“Why not?” he asked, in surprise.
“’Cause if you do, you’ll be stuck, too, and then we’ll both be stuck in this sticky mud, and we can’t get out, and nobody will know we’re here, and nobody can take Trouble home, and——”
“That’s so—I forgot about Trouble,” said Teddy. “And that is pretty sticky mud, isn’t it, Jan?”
“It’s terribly sticky!” answered the little girl. “It’s just like that time when I sat down in the fly paper. I guess you better go and get mother or daddy or Uncle Ben. They can get me out.”
“Wait! Maybe I can do it myself!” said Teddy, after a bit. “If I had a rope I could throw it to you, and you could take hold of it and I could stand up here, where there isn’t any mud, and pull you out.”
“Yes, but you haven’t any rope,” said Janet.
Teddy thought some more.
“No, there isn’t any rope,” he said. “But if I could find a piece of wild grapevine, that would be as good as a rope. Don’t you ’member, when we went to Grandpa’s Cherry Farm, how we swung on a wild grapevine in the woods, just like a swing?”
“I ’member,” Janet answered. “Please go and get me a wild grapevine rope, Teddy, and pull me out. My shoes are all full of mud.”
“Yes, and there’s a lot on your legs, too,” her brother said. “Well, I’ll see if I can find a grapevine. If I can’t, I’ll get daddy or Uncle Ben—they’ll pull you out, anyhow.”