"Catch me!" cried Van. Then he swung the key tauntingly over toward Joel. "Hoh, don't you wish you may get it, Joe Pepper, don't you, now?"
For answer Joel made a blind rush at him, and there they were, flying around and around in Mother Fisher's room, Van now having all he could do to look out for himself and keep away from Joel's sturdy fists, without the care of keys. So he flung his captured prize as far as he could over into the opposite corner. And hearing it land somewhere, Joel released him, and ran blindly over where it appeared to strike. And as Van followed quickly, there really didn't seem to be any chance of recovering it, at least in peace, with another on its trail who had a sharp pair of eyes in his head.
Joel turned suddenly, and before Van had the least idea what he was about, he was seized and hustled off to Mother Fisher's closet, bundled in, the door slammed to, the key turned in the lock, and there he was.
"Now," said Joel, drawing the first long breath, "I'll get that key easy enough," and he rushed over to begin operations.
"Let me out!" screamed Van, in muffled accents, and banging on the closet door.
"Don't you wish you may?" Joel, pawing and prowling frantically along the floor, found time to hurl him this over his shoulder. Then he rubbed his smarting eyes and set to work with fresh vigor, not paying any further attention to Van's entreaties. At last, when it really seemed as if that key had been possessed of little fairy legs and run off, Joel pushed aside Mother Fisher's big workstand, a thing he had done at least three times before, and there it was shining up at him where it had hidden behind one of the legs!
"I've got you now," cried Joel, jubilantly pouncing on it. And this time, not daring to trust it in his hands, he thrust it deep within his pocket, and with never a thought of Van, who had stopped his cries to listen to Joel, he tore out of the room, and down the stairs, three at a time.
"Has any one seen Mamsie?" he cried of the first person he met, one of the under servants passing through the back hall.
"Why, she's gone out with Mrs. Whitney," said the maid.
"Bother!" exploded Joel, dancing impatiently from one foot to the other.