“Lose Cherry Farm!” cried Daddy Martin, as he looked over at his wife in surprise.
“Yes, there is bad news,” she said. “But maybe it will turn out all right in the end, as Nora would say. I’ll tell you after supper. There’s the bell.”
And while the family is at table I will tell you just a little about them, so you will feel that you have been properly introduced. I did not have time to do it before, on account of so much happening—Trouble getting stuck in the mud and all that.
I have told you why Ted and Jan were called Curlytops, so you know that much about them, anyhow. And you have really met all the family, from daddy and mother, down to Trouble and Nora, with Ted and Jan coming in between, you might say.
The Martins lived in the town of Cresco in an Eastern State, and Mr. Martin owned a store. He also owned a nice home just outside the place.
Grandpa Martin, who was Daddy Martin’s father, lived with Grandma Martin on Cherry Farm. This was near the country village of Elmburg, close to Clover Lake. And, while I am about it, I may as well tell you that the children had an Uncle Frank Barton, who owned a large cattle ranch near Rockville, Montana. Then there was Aunt Josephine Miller, a maiden lady who lived in Clayton and had a summer place at Mt. Hope near Ruby Lake. She was a sister of Mrs. Martin’s. The children always called her Aunt Jo.
Theodore, Teddy or Ted Martin, any of which names he answered to, was aged seven and his sister was six years old. The children’s birth anniversaries came on the same day, but they had been born a year apart. I have told you of their curly hair, and I can’t do more than add that never were such ringlets, twists, whorls, waves and whatever else goes to make up curly hair, seen on children before. Once Grandma Martin’s thimble was lost and—well, I’ll tell you about that when we get to it. At any rate “Curlytops” was the best name in the world for Jan and Ted, just as Trouble was for Baby William.
I call him a baby, though really he was getting to be quite a good-sized boy. He was “half-past two years growing on three,” as Jan always said whenever anyone asked his age, and he was bright and quick.
“Well, now let’s hear about the trouble,” said Daddy Martin, as, having finished his supper, he pushed back his chair from the table, and took his little boy up in his lap.
“I gived posy-tree to bossy-cow, an’ bossy sneezed an’ I got wet-muddy,” said William, reaching up to kiss his father.