“I’ll take the whole family over in my car,” Mr. Bobbsey said.
“And it will give me a chance to do a little shopping at the Hitchville stores,” Mrs. Bobbsey said. “I need some things for the children.”
So the trip was planned for the following day, by which time many peaches would be picked by the orchard workers. After a while the Bobbsey twins became tired of “helping,” as they called it, and they had eaten all the peaches that were good for them, so they turned to look for something new to amuse them.
“Why don’t you go up in the barn and watch them sorting the peaches?” suggested their mother. “That will be fun.”
“Oh, let’s!” exclaimed Flossie. “And we can roll on the hay.”
But just then Bert saw a small cart drawn by an old and slow-going horse being driven into the orchard by Zeek. Bert at once had an idea.
“What’s that cart for, Mr. Watson?” the boy asked.
“We use that to cart the soft peaches in, as it doesn’t do much harm if they get shaken up and bruised a bit more,” the farmer answered. “We have to be more careful with the sound fruit, and I send that up to the barn on my small auto truck. But we don’t much care what happens to the soft peaches.”
“Do you think—now—maybe—if I was careful—I could drive the cart back to the barn?” asked Bert eagerly. “I’d love to drive the horse, and I know how, for I did it once when we were at Meadow Brook. Could I, please, Mr. Watson?”
“There won’t be any danger driving this horse,” chuckled Zeek, as he brought the animal to a stop near the box of soft peaches into which Freddie had toppled. “He’ll stand without hitching any minute of the day or night.”