“Yes, we can stay here. But Mr. Portnay isn’t here. I can’t get the albums from him.”
“Not here? Then, where is he?” asked Mrs. Martin.
“He stopped here, but has gone on,” her husband answered. “He has gone on to Cub Mountain, and, I suppose, has the box of albums in his car with him. Perhaps he doesn’t know about them, and they may get lost. I wish he had stayed here until I came!”
CHAPTER IX
AT THE FARM
While the young Curlytops did not think much about the missing albums, they could see that their father was worried because he had not got them back from Mr. Portnay. And anything that worried their father and mother also worried Ted and Janet.
For they could see that Mr. Martin was bothered by the failure to meet the moving picture actor and get back from him the box his man had taken by mistake, thinking it contained false hair, false beards and make-up paint.
“What are you going to do?” Mrs. Martin asked her husband.
“I hardly know,” was his answer.
“Can’t you telephone or telegraph on ahead to Cub Mountain and ask him to wait for us, or to leave the box of albums where we can get it when we arrive there to-morrow?” Mrs. Martin asked.
“I might do that if I knew where to send a telegram or where to telephone to Mr. Portnay,” answered her husband. “That’s what I should have done here—sent a telegram to that actor at this hotel. He would have received it and have left the box here for me. But I didn’t think of that; so he has gone on, taking my box with him. Very likely, he doesn’t even know he has it; he is so busy making this picture.”