By this time the ice-boat was more than two miles down the lake, for the wind was blowing hard and the _Bird_ sailed swiftly. The children could not see their father, mother, Bert or Nan now. They would soon be at the end of the lake, and before them Flossie and Freddie could see big drifts of snow near the edge of the frozen lake and between it and the forest beyond.
"I--I guess we"d better stop pretty soon," faltered Freddie. "If we don"t we"ll run ash.o.r.e."
With all his strength, he pulled on another rope, at the same time shoving the tiller over as far from him as it would go. The result was a surprise to him and to Flossie. The ice-boat turned quickly, and then, like a frightened horse, it darted toward sh.o.r.e.
Over the ice it skimmed. Then it turned up on one side, buried the bow, or front part, deep in a big snow drift and with another motion sent Flossie and Freddie, together with the robes and blankets, flying into a pile of soft snow. Down came the Bobbsey twins with a soft thud, not being in the least hurt.
For a moment neither of the children spoke. Then Flossie, brushing the snow from her face, looked around, and seeing Freddie near her, doing the same thing, she asked:
"What--what happened?"
"I guess I steered right up on sh.o.r.e instead of away from it," replied Freddie. "I must have turned the handle the wrong way. Are you hurt, Flossie?"
"Nope. Are you?"
"Nope. I hope the ice-boat isn"t broken. Bert wouldn"t like that. Let"s go and look."
As the children floundered out of the snow, which had been left from a storm that had swept over the country before the lake had frozen, they heard a voice calling to them. Looking in the direction of the woods, they saw coming toward them an old man, wearing a big, ragged overcoat, a fur cap and mittens, while over his shoulder was an axe.
"Oh! oh!" said Flossie in a low voice. "Who--who"s that, Freddie?"
"Oh, I know him. That"s Uncle Jack, the woodchopper. He"ll help us get the boat on the ice again, and I can sail it back home."
"Nope!" cried Flossie, shaking her flaxen curly head. "I"m never going to ride in an ice-boat with you any more. Never! You go too fast, and stop too quick. I"m going to _walk_ home!"
"What"s the matter, children?" asked Uncle Jack, and he came plowing his way through the snow. "Ah, your ice-boat is upset, I see! Well, you two are pretty small potatoes to be out sailing alone. "Most froze, too, I"ll warrant ye! Come on to my cabin. It"s warm there, whatever else it is!"
and he helped Flossie and Freddie from the snowdrift.
"Thank you," said Flossie. "But we"re not potatoes, Uncle Jack."
"Well, little peaches, then. Anyhow, your cheeks look like red apples,"
said the man, laughing.
CHAPTER V
GLORIOUS NEWS
"How did it all happen?" asked Uncle Jack, a little later, as he led Flossie and Freddie along a path through the snow to his cabin in the woods. "Why are you two out ice-boating alone?"
"The rest of "em spilled out," answered Freddie; "and I upset Flossie and me when I pulled on the wrong rope. But we"re not hurt a bit. It was fun.
Wasn"t it, Flossie?"
"Ye--yes, I--I guess so."
"Hum! You"re part of the Bobbsey twins, aren"t you?" asked the old woodchopper, who made a living by cutting firewood and kindling wood in the forest, where he lived by himself in a lonely cabin all the year around.
"Yes, we"re the littlest ones," answered Flossie. "Bert and Nan are bigger, but they fell off, too."
"So falling from an ice-boat doesn"t go by sizes," laughed the old man.
Then, taking turns, Flossie and Freddie told the story of the runaway ice-boat, and of having left the rest of their family several miles away on the ice.
"We tried to stop, but we couldn"t," said Flossie. "And, oh, dear! I wonder where Daddy and Mother are now." Flossie spoke as though it would not take much to make her cry.
"Don"t worry," said Uncle Jack, as every one around Lakeport called him.
"If your father and mother don"t come for you I"ll take you home."
"It--it"s a long way to walk," said Freddie with a sigh. "And I guess Flossie is hungry. Aren"t you?" he asked of his little sister.
"Well--a little," admitted the blue-eyed girl twin.
"How about you, little man?" asked Uncle Jack.
"I--I guess I am, too," Freddie admitted. "Have you got anything to eat?"
"Well, maybe we can find something in my cabin," said the old man. He had left his axe sticking in a tree near where the ice-boat had run into the snow bank, and was leading the children along by either hand. Flossie and Freddie looked up into his kindly, wrinkled face, the cheeks glowing red like two rosy apples, and they knew they would be well taken care of.
Uncle Jack was a fine, honest man, and he was always kind to children, who, often in the Summer, would gather flowers near his lonely log cabin.
In a little while Flossie and Freddie were seated in front of a stove, in which crackled a hot fire, eating bread and milk, which was the best the woodchopper could offer them. But they were so hungry that, as Freddie said afterward, it tasted better than chicken and ice-cream.
"Haven"t you got any little girl?" asked Flossie after a while.
"No, I haven"t a chick or a child, I"m sorry to say."
"My father would give you a chicken if you wanted it," said Freddie. "And some days _we_ could come and stay with you."
"That last part would be all right," said the old man with a smile; "but I haven"t any place to keep a chicken. It would get lonesome, I"m afraid, while I"m off in the forest chopping wood. But I thank you just the same."
"Didn"t you ever have any children?" asked Flossie, taking a second gla.s.s of milk which the kindly old man gave her.
"Never a one. Though when I was a boy I lived in a place where there were two children, I think. But it"s all kind of hazy."
"Where was that?" asked Freddie, brushing up the last of the bread crumbs from his plate.
"I don"t remember much about my folks. Most of my life has been spent working on farmers" land, until I got so old I could not plow or cut hay.
Then the man who owns this forest said I might come here and chop firewood, and I did. I built this cabin myself, and I"ve lived all alone in it for many years."
This was so, for Jack had been in the woods from the time when Bert and Nan were babies, so Flossie and Freddie had often heard their older brother and sister say.
"Haven"t you any folks?" asked Freddie.
"Well, I seem to remember that once I had a brother and a sister. But I lost track of them, and they lost me, I guess; so where they are now, if they"re anywhere, I don"t know. I"m all alone, I guess," and the woodchopper"s face was sad.
"Never mind! We"ll come to see you," said Flossie, with a smile. "But now maybe we"d better start home, Freddie. Papa and Mamma may be worried about us."