In one of the downtown offices where he had to stop to see a man, Mr.

Bobbsey was kept rather a long time talking business, and Freddie and Bert got tired, or at least Freddie did. Bert was so interested in looking out of the high window at the crowds in the streets below, that he did not much care how long his father stayed. But Freddie wandered about the outer office, looking at the typewriter which a pretty girl was working so fast that, Bert said afterward, you could hardly see her fingers fly over the keys. The girl was too busy to pay much attention to what Freddie did until, all of a sudden, she looked down at the floor and exclaimed:

"Oh, it's raining in here! Or else a water pipe has burst!" She pointed to a little puddle of water that had formed under her desk, while another stream was running over the office floor.

"Why, it isn't raining!" declared Bert, for the sun was shining outside.

"It can't be!"

"Then where did the water come from?" asked the girl.

"I--I guess I made it come!" confessed Freddie, walking out of a corner.

"I got a drink from the water tank, but now I can't shut off the handle, and the water's comin' out as fast as anything!"

"Oh, my!" cried the girl, jumping up with a laugh, "I must shut it off before we have a flood here!"

"Freddie! what made you do it?" asked Bert.

"I couldn't help being thirsty, could I?" asked the little boy. "And it wasn't my fault the handle got stuck! I didn't know so much water would come out!"

And I suppose it really wasn't his fault. The girl soon shut oft the water at the faucet, and a janitor mopped up the puddle on the floor, so that when Mr. Bobbsey came out with his friend from the inner office, everything was all right again. And the business man only laughed when he heard what Freddie had done.

"Now we'll go to the Woolworth Building," said Mr. Bobbsey to Freddie and Bert, as they went out on Broadway. "I think mother and the girls will be there waiting for us, as I stayed talking business longer than I meant to."

And, surely enough, Mrs. Bobbsey, Nan, and Flossie were waiting in the lobby of the big Woolworth Building when Mr. Bobbsey came up with the two boys. This building is the tallest one in the world used for business, and from the top of the golden tower one can look for miles and miles, across New York Bay, up toward the Bronx, over to Brooklyn and can see towns in New Jersey.

"We'll go up in the tower and have a view," said Mr. Bobbsey, "and then we'll get lunch and go to the Bronx, where the animals are."

They entered one of the many elevators, with a number of other persons who also wanted to go to the Woolworth tower, and, in a moment, the sliding doors were closed.

"Oh!" suddenly exclaimed Nan.

And Flossie, Freddie and Bert all said the same thing, while Mrs.

Bobbsey clasped her husband's arm and looked rather queer.

"What's the matter?" asked her husband.

"Why, we're going up so fast!" exclaimed the children's mother. "It makes me feel queer!"

"This is an express elevator," said Mr. Bobbsey. "There are so many floors in this tall building that if an elevator went slowly, and stopped at each one, it would take too long to get to the top. So they have some express elevators, that start at the bottom floor, and don't stop until they get to floor thirty, or some such number as that."

"Are there thirty floors to this building?" asked Bert, as the elevator car, like a big cage in a tunnel standing on end, rushed up.

"Yes, and more," his father answered.

"I like to ride fast," said Freddie, "I wish we had an elevator like this at home."

They had to take another, and smaller elevator, that did not go so fast, to get to the very top of the tower, and from there the view was so wonderful that it almost took away the breath of the Bobbsey twins.

"My, this is high up!" exclaimed Bert, as he looked over the edge of the railing, and down at the people in the streets below, who seemed like ants crawling around.

"Well, I guess we'd better be going now," said Mr. Bobbsey, after a bit.

"Come, children! Nan--Bert--Flossie--Why, where is Freddie?" he asked, looking around.

"Isn't he here?" cried Mrs. Bobbsey, her face turning white.

"I don't see him," went on Mr. Bobbsey. "He must have gone inside." But Freddie was not there, nor was he anywhere on the outside platform that surrounded the topmost peak of the tall building.

"Oh, where is he? What has happened to Freddie?" cried his mother. "If he has fallen! Freddie!"

CHAPTER IX

WASHINGTON AT LAST

The startled cries of Mrs. Bobbsey alarmed a number of other women on the tower platform, and some one asked:

"Did your little boy fall off?"

"I don't know what happened to him!" said Mrs. Bobbsey, who was now almost crying. "He was here a moment ago, and now he's gone!"

"He couldn't have fallen off!" exclaimed Mr. Bobbsey. "Some one would have seen him. I think he must have gone down by himself in the little elevator. I'll ask the man."

The elevator, just then, was at the bottom of the tower, but it was soon on its way up, and Mrs. Bobbsey fairly rushed at the man as he opened the door.

"Where is my little boy? Oh, have you seen my little boy?" she cried.

"Well, I don't know, lady," answered the elevator man. "What sort of little boy was he?"

"He has blue eyes and light hair and--"

"Let me explain," Mr. Bobbsey spoke quietly. "My little boy, Freddie, was out on the tower platform with us looking at the view, a few minutes ago, and now we can't find him. We thought perhaps he slipped in here by himself and rode down with you."

"Well, he might have slipped into my elevator when I wasn't looking,"

answered the man. "I took two or three little boys down on the last load, but I didn't notice any one in particular. Better get in and ride to the ground floor. Maybe the superintendent or the head elevator man can tell you better than I. Get in and ride down with me."

"Oh, yes, and please hurry!" begged Mrs. Bobbsey. "Oh, what can have happened to Freddie?"

"I think you'll find him all right," said the elevator man. "No accident has happened or I'd have heard of it."

"Yes; don't worry!" advised Mr. Bobbsey.

But Mrs. Bobbsey could not help worrying, and Nan, Bert and Flossie were very much frightened. They were almost crying. Even though the Bobbseys got in an express elevator after getting out of the small, slower one, it could not go down fast enough to suit Freddie's mother. When the ground floor was reached she was the first to rush out.

One look around the big corridor of the Woolworth Building showed Mrs.

Bobbsey that something had happened over near one of the elevators.

There was a crowd there, and, for a moment, she was very much frightened. But the next second she saw Freddie himself, with a crowd of men around him, and they were all laughing.

"Oh, Freddie! where did you go and what have you been doing?" cried his frightened mother as she caught him up in her arms.