The Curlytops Snowed In.

by Howard R. Garis.

CHAPTER I

A LETTER FROM GRANDPA

"Ted! Teddy! Look, it's snowing!"

"Oh, is it? Let me see, Mother!"

Theodore Martin, who was seldom called anything but Teddy or Ted, hurried away from the side of his mother, who was straightening his tie in readiness for school. He ran to the window through which his sister Janet, or Jan as she liked to be called, was looking.

"Oh, it really is snowing!" cried Ted in delight. "Now we can have some fun!"

"And look at the big flakes!" went on Jan. "They're just like feathers sifting down. It'll be a great big snowstorm, and we can go sleigh-riding."

"And skating, too!" added Ted, his nose pressed flat against the window pane.

"You can't skate when there's snow on the pond," objected Jan. "Anyhow it hasn't frozen ice yet. Has it, Mother?"

"No, I think it hasn't been quite cold enough for that," answered Mrs.

Martin.

"But it'll be a big snowstorm, won't it?" asked Jan. "There'll be a lot of big drifts, and we can wear our rubber boots and make s...o...b..a.l.l.s! Oh, what fun, Ted!" and she danced up and down.

"And we can make a snow man, too," went on Teddy. "And a big s...o...b..ll!"

"An' I frow s...o...b..a.l.l.s at snow man!" exclaimed the voice of a smaller boy, who was eating a rather late breakfast at the dining-room table.

"Oh, Trouble, we'll make you a little snow house!" cried Jan, as she ran over to his high chair to give him a hug and a kiss. "We'll make you a snow house and you can play in it."

"Maybe it'll fall down on him and we'll have to dig him out, like the lollypop-man dug Nicknack, our goat, out of the sand hole when we were camping with grandpa," added Ted with a laugh. "Say, but it's going to be a big storm! Guess I'd better wear my rubber boots; hadn't I, Mother?"

"I hardly think so, Teddy," said Mrs. Martin. "I don't believe the snow will get very deep."

"Oh, Mother, won't it?" begged Jan, as if her mother could make it deep or not, just as she liked.

"Why won't it be a big storm, Mother?" asked Teddy. "See what big flakes are coming down," and he looked up at the sky, pressing his face hard against the window. "Why won't it?"

"Because it seldom snows long when the flakes are so big. The big flakes show that the weather is hardly cold enough to freeze the water from the clouds, which would be rain only it is hardly warm enough for that. It is just cold enough now to make a little snow, with very large flakes, and I think it will soon turn to rain. So you had better wear your rubbers to school and take an umbrella. And, Teddy, be sure to wait for Janet on coming home. Remember you're a year older than she is, and you must look after her."

"I will," promised Teddy. "If I have to stay in, Jan, you wait for me out in front."

"Will you have to stay in, Teddy?"

"I don't know. Maybe not. But our teacher is a crank about things sometimes."

"Oh, The-o-dore Mar-tin!" exclaimed his mother, speaking his name very slowly, as she always did when she was displeased or was quite serious, "you must not say such things about your teacher."

"Well, the other boys say she's cranky."

"Never mind what the other boys say, you must not call her that.

Teachers have it hard enough, trying to see that you children know your lessons, without being called cranks. Don't do it again!"

"I won't," promised Teddy, just a bit ashamed of himself.

"And get ready to go to school," went on his mother. "Did you clean your teeth--each of you--and comb your hair?"

"I did," said Janet.

"I cleaned my teeth," announced Ted, "but my hair doesn't need combing.

I combed it last night."

For most boys this would hardly have been of any use, but with Teddy Martin it was different. Teddy's hair was so curly that it was hard work to pull a comb through it, even though he went slowly, and when he had finished it was curlier than before, only more fluffed up. Janet's was the same, except that hers was now getting longer than her brother's.

No wonder then that the two children were called "Curlytops;" for their hair was a ma.s.s of tangled and twisted ringlets which clung tightly to their heads. Everyone called them Curlytops, or just Curlytop, of course, if one happened to meet Teddy or Janet alone.

"I think you'd better give your hair a little brushing this morning, anyhow, Teddy," his mother said. "You can get a few of the wrinkles out."

"Well, if I do they won't stay," he answered. "Oh, but look at it snow!"

he cried. "The flakes are getting smaller; don't you think so, Jan?"

"I think so--a little."

"Then it'll last and be a big storm, won't it, Mother?" he asked anxiously.

"Well, maybe so. But you don't want too big a storm, do you?"

"I want one big enough for us to go coasting on the hill and have sleigh-rides. And we can skate, too, if the pond freezes and we sc.r.a.pe off the snow. Oh, we'll have fun, won't we, Jan?"

Without waiting for an answer Ted ran upstairs to take a few of the "wrinkles" out of his curly locks, while Nora Jones, who helped Mrs.

Martin with the housework, looked for the children's umbrella and rubbers.

It was the first snowstorm of the season, and, as it always did, it caused much delight, not only to the Curlytops but to the other children of Cresco where the Martin family lived. Janet watched eagerly the falling flakes as she put on her rubbers and waited for Teddy to come down from the bathroom, where he had gone to comb his hair, though he could not see much use in doing that.

"It'll only be all curly again," he said. But still he minded his mother.

"The flakes are getting lots smaller," said Janet, as she and Teddy started for school. "We'll have big heaps of snow, Ted, and we can have fun."

"Yes, I think it will be more of a storm than I thought it would amount to at first," said Mrs. Martin. "I'm glad we have plenty of coal in the cellar, and an abundance of dry wood. Winter has started in early this year."

"And pretty soon it'll be Thanksgiving and Christmas!" cried Ted. "Then what fun we'll have!" exclaimed the excited boy.

"Now don't get any snow down inside your collars," called Mrs. Martin to her children, as they went down the street.

"We won't!" they promised, and then they forgot all about it, and began s...o...b..lling one another with what little snow they could sc.r.a.pe up from the ground, which was now white with the newly-fallen crystals.