“You look in the glass and see what they’re staring at,” Maida said slyly. Rosie went to the mirror.
“I don’t see anything the matter.”
“It’s because you look so pretty, goose!” Maida exclaimed.
Rosie always blushed and looked ashamed if anybody alluded to her prettiness. Now she leaped to Maida’s side and pretended to beat her.
“Stop that!” a voice called. Startled, the little girls looked up. Billy stood in the doorway. “I’ve come over to make a snow-house,” he explained.
“Oh, Billy, what things you do think of!” Maida exclaimed. “Wait till I get Arthur and Dicky!”
“Couldn’t get many more in here, could we?” Billy commented when the five had assembled in the “child’s size” yard. “I don’t know that we could stow away another shovel. Now, first of all, you’re to pile all the snow in the yard into that corner.”
Everybody went to work. But Billy and Arthur moved so quickly with their big shovels that Maida and Rosie and Dicky did nothing but hop about them. Almost before they realized it, the snow-pile reached to the top of the fence.
“Pack it down hard,” Billy commanded, “as hard as you can make it.”
Everybody scrambled to obey. For a few moments the sound of shovels beating on the snow drowned their talk.