“I locked him in—’cause he pulled Flossie’s hair!” declared Freddie, and Freddie was looked upon as quite a hero by the boys and girls in his room.
By standing up, Flossie, Freddie and the others in their class could see the tool shed. And the children stood up and looked out as Miss Snell and the principal went to release the locked-up boy. He came out crying, and seemed frightened. But he soon quieted down, and promised never again to pull Flossie’s hair, while Freddie was made to promise never again to lock anyone in the tool shed.
“Tell your teacher, or tell me, when anyone plagues your sister, Freddie,” the principal said.
“Yes’m—I mean yes, sir,” Freddie answered.
Neither he nor Flossie had any more trouble with the “bad” boy, about whose teasing they had talked on their way to school that morning. I think, after being locked up, that Nick was afraid of Freddie. At any rate, Flossie’s hair was not again pulled.
“Our smaller twins are growing up,” said Mr. Bobbsey to his wife at home that night, when the story of what had happened in school had been told at the supper table.
“Yes,” agreed Mrs. Bobbsey. “Our little ‘fireman’ and our ‘fat fairy’ will soon be almost as big as Bert and Nan.” Fireman and fairy were the pet names for the smaller Bobbsey twins. But they were getting almost too old for pet names now.
The weeks passed, and the weather grew colder, though, as yet, no snow had appeared. Freddie and Flossie, who had gotten out their sleds soon after coming home from the West, looked at the sky anxiously each day.
“Do you think it will ever snow?” asked Flossie of her mother. “I want to go coasting.”
“So do I, and skating, too,” Freddie added.