"We load the ice from here into freight cars," the man explained.
"See, the ice house is built in two parts, with a pa.s.sage-way between.
And is this pa.s.sage is a railroad track. The engine backs a freight car in here, the big doors of the car are opened, and the ice is slid in on wooden chutes, something like the iron chutes the coal man uses.
Then, when the car is full, it is pulled down to the city in a long train, with other cars."
"And then the icemen come with their wagons, get the ice and bring it to us," finished Mab. "I"ve seen them."
"That"s right, little lady!" said the foreman with a laugh. And sometimes ice comes to the city by a boat, instead of in freight cars, and the men with wagons go down to the boat-dock to get the cold, frozen cakes. And now you have seen how ice is cut in winter, and stored away until we need it in the summer."
"My!" exclaimed Hal, as he looked up at the big ice store-house.
"There must be enough ice in there for the whole world!"
"Oh, no indeed!" cried Daddy Blake. "No enough for one city. And besides this ice, which is called natural, because Jack Frost and Mother Nature make it, there is other ice, called artificial. That is what is made by machinery."
"Why, can anybody make ice by machinery?" asked Mab in surprise.
"Oh, yes, even on the hottest day in summer," her papa told her. "But it takes a lot of machinery. It is done by putting water into small metal tanks, and then by taking all the warmth out of the water by dipping the tanks into a big vat of salt and water which is made very cold by something called ammonia. It is too hard for you to understand now, but when you get older I will explain. Now I think we had better be skating home," said Daddy Blake.
As they walked down to the frozen lake, there was a barking sound from a small shed under which was an engine, that hauled up the ice cakes.
Out from the shed rushed a little dog, spotted black and white, and straight for the Blake children he rushed, barking and wagging his tail so that it almost wagged off.
"Look out!" cried Daddy Blake.
"Don"t be afraid!" called the engineer, laughing. "He"s so gentle he wouldn"t hurt a baby!"
And how strangely the dog was acting! He would jump up first on Hal, and then on Mab, trying to lick their faces and hands with his red tongue.
"Oh dear!" cried Mab, who was a little bit frightened.
"He won"t hurt you!" exclaimed the engineer. "Here, Spot!" he called.
"Leave the children alone. Be good, Spot!"
But the dog would not mind. He jumped up on Hal, barking as loudly as he could, and wagging his tail so hard that it is a wonder it did not drop off. The animal seemed wild with delight.
"Why! Why!" cried Mab, as she looked carefully at the dog when he stood still a moment to rest after all the excitement. "That dog looks just like our Roly-Poly, only Roly was white and not spotted black and white," said Mab.
"Well, when I got this dog he was all white," explained the engineer.
"He got spotted black by accident."
"I wonder if that could be Roly?" spoke Daddy Blake thoughtfully.
"Here, Roly-Poly!" he called. "Come here, sir!"
In an instant the dog made a jump for Daddy Blake, barking joyfully, and almost turning a somersault.
"I believe it is Roly!" shouted Hal. "It"s our dog!"
"But how could it be?" asked Mab. "Roly was lost under the ice."
"And that"s just where I got this dog," the engineer explained. "Out from under the ice. One day, after the first freeze this winter, I was Balking along a little pond. I came to a thin place in the ice, and looking through, from the sh.o.r.e where I stood, I saw a little white dog down below, just as if he were under a pane of gla.s.s.
"I broke the ice with a stick and got him out. I thought he was dead, but I took him home, thawed him out, gave him some hot milk, and soon he was as lively as a cricket. And I"ve had this dog ever since. When I came here to work at ice cutting I brought him with me."
"But you said he was pure white when you got him out," said Daddy Blake wonderingly.
"Yes, that"s right," answered the ice engineer. "So he was. And how he got spotted was like this. I was blacking my boots one day, and I left the bottle of black polish on a low bench. The dog grabbed it, playful like, and the black stuff spilled all over him. That"s how he got spotted. He was worse than he is now, but it"s wearing off."
"Then I"m sure this is our Roly-Poly!" cried "Oh, you dear Roly!" she cried, and the spotted poodle dog tried to climb up in her arms and kiss her, he was so glad to see her.
"I believe it is Roly," said Daddy Blake. "It is all very wonderful, but it must be our Roly."
"Well, if he"s yours, take him," said the engineer kindly. "I always wondered how he got under the ice. But of course he could not tell me."
"We were skating, the children and I, one day," explained Daddy Blake.
"Poor Roly slipped through an air hole in the ice. Then he must have floated down the pond underneath the ice, until he came to another thin place, where you saw him."
"I guess that"s it," the engineer agreed. "He was almost drowned and nearly frozen when I found him. But I"m glad he"s all right now, and I"m glad the children have him back."
"Oh, and maybe we aren"t glad!" cried Mab. "Aren"t we, Hal?"
"Well, I guess!" he cried. "The gladdest ever!"
Roly-Poly was happy too. He was so glad that he did not know whom to love first, nor how much. He raced back and forth from the children to Mr. Blake, and then over to the kind engineer, who had saved his life.
"Oh, let"s hurry home!" cried Mab. "I want to show mamma and Aunt Lolly and Uncle Pennywait that Roly-Poly is still alive."
And so Daddy Blake and the children skated down to the end of the lake, Roly-Poly running along with them. He had barked his good-byes to the engineer, and Daddy Blake and Hal and Mab had thanked the nice man over and over again.
"Don"t fall through any more air holes, Roly!" cautioned Hal, as he skated along with Charlie, while Mab glided slowly at the side of Mary.
"Bow-wow!" barked Roly, which meant, I suppose, that he would be very careful.
Soon they were all safely home, and Roly-Poly barked louder than ever, and almost wagged off his tail, sideways and up and down.
"Oh, how wonderful!" cried Aunt Lolly when she heard the story. "I knew something would happen. Something wonderful has happened."
And so it had. And it was really wonderful that Roly had floated down beneath the ice, and that the engineer had come along just in time to get him out alive.
And so Roly came back, just as I told you he would. In a few weeks the black spots wore off him, and he was all white again, and as lively and frisky as ever, hiding anything he could find, and barking and wagging his tail like anything.
"Won"t all the boys and girls be surprised when they see our dog back again?" asked Mab.
"I guess they will," agreed Hal. "It is just like a fairy story; isn"t it?"
"Oh, it"s better than a fairy story, for it"s true!" exclaimed Mab.
"If it was a fairy story we would wake up and Roly-Poly wouldn"t be here. Oh! I am so glad!"
Hal and Mab had many more days of skating on the pond with Daddy; Blake. And then, one morning, when they woke up, the ground was deeply covered with white snow.
"No more skating right away!" cried Daddy Blake, "The ice has gone to sleep under white blankets."