"What"ll we sell?" asked Hal.
"Oh, we can sell other stones--big ones--for bread, and sand for sugar and leaves for cookies and things like that," Janet proposed.
"I wish we had something real to eat, and then we could sell that and it would be some good," remarked Ted. "I"m going to ask Nora."
"Oh, that"ll be fun!" cried Jan. "Come on, Hal. We"ll get the store ready and Ted can go in and ask Nora for some real cookies and maybe a piece of cake."
Nora, good-natured as she always was, gave Ted a nice lot of broken cookies, some crackers and some lumps of sugar so the children could play store and really eat the things they sold. Hal gathered some mussel sh.e.l.ls and colored stones on the sh.o.r.e of the lake, and these were money.
The store counter was made by putting a board across two boxes and they took turns being the storekeeper. Trouble wanted to play, too. But he only wanted to buy bits of mola.s.ses cookies, and he ate the pieces as fast as he got them, without pretending to go out of the store to take them home.
"Me buy more tookie!" he would say, swallowing the last crumb and hurrying up to the board counter with another "penny," which was a sh.e.l.l or a stone.
"You mustn"t eat them up so fast, Trouble," said Janet. "Else we won"t have any left to play store with."
"Oh, well, we can get more from Nora," said Ted. "And the cookies taste awful good."
They played store until there were no more good things left to eat and Nora would not hand out any others from her boxes and pans in the kitchen tent. Then the Curlytops and Hal got in the rowboat and paddled about in the shallow cove.
Trouble did not go with them, his mother saying he must have a little sleep so he would not be so cross in the afternoon. And when Jan, her brother and Hal came up from the lake they found the little fellow making what he called a "playhouse."
"Oh, what funny stones Trouble has!" cried Ted as he saw them. "They"re blue."
"They"re pretty," decided Janet. "Where"d you get them, Trouble?"
"Over dere," and he pointed to a spot some distance from the camp.
"He found them himself and brought them here in his ap.r.o.n," said Mrs.
Martin. "He"s been piling them up into what I called a castle, but he says it"s a playhouse. He"s been very good playing with the blue stones."
"Let"s get some too, and see who can build the biggest castle!" cried Janet. "Show us where you got them, Trouble."
But when Baby William toddled to the place where he had picked up the blue stones there were no more. He had gathered them all, it seemed, and now would not let his brother or sister take any from his pile.
However they found other stones which did as well, though they were not blue in color, and soon the Curlytops and Hal, as well as Trouble, were making a little house of stones.
"This is more fun than playing store!" cried Janet, as she made a little round tower as part of her castle.
"Are you making a palace for Princess Blue Eyes, Hal?" asked Ted.
"Yes," he answered, for his stone castle was rather a large one. "But I can"t be sure she"ll like it. She doesn"t want to stay in one place very long. She"s like a firefly--always dancing about."
And so they pretended and played, having a very good time, while Mother Martin watched them and smiled. The children were having great fun camping with grandpa.
The castles finished--Trouble"s being the prettiest because of the blue stones, though not as large or fancy as the others--the Curlytops, Hal and Baby William went on a little picnic in the woods that afternoon, taking Nicknack with them. Or rather, the goat took them, for he pulled them in the cart along the forest path.
When Jan, Hal and Ted were eating breakfast the next morning they heard a cry from Trouble, who had toddled out of the tent as soon as he had finished his meal.
"Oh, what has happened to him now?" exclaimed Mother Martin. "Run and see, Jan, dear, that"s a good girl!"
Janet found her little brother at the place where they had made the castles the night before. Trouble"s eyes were filled with tears.
"My p"ayhouse all gone!" he cried. "Trouble"s house all goned away!"
It was true. Not a trace of his playhouse was left! In the night someone or something had taken the blue stones away.
CHAPTER XVIII
IN THE CAVE
Trouble felt very bad about his playhouse of blue stones which had been taken away. He was only a little fellow, and when he had gone to so much work, building up what looked like a fairy castle, he surely thought he would find it where he left it at night to have it to play with the next morning. But it was gone.
"All goned," sobbed Trouble.
"Isn"t it funny, though?" said Teddy. "Mine is all right, and so is yours, Jan, and Hal"s, too. They just spoiled Trouble"s."
"Maybe it was Nicknack," suggested Jan. "He might have got loose in the night and knocked it down. But he didn"t mean to I guess, for he"s a good goat."
"It couldn"t have been Nicknack," declared Hal.
"Why not?" asked Ted. "Didn"t he fall down into the big hole when Trouble led him to it?"
"Yes, but Nicknack is there in his stable. He isn"t loose at all, and he"d have to be loose to come here and knock over Trouble"s playhouse.
The goat is tied fast just where he was last night."
So Nicknack was; and Grandpa Martin, who was the first one up in the camp that morning, said the goat was lying quietly down in his stable when he went to give him a drink of water. So it couldn"t have been Nicknack.
"Anyhow, Trouble"s blue-stone castle wasn"t just knocked down," went on Hal, "it"s gone--every stone is gone. Somebody took "em!"
Jan and Ted noticed this for the first time. When Trouble had called out that his playhouse was gone they had thought he meant it was just knocked over. But, instead, it was gone completely. Not a blue stone was left.
And, strangely enough, none of the other three castles was touched. Hal had built quite a large one, but not a stone had been taken from it.
"Where my p"ayhouse?" asked Trouble, looking all about. "I want my p"ayhouse."
"We"ll find it for you," promised Jan, though she did not know how she was going to do it. Perhaps Hal could think of a way. Hal was older than Jan and Ted.
"What"s the matter, Curlytops?" asked Mother Martin as she came out of the tent. "Has anything happened? Why is Trouble crying? Did he get hurt?"
"No, but someone took away his nice blue stone castle," explained Jan, and she and the others took turns telling what had happened.
"It is queer," said Grandpa Martin, when he came up and heard what had taken place. "I wonder if any of those----"
Then he stopped talking and looked at the children"s mother in a queer way. She nodded her head, glanced down at the Curlytops and Hal, and put her finger across her lips as your teacher does in school when she wants someone to stop whispering.