He and Danny went at each other with their fists clenched, a crowd of other boys looking on, and urging one or the other to do their best, for both Danny and Bert had friends, though Bert was the best liked.

Danny struck Bert several times, and Bert hit back, once hitting Danny in the eye. Bert's lip was cut, and when the fight was over both boys did not look very nice. But everyone said Bert had the best of it.

"Oh, Bert!" exclaimed his mother, when he came home after the trouble with Danny. "You've been fighting!"

"Yes, mother, I have," he admitted. "I'm sorry, but I couldn't help it. Danny Rugg hit me first. I couldn't run away, could I?"

It was a hard question for a mother to answer. No mother likes to think her son a coward, and that was what the boys would have called Bert had he not stood up to Danny.

"I--I just had to!" continued Bert. "And I beat him, anyhow, mother."

Mrs. Bobbsey cried a little, and then she made the best of it, and bathed Bert's cut lip and bruised forehead. She told his father about it, too, and Mr. Bobbsey, after hearing the account, asked:

"Who won?"

"Well, Bert says he did?"

"Um. Well, I've no doubt but what he did. He's getting quite strong."

"Oh, Richard!" exclaimed Mrs. Bobbsey, in dismay.

"Well, boys will--er--have their little troubles," said her husband.

"I'm sorry Bert had to fight, but I'm glad he wasn't a coward.

But he mustn't fight any more."

Then Mr. Bobbsey sat down to read the evening paper.

The weather was getting cooler. Several nights there had been heavy frosts, and for some time the papers had been saying that it was going to snow, but the white flakes did not sift down from the sky.

Thanksgiving was approaching. It was the end of the Fall term of school, and there were to be examinations to see who would pa.s.s into the next higher cla.s.ses for the Winter season.

Of course in the case of Freddie and Flossie, who were still in the kindergarten, the examinations were not very hard, but they were soon to go into the regular primary cla.s.s, where they would learn to read. And both the twins were very anxious for this. Bert and Nan had somewhat harder lessons to do, and they had to answer more difficult questions in the examinations.

But I am glad to say that all of the Bobbsey twins were promoted, and Freddie and Flossie came home very proud to tell that when they went back again, after the Thanksgiving holidays, they would be in the primer reading book.

And such preparations as went on for Thanksgiving! Dinah was busy from morning until night, and when the little twins made inquiries about the turkey they were to have. Mr. Bobbsey said it would be the biggest he could buy.

"An' I'se gwine t' stuff him wif chestnuts an' oysters," said Dinah.

"I tells you what, chilluns, yo' all am suttinly gwine to hab one grand feed."

"I wish everybody was," said Flossie, a bit wistfully. "I hope our cat Snoop, wherever he is, has plenty of milk, and some nice turkey bones."

"I guess he will have," said Mamma Bobbsey, gently.

"I hope all the poor children in our school have enough to eat,"

said Freddie. "Mr. Tetlow said for us to bring what we could for them."

"And you never told me!" exclaimed Mrs. Bobbsey. "Why didn't you?

I would have sent something."

Neither Bert nor Nan had thought to mention at home that a collection would be taken it the school for the poor families in the town.

But as soon as Mrs. Bobbsey heard what Freddie said she telephoned to her husband. Mr. Bobbsey went to see Mr. Tetlow, and from him learned that there were a number of families who would not have a very happy Thanksgiving.

Then the lumber merchant gave certain orders to his grocer and butcher, and if a number of poor people were not well supplied with food that gladsome season, it was not the fault of Mr. Bobbsey.

But I am getting a little ahead of my story. A few days before Thanksgiving Mrs. Bobbsey, with a letter in her hand, came to where the four twins were in the sitting room, talking over what they wanted for Christmas.

"Guess who are coming to spend Thanksgiving with us!" cried Mamma Bobbsey, as she waved the letter in the air.

"Uncle Bobbsey!" guessed Nan.

"Uncle Minturn," said Bert.

The little twins guessed other friends and relatives, and finally Mrs. Bobbsey said:

"Yes, your Uncle Bobbsey and Uncle Minturn are coming, and so are your aunts, and Cousin Harry, Cousin Dorothy and also Hal Bingham, whom you met at the seash.o.r.e."

"Oh, what a jolly Thanksgiving it will be!" cried the Bobbsey twins.

CHAPTER XVI

MR. TETLOW ASKS QUESTIONS

Thanksgiving was celebrated in the Bobbsey home as it never had been before. I am afraid if I told you all that went on, of the big, brown-roasted turkey, of the piles of crisp celery, of the pumpkin and mince pies, of the nuts and candies, of the big dishes of cranberry sauce, and the plum pudding that Dinah carried in high above her head--I am afraid if I told you of all these things there would be trouble.

For I am sure you would all be writing to me to ask where the Bobbseys lived, so that you might go and see them, and perhaps spend Christmas with them. Not that they would not be glad to have you, but they have so many friends that their house is sure to be filled over the holidays.

So I will simply say that there was the grandest time ever, and let it go at that. Uncle and Aunt Bobbsey--Uncle and Aunt Minturn, from the country and seash.o.r.e, came, with Cousin Dorothy and Cousin Harry. Then, also, Hal Bingham arrived, and the Bobbsey twins took great delight in showing their former playmates about Lakeport.

"Isn't it lonesome at the seash.o.r.e now?" asked Nan of Dorothy, as she walked with her cousin about the busy streets of the town.

"Not at all," answered Dorothy. "The sea is never lonesome for me.

It always seems to be telling me something, Winter or Summer."

"I love it in the Summer," said Nan, "but in the Winter it seems so cold and cruel."

"That is because you do not know it as well as I do," said Dorothy.

Hal, Harry, and Bert had fine times together. There was no skating, and the little flurry of snow there had been was not enough for coasting, but they had other fun.

"Do your ducks miss our duck Downy?" asked Freddie of his cousin Harry.