“I did sneeze!” insisted Flossie.
“You did not!” asserted Freddie. “You——”
“Hush! Hush!” cautioned Bert. “You’ll spoil everything!”
But Freddie was not to be shut off in that way. He came to a stop in the hall, along which the two pairs of twins were tiptoeing their way through the house, and in the half-darkness, for the light was turned low, he pointed his fat, chubby forefinger at Flossie, holding, the while, his cigar box under his other arm.
“She did not sneeze—not a reg’lar, full, fair sneeze!” he declared. “She put her hand over her mouth an’ she choked, an’ she made more noise ’n if she had sneezed. Guess I know what she done!”
“Did, dear! Did!” corrected Nan. “You must use right words now that you are in regular classes at school and are out of the kindergarten. Did—not done.”
“Well, Flossie did snort and she did not done sneeze,” went on the fat little “fireman,” as his father sometimes called him.
“I—I could ’a’ sneezed if I’d wanted to,” said Flossie. “Only I’ve an awful loud sneeze, I have. It’s louder’n yours, Freddie Bobbsey.”
“’Tis not!” declared Freddie. “You wait till I tickle my nose, an’ I’ll sneeze an’ I’ll show you! I’ll show you who can sneeze loudest!”
“No, you will not!” said big brother Bert kindly, but firmly. “You two youngsters must keep quieter, or we can’t do what we’re going to do. Nan and I will take you back upstairs and mother will make you go to bed! There!”