“We’ll have to get a pitchfork and turn over all the hay,” Bobby decided. “That’s the only way to find the box: it’s lost in all this hay.”
He was willing to go and get the pitchfork, but he was gone several minutes. When he came back, Jud was with him.
“Pitchforks and Twaddles won’t mix,” declared Jud firmly. “We’ll have to manage some other way. Show me where you hid the box, Meg.”
Meg showed him, as nearly as she could remember. Jud knelt down and felt under the hay, while the children stared at him as though they expected him to work some kind of magic.
“I think I can find it,” he announced. “You 171 all sit down and close your eyes tightly and don’t open them till I give the word.”
So they sat down on the floor and Dot put her head in Meg’s lap, for it was hard for her to keep her eyes closed. She always wanted to see what was going on.
Meg counted to ninety-eight before she heard Jud cry, “All right!”
The four little Blossoms opened their eyes and there stood Jud, the lunch box in his hand. He was smiling.
“How did you find it?” asked Meg. “Was it under the hay?”
“On top,” said Jud mysteriously. “You see, Meg, the box fell through the slats and landed on top of a ration of hay in one of the stalls. All I had to do was to go downstairs and get it.”