This the children did, but were quickly out at the barn again.
Wearing their old clothes, so that a little dirt would not hurt, and having promised not to let Trouble stray away this time, Jan and Ted started to build the goat wagon. In the barn were many odds and ends of boards that Ted felt sure would be just what he wanted. He knew how to hammer, nail and saw, for his father had given him a chest of tools one Christmas. Jan, too, could nail two boards together, even if some of the nails did go in crooked.
Ted found part of an old little express wagon that he had played with a year or two before while at Cherry Farm. Only two wheels were left, but one from a broken wheelbarrow made another for the goat cart, and for a fourth wheel he found an iron one that had been on a churn.
The wheels were of three different sizes, but Ted said he didn’t think that would matter any.
“It’ll be all the more fun,” declared Jan. “It’ll be such a funny, wiggily motion when we ride that it’ll be like sailing in a boat on dry land.”
“We’ll ride out first and see how fast the cherries are getting ripe,” proposed Ted, as he hammered away at the goat wagon.
“And when they get ripe and are ready to pick, we’ll help grandpa cart ’em in and sell ’em. Then maybe he’ll have lots of money and won’t have to lose the farm,” said Jan.
“Do you think he will lose it?” asked her brother anxiously.
“I don’t know. But I know there’s some kind of trouble, and grandpa and grandma are worried. I heard them talking with mother and daddy quite late last night. There’s some trouble about Cherry Farm.”
“Yes, here I is. I hasn’t runned away!” called Baby William.