“That’s because you have that great rope wrapped around it,” said Polly. “It hits the sides of the door frame. You’ll have to take it off and push the table through.”
Grumbling, the boys set to work to untie the rope. This was not easy, for Ward and Artie had put their best efforts into those knots, and they were fearful and wonderful to behold. Then, too, in the pushing and shoving exerted by the movers, the rope had twisted, so that the knots were hard to get at. Artie finally succeeded in unloosening one and Fred unfastened the other, and they pulled the rope out.
“Now I’ll push and you two pull,” said Fred, who would not allow the girls to help.
The table stuck again. Fred gave a violent shove. Artie and Ward felt a sharp prod in their ribs, and both went over backward.
“Laugh if you want to,” said the indignant Artie, rising and looking reproachfully at the girls, who stood behind Fred. “I don’t see anything funny myself. It’s a wonder that we don’t go through this fool floor.”
The floor of the loft was not tight, and in many places the cracks were wide enough for a very thin person’s foot. Some parts of the floor were merely of poles laid closely together to hold the hay. When Ward had been a very little boy, he had once fallen between these poles and landed on a pile of hay on the main floor, a much frightened lad.
“We didn’t mean to laugh,” apologized Polly. “But you looked so funny! You went down together just like two wooden soldiers.”
With much pushing and pulling and some scolding from Fred, the table was dragged to the edge of the loft and the rope again tied around it, ready to be lowered.
“What do we tie it to?” asked Fred suddenly. “Haven’t got the confidence in your gun that you have, Artie.”
Artie grinned. He had fallen over a bluff in camp the past summer, and a rope tied to his old gun stuck in the ground had proved to be his ladder to safety. But even Artie could not trust his gun to stand the weight of the table.