"Our feet are quite large. I'm sure we can wear them," they said.
Father Vedder got the bag down and took out two pairs of skates. They had long curling ends on the runners. The Twins sat down on the floor. Father Vedder tried on the skates.
"They are still pretty large; but you will grow," he told the Twins. "You may have them if you will be very careful and not let them get rusty. By and by we will teach you to skate."
The Twins practiced standing in the skates on the kitchen floor; and, when bedtime came, they took the skates to bed with them.
"O Kit," said Kat, "I never supposed we'd get them so soon. Did you?"
"Well," said Kit, "you see, we're pretty big and very good. That makes a difference."
"It's very nice to be good when people notice it, isn't it?" said Kat.
"Yah," said Kit. "I'm going to be good now right along, all the time; for very soon St. Nicholas will come, and he leaves only a rod in the shoes of bad children. And if you've been bad, you have to tell him about it."
"Oh! Oh!" said Kat. "I'm going to be good all the time too. I'm going to be good until after the feast of St. Nicholas, anyway."
Not many days after Kit and Kat got their skates, there came a cold, cold wind. It blew over the fields and over the canals all day and all night long; and in the morning, when the Twins looked out, the canal was one shining roadway of ice.