get hungry any time, you come up to the house and I'll fix you something good. And stop in anyway before you go home and have some milk to drink. Mud, Sunny Boy? Why, bless your heart, dear, a little mud is nothing. I wouldn't know spring had come to stay if I didn't see some mud tracked in."

The boys thanked Mrs. Parkney, and Bob drove off. When he came to the pasture, he got out and took down three bars and then drove in across the gra.s.s, down to the brook.

"Why, it's almost like a river!" cried Perry Phelps in surprise. "Look how fast it goes!"

"Ice melting up above," said Mr. Parkney, getting out his tools while Bob tied the horse to a tree. "See the chunks of ice floating past?"

As the boys watched they saw pieces of dirty-looking ice go swirling past in the rushing water.

"Is it a freshet?" asked Sunny Boy, remembering what his daddy had told him about freshets.

"Not exactly," answered Mr. Parkney. "The water's pretty high, but I don't believe this little stream can do much in the way of a freshet.

Folks around here say it carries on right powerful-like some springs, but it doesn't look dangerous to me."

The pasture land was soft and oozy, but as every boy wore either rubber boots or storm rubbers, they did not mind the mud. Perry Phelps said if they were going to explore, he thought it would be a good plan to follow the brook and see where it went.

"Go as far as you like," said Mr. Parkney. "Bob and I are going up to the house at noon for dinner, but we'll be back around half-past one.

And we won't let you miss the half-past four car, because your mothers will be expecting you home on that. Go as far as you like; you won't be trespa.s.sing. The few folks that live around here are good-natured, and the next farm is vacant, anyway."

"But don't try any funny stunts, like wading in the brook," said Bob.

"That water has more current than you'd expect, and it might knock you down easily. And it isn't warm enough yet to make a cold bath pleasant."

Sunny Boy had been thinking that it would be fun to wade into the brook and see how near the water came to the top of his rubber boots. But he didn't want to be knocked down and perhaps. .h.i.t with a piece of the ice, so he wisely decided to follow Bob's advice and stay on sh.o.r.e.

The boys walked beside the brook, following its twists and turnings and climbing the fences that stood in their way, till they came to a large clump of willow trees, loaded down with p.u.s.s.y willows.

"Let's pick them for Miss Davis," suggested Sunny Boy.

"But then we'll have to carry them all day," said Perry.

"No we won't. We can take them back and leave them in the wagon," said Sunny Boy. "And then we'll eat lunch and walk the other way. I don't think there is much fun around here."

Nelson Baker had a pocket knife, so he cut the p.u.s.s.y willows and the boys carried a large bunch back to the tree where Bob had tied the horse and wagon. But the horse was gone, and, of course, the wagon, when they reached the tree, and neither Bob or Mr. Parkney was in sight.

"They've gone home to eat their dinner," said Sunny Boy. "Let's leave the p.u.s.s.y willows under this tree. Mr. Parkney said he would be back by half-past one, you know."

"I'm starving," declared Leslie Bradin. "Come on, let's eat now. My mother put two stuffed eggs in my box."

Seven very hungry small boys may dispose of seven hearty lunches in almost seven minutes. It did take Sunny Boy and his friends a little longer, but in much less than half an hour they were through eating and had tossed the boxes into the brook and seen them rushed swiftly down stream.

"What's on the other side of that fence?" asked Oliver Dunlap, pointing to a wire fence that ran across the pasture, dipped into the brook, and continued on the other side.

"Mr. Parkney said n.o.body lives there," Sunny Boy reminded Oliver.

"Let's explore where n.o.body lives. Come on, fellows!"

They ran toward the fence, intending to climb over it, but before they reached it, Sunny Boy saw something that made him cry out in surprise.

"Look, Oliver!" he shouted. "Carleton, look! See the fence in the water!"

The boys looked toward the brook. Part of the fence that was in the water had broken and hung wobbling. But what had attracted Sunny Boy's attention was a pile of ice cakes that were jammed against the fence.

They were a yellowish-white, not at all like the ice cakes the iceman left in the refrigerator on summer mornings.

"It'll break in a minute," declared Nelson Baker. "Let's watch."

The boys stood waiting a few moments, and with a dull roar, the ice was forced through the fence, carrying a part of it along, and the water, as though angry at being held back, raced madly by, tossing cakes of ice on either bank. A large piece was tossed right on the toe of Sunny Boy's boot.

"There must be more ice where that came from," said Nelson. "Maybe we can find the beginning of the brook. Hurry up! Let's try to find it."