“Yes,” answered Mrs. Bobbsey, as she sipped the hot, comforting coffee the farmer’s wife set before her. “Did anybody ever live there?”
“A queer, solitary sort of fellow—a farm hand,” answered the farmer. “But that was some time ago. It’s too bad you folks didn’t come on just a bit farther and you could have spent the night here.”
“We couldn’t get any farther with a flat tire,” said Mr. Bobbsey. “Besides, from the lonely look of that cabin, it didn’t seem as if there was another house within ten miles.”
“Yes, it is lonesome back there by the cabin,” agreed the farmer. “But that fellow liked it lonesome, he said. Do you want me to hitch up and haul your car here?” he asked.
“Oh, no, thank you,” replied Mr. Bobbsey. “Now that it is daylight and I can see what I’m doing, it will be easy enough to change the tire. Then we can go on to Midvale and thence to Hitchville. This road will take us to Midvale, will it not?”
“It will if you keep on going long enough,” the farmer said. “But you missed the best and shortest way. However, there’s no help for it now. I hope you don’t have any more bad luck.”
“Thanks,” said Mr. Bobbsey.
The twins, as usual, finished their meal before their father and mother were ready to leave the table, and, being excused, they ran out to see and make friends with Major, the dog, who was ready enough to play with them. There were other farm animals, also, to be admired. A little lamb, its mother dead, was being brought up on a baby’s feeding bottle by one of the farm boys. The little “cosset,” as a lamb of this kind is called, was so “dear and sweet” that the children begged their father to buy it for them.
“I guess you’ll find something just as good at Cloverbank,” he said, with a laugh. “Anyhow, we haven’t any room for it in the auto.”
“And I doubt if my Ned would sell it at any price,” said the farmer. “He sets quite a store by that cosset.”