The Story of a Lamb on Wheels

CHAPTER VII CHAPTER VII THE LAMB CARRIED AWAY Mirabell and Arnold were so surprised for a moment at what had happened that they could only stand, looking at the hole in the sidewalk down which the Lamb on Wheels had fallen. Carlo, the fuzzy little dog, seemed to know he had done something wrong in getting tangled in the string, breaking it off, and so sending the Lamb wheeling along until she slid into the coal hole. And the dog gave a howl and ran back toward the house, having finally managed to get his legs loose from the cord. "Bow-wow!" barked Carlo, as he ran. Perhaps he feared that he, too, might slip down that black, dark hole which led into the coal bin of Dorothy's house. Then as Mirabell and Arnold stood, looking with wide-opened eyes at the place where they had last seen the Lamb, the man on the wagon threw another shovelful of coal down the hole. "Wait a minute! Stop! Oh, please stop!" begged Mirabell. "Whut's dat? Whut's de mattah?" asked the coal-wagon driver. He was a colored man, and that was the very best shade for him, I think. No matter how much coal dust got on his face and hands it never showed. "Her little Lamb fell down the coal hole," explained Arnold. "Carlo got tangled in the string, it broke and she fell down the hole. Don't throw any more coal on her until we get her out." "Does you-all mean dat Carlo fell down de hole?" asked the colored coal-wagon driver. "No, Carlo is a dog," explained Mirabell. "He got tangled up in my Lamb's string, and she fell down the hole. I haven't named my Lamb yet. She's on wheels." "On wheels?" cried the man. "A Lamb on Wheels? Well, I 'clar to goodness dat's de fustest time I ebber done heah ob a t'ing laik dat!" "Oh, she isn't a real, live lamb," explained Mirabell. "She's a toy, woolly one from the store, and my Uncle Tim, who's a sailor, gave her to me." "Well now, honey, I suah is sorry to heah dat!" said the colored man. "Your toy Lamb down de coal hole! Dat is too bad!" "Can we get her out?" asked Arnold. "I'll crawl down the hole and get the Lamb if you won't throw any more coal." "Oh, I won't frow any mo' coal—not fo' a while—not when I knows whut de trouble is," said the kind-hearted driver. "But I doan believe, mah li'l man, dat you'd better go down de coal hole." At that moment the door of Dorothy's house opened, and her mother came out on the porch. "What is it, Mirabell?" she asked. "What has happened?" She saw the children from next door talking to the coal driver, and she wondered at it. "Oh, my Lamb is down the coal hole!" said Mirabell. "Oh, that's too bad!" exclaimed Dorothy's mother. "I saw you holding a toy Lamb up to the window, before Dorothy was taken ill. How did your toy get down the coal hole?" Mirabell and Arnold told by turns, and the driver said: "I suah is sorry, lady. But it w'an't mahfaulta-tall!" "I know it wasn't," said Dorothy's mother. "But do you think you could get the little girl's Lamb's back?" "Well, dat coal hole isn't so very big," was the answer, as the driver scratched his kinky head. "But I might squeeze mahse'f down in it." "Oh, I think a better way would be to go down in our cellar, crawl over the bin, and get the Lamb that way," Dorothy's mother said. "Yes-sum, I could do it dat way!" the colored man said. "I'se been down in yo' cellar befo'. I'll get de Lamb on Wheels." Dorothy's mother waited on the front porch, and Mirabell and Arnold waited on the sidewalk near the coal hole. A little while after the colored man had gone in the side entrance, through the cellar and into the coal bin, the two children heard him calling, as if from the ground beneath them. "I got de Lamb!" said the driver, in a voice that sounded far-off and rumbly. "Watch out, now! I'se gwine to frow it up de hole!" "All right!" said Arnold. "I'll catch her!" "No, don't throw my Lamb!" objected Mirabell. "She might fall on the sidewalk and break." "All right—den I'll HAND her up out ob de hole," called the colored man, who was now in the partly filled bin under the sidewalk. "Watch out fo' her!" Mirabell and Arnold could hear him walking around on the coal under the sidewalk. In another half minute a black hand was thrust up through the hole, and in the hand was a white, woolly Lamb on Wheels. Wait a minute! Did I say white? Well, I meant to have said a BLACK Lamb. For Mirabell's white, clean Lamb on Wheels was now covered with black coal dust. "Oh, that isn't my Lamb on Wheels at all!" cried Mirabell, and there were real tears in her eyes as her brother took the coal-dust covered toy from the colored man's hand. "That isn't my Lamb at all!" "Oh, yes, it must be, Mirabell," said Dorothy's mother. "No other Lamb has fallen down the coal hole." "But my Lamb was WHITE, and this one is BLACK," sobbed the little girl. "Well, bring her in here and we'll wash her nice and clean and white again," said Dorothy's mother. "Bring your Lamb in, Mirabell. Dorothy is better now, though she cannot be out yet, and she will be glad to see you. Come in and I'll wash your Lamb!" "And I certainly do need a bath!" thought the Lamb to herself, when she heard this talk. She could look down at her legs and see how black they were. "Oh, what a terrible adventure it is to fall into a coal hole! I wonder what will happen next!" And she soon found out. For when the colored man had come out of the cellar, and was again shoveling the coal down the hole, Mirabell and Arnold took the black Lamb on Wheels into Dorothy's house. Dorothy and her brother Dick were glad to see the children from next door. "Now to give Mirabell's Lamb a bath," said Dorothy's mother. "I wonder if I'll be put in the bathtub, as the Wooden Lion was," thought the Lamb. And she was, though she was not dipped all the way in, for fear of spoiling the wooden, wheeled platform on which she stood. With a nail brush and some soap and water, Dorothy's mother scrubbed the coal dust out of the Lamb's wool. "There, she is nice and clean again," said Dorothy's mother, as she held the Lamb on Wheels up for the four children to see. "But she is all wet!" cried Mirabell. "I'll set her down by the warm stove in the kitchen, and she will soon dry," said the mother of Dick and Dorothy. "And I'll put my Sawdust Doll down there with the Lamb so she won't be lonesome," said Dorothy. And then the four children played games in the sitting room, while waiting for the Lamb to dry. And as Mary, the cook, was not in the kitchen just then, the Lamb and the Sawdust Doll were left alone together for a time. "Oh, my dear, how glad I am to see you again!" exclaimed the Sawdust Doll when they were alone. "But, tell me! what happened? You are soaking wet!" "Yes, it's very terrible!" bleated the Lamb. "I fell down a coal hole and had a bath!" Then she told her different adventures, and the Sawdust Doll told hers, so the two toys had a nice time together. Soon the warm fire made the Lamb nice and dry and fluffy again. And she was as clean as when jolly Uncle Tim, the sailor, had bought her in the store. "How is the White Booking Horse?" asked the Lamb of the Doll, when they had finished telling each other their adventures. "Oh, he's just fine!" exclaimed the Sawdust Doll. "Did you hear about his broken leg, how he went to the Toy Hospital, and how he scared away some burglars by kicking one downstairs?" "No, I never heard all that news," said the Lamb. "Please tell me," and the Sawdust Doll did. Then the two toys had to stop talking together as Mirabell, Arnold, Dorothy and Dick came into the kitchen. "Oh, now my Lamb is all nice again!" cried Mirabell, when she saw her toy. "Oh, I am so glad." "So am I," said Dorothy. For many days Mirabell had jolly good times with her Lamb on Wheels. Sometimes the Lamb was taken to Dorothy's house, and then there was a chance for the woolly toy to talk to the Sawdust Doll and the White Rocking Horse. And one day the Lamb had another strange adventure. Mirabell had been out in the street near Dorothy's house drawing her Lamb up and down by means of a string. And Mirabell kept watch to see that Carlo did not run along and get tangled in the string. The little girl also made sure that no sidewalk coal holes were open. She did not want the Lamb to fall into another one. "Oh, Mirabell, come over here a minute!" called Dorothy to her friend. "Mother got me a new trunk for my Sawdust Doll's things." "Oh, I want to see it!" cried Mirabell, and she was in such a hurry that she let go of the string by which she had been by herself on the sidewalk for a little way, and finally rolled out toward the gutter. For once in her life Mirabell forgot all about her toy, pulling her Lamb. The Lamb rolled along. [Illustration: Lamb On Wheels Tells Sawdust Doll of Her Troubles] And while Mirabell was looking at the new trunk for the Sawdust Doll's clothes, a big dog came running along the street. He saw the white, woolly Lamb near the curbstone. "Oh, ho! Maybe that is good to eat!" thought the dog. And before the Lamb on Wheels could say a word, that dog just picked her up in his mouth and carried her away as a mother cat carries her little ones. Yes, the big dog carried away the Lamb on Wheels! CHAPTER VIII SAILING DOWN THE BROOK The Lamb on Wheels was so frightened when the dog took her up in his mouth that she did not know what to do. If she could, she would have rolled away as fast as a toy railroad train, such a train as Arnold and Dick played with. But the dog had the Lamb in his mouth before she knew what was happening. Besides, across the street was a man, and, as he happened to be looking at the Lamb, of course she dared not make believe come to life and trundle along as she sometimes did in the toy store. It was against the rules, you know, for any of the toys to do anything by themselves when any human eyes saw them. And so the Lamb had to let herself be carried away by the dog. Now you might think that when the man saw the dog run away with the Lamb on Wheels in his mouth the man would have stopped the dog. But the man was thinking of something else. He was looking for a certain house, and he had forgotten the number, and he was thinking so much about that, and other things, that he never gave the Lamb a second thought. He did see the dog take her away, but maybe he imagined it was only some game the children were playing with the toy and the dog, for Mirabell and Dorothy were there on the street, in plain sight. But as the two little girls were just then thinking of the new trunk for the Sawdust Doll, neither of them thought of the Lamb, and they did not see the dog take her. "Oh, what a nice trunk!" said Mirabell to Dorothy. "I'm glad you like it," said Dorothy. She had her Sawdust Doll in her arms, and, as it happened, the Doll saw the dog running away with the Lamb on Wheels in his mouth. "Oh! Oh! Oh, dear me! That is dreadful!" said the Sawdust Doll to herself. "Oh, the poor Lamb! What will happen to her?" Away ran the dog with the Lamb on Wheels in his mouth down the street, over a low fence, and soon he was in the vacant lots where the weeds grew high. And then, as there were no human eyes in the vacant lots to see her, the Lamb thought it time to do something. She began to wiggle her legs, though she could not get them loose from the platform with wheels on, and she cried out: "Baa! Baa! Baa!" "Hello there! what's the matter?" barked the dog, and it made his nose tickle to have the Lamb, whom he was carrying in his teeth, give that funny Baa! sound in his mouth. "Matter? Matter enough I should say!" exclaimed the Lamb on Wheels. "Why are you carrying me away like this, you very bad dog?" For, being a toy, she could talk animal language as well as her own, and the dog could understand and talk it, too. "Why am I carrying you away?" asked the dog. "Because I am hungry, of course." "But I am not good to eat," bleated the Lamb. "I am mostly made of wood, though my wheels are of iron. Of course I have real wool on outside, but inside I am only stuffed." "Dear me! is that so?" asked the dog, opening his mouth and putting the Lamb down amid a clump of weeds in the vacant lot. "Yes, it's just as true as I'm telling you," went on the Lamb. "I am only a toy, though when no human eyes look at me I can move around and talk, as can all of us toys. But I am not good to eat." "No, I think you're right about that," said the dog, after smelling of the Lamb. For that is how dogs tell whether or not a thing is good to eat—by smelling it. "You looked so natural," went on the dog, "that I thought you were a real little Lamb. That's why I carried you off when that little girl left you and ran away. I'm sorry if I hurt you." "No, you didn't hurt me, but you have carried me a long way from my home," the Lamb said. "I don't know how I am ever going to get back to Mirabell." "Can't you roll along to her on your wheels?" asked the dog. "I haven't time now to carry you back." "Not very well," the Lamb answered. "It is very rough going in this lot, full of weeds and stones. I can easily roll myself along on a smooth floor, in the toy shop or at Mirabell's home. But it is too hard here." "Ill leave you here now," barked the dog, "and when it gets dark I'll come and get you. I'll carry you back to the porch of the house, from in front of which I carried you off. Then you can roll in and get back to Mirabell, as you call her. Shall I do that?" "Well, I suppose that would be a good plan," the Lamb said. "I don't exactly like being carried in your teeth, but there is no help for it." "Then I'll do that," promised the dog. "I'll come back here and get you after dark. You'll be all right here in the tall weeds." "I suppose so," replied the Lamb. "Though I shall be lonesome." "Please forgive me for causing you all this trouble," went on the dog. "I never would have done it if I had known you were a toy. And now I'll run along and come back to-night. I hear a dog friend of mine calling me." Another dog, at the farther end of the lot, was barking, and the Lamb crouched deeper down in the weeds. "Dear me! this surely is an adventure," said the Lamb on Wheels to herself, as she was left alone. "Being taken away in a rag bag, as the Sawdust Doll was, couldn't be any worse than this. And though none of my legs is broken, as was one of the White Rocking Horse's, still I am almost as badly off, for I dare not move. I wonder what will happen to me next!" It was not long before something did happen. As the Lamb stood on her wheels and wooden platform among the weeds, all at once two boys came along. They were looking for some fun. "Oh, look!" cried a big boy. "There's a little white poodle dog over in the weeds!" and he pointed to the Lamb, whose white coat was easily seen amid the green leaves. "Oh, we can have some fun with it!" said the little boy. "Let's call it." So they whistled and called to the white object they thought was a dog, but the Lamb did not move. Of course she couldn't, while the boys were looking at her. "That's funny!" said the big boy. "What do you think is the matter with that dog? It doesn't come to us." "Let's go up and see," said the smaller lad. Together they tramped through the weeds until they were close to the toy. Then the big boy cried out: "Why, it isn't a dog at all! It's a Lamb on Wheels!" "So it is!" said the little boy. "But I know how we can have some fun with it, just the same!" "How?" asked the big boy. "We can play Noah's Ark over in the brook," explained the small boy. "There are some boards over there. I was making a raft of them the other day. We can make another raft now, and we can get on and sail down the brook. And we can take the Lamb on board with us and make believe we're in a Noah's Ark and that there's a flood and all like that! Won't that be fun?" "Yes, I guess it will," said the big boy. "Come on! I'll carry the Lamb." So, picking up the toy and tucking it under his arm, he led the way to the brook, which ran through the vacant lots. It was a nice brook, not too deep, and wide enough to sail boats on. "Now we'll make the raft," said the smaller boy, as they came to a place on the bank of the brook where there were some boards and planks. The big boy set the Lamb down near the water and then the two lads began to make a raft. A raft is like the big, wide, flat boat, without any house or cabin on it. It did not take long to make it. "All aboard!" cried the big boy, when the raft had been finished. "All aboard! Come on!" He picked up the Lamb again, and walked out on the raft. The smaller boy went with his chum. With long poles, cut from a near-by tree, the boys shoved the raft out into the middle of the brook. "Now we're a Noah's Ark!" laughed the small boy, "and we have one animal with us—a woolly Lamb on Wheels!" And down the brook Mirabell's toy went sailing with the two boys on the raft. "This is certainly surprising!" thought the Lamb. "I was bought by a sailor, and here I am making a voyage! I hope I shall not be seasick!" CHAPTER IX ON A LOAD OF WOOD Now while the Lamb on Wheels was being carried away by the dog, and after she had been dropped in the lot, where she was picked up by the boys and put on a Noah's Ark raft—while all this was happening to the toy, Mirabell, the little girl who owned the Lamb, was almost heart-broken. After she had admired the trunk Dorothy had had given to her for the Sawdust Doll, Mirabell ran back to get her pet toy. "Oh, where is my Lamb on Wheels?" cried Mirabell, looking up and down the street. "Where is she?" "Where did you leave her?" asked Dorothy, who had gone back with her friend. "I left the Lamb right here by the fence," answered Mirabell. "She had a string on. I was pulling her along the sidewalk, and when you called me I let go the string and ran. Oh, where is my nice Lamb?" "Maybe Dick took the Lamb," suggested Dorothy to Mirabell, when they had looked up and down the street, in front of and behind the fence, and even in the yard, and had not found the toy. "Dick sometimes takes my things and hides them just for fun," Dorothy said. "Or Arnold, maybe," added Mirabell. Just then Dick and Arnold came out of Mirabell's house, each with a slice of bread and jam, and there was some jam around their mouths, too, showing that they had each taken a bite from their slices of bread. "Oh, Arnold, did you take my Lamb!" cried Mirabell. "Or did you take it, Dick?" asked his sister. "Nope!" answered both boys, speaking at the same time. "But where is she?" asked the little girl over and over again. "Where is my Lamb on Wheels?" "Oh, I know!" suddenly cried Dick. "I thought you said you didn't!" exclaimed his sister. "You said you and Arnold didn't hide her away." "Neither did we," went on Dick. "But I think I know where she is, just the same." "Where?" asked Arnold, as he finished the last of his bread and jam, having given his sister a bite, while Dick gave Dorothy some. "Where is the Lamb on Wheels?" asked Arnold. "Down in our cellar!" went on Dick. "Don't you remember how she rolled down there once, when the man was putting in coal? Maybe she's there again." "Oh, let's look!" cried Mirabell. So the children ran to Dorothy's mother, who said she would have Patrick, the gardener, look down in the coal bin for the lost Lamb on Wheels. But of course the Lamb on Wheels was not in Dorothy's cellar, and Mirabell felt worse than ever. "I guess some one must have come along the street when you weren't looking, Mirabell," said Dorothy's mother, "and carried your Lamb away." "I—I guess so," sobbed Mirabell. "Oh, but I wish I had her back. Uncle Tim gave her to me, and now he is away far out on the ocean! Oh, dear!" and the little girl felt very bad indeed. She did not give up the search, and Dorothy, Dick and Arnold also helped. They looked in the two yards, across the street, and in other places, but the Lamb could not be found. [Illustration: The Boys Leave Lamb on Wheels on the Raft] The reason Mirabell could not find her toy, as you and I know very well, was because the Lamb on Wheels was riding down the brook on a raft with the two boys. At first the Lamb was much frightened when she looked over the edge of the flat boat of planks and boards, and saw water on all sides of her. "I really must be at sea, as that jolly sailor was," thought the Lamb. "I am on a voyage at last! Oh, I hope I shall not be seasick! Oh, how wet the ocean is!" she thought, as some water splashed up near her, when the little boy shoved the raft along with his pole. The Lamb, not knowing any better, thought the brook was the big ocean. But as the raft sailed on down and down and did not upset and as the Lamb grew less frightened and was not made ill, she began to feel better about it. "Perhaps I am more of a sailor than I thought," she said to herself. "I never knew I would be brave enough to go to sea. I wish the Bold Tin Soldier and the Calico Clown could see me now. I'm sure they never had an adventure like this!" So the Lamb on Wheels stood on her wooden platform in the middle of the raft and looked at the water of the brook. Now and then little waves splashed over the edge of the raft, but only a little water got on the toy, and that did not harm her. "Isn't this fun!" cried the little boy who had first thought of playing Noah's Ark with the raft. "It is packs of fun!" agreed the older boy. "Let's make believe we are going on a long voyage." So the raft went on and on down the brook, and the Lamb on Wheels was having a fine ride. "Though I wish some of the toys were here with me," she thought to herself. "I wonder if the Sawdust Doll would get seasick if she were on board here. I don't believe the Bold Tin Soldier would, and the Calico Clown would be trying to think of new jokes and riddles, so I don't believe he would be ill. But I wonder what is going to happen to me? What will be the end of this adventure?" The two boys poled their raft down to a broader part of the brook, where it flowed at the bottom of a garden. At the upper end of the garden was a large house, and not far away was another house. The Lamb on Wheels could see the houses from where she stood on the raft, and she wondered if any little boys or girls lived in them. "Having adventures is all right," thought the Lamb, "but one can have too many of them. I have been on a voyage long enough, I believe. I wish I could get back home to Mirabell." A few minutes after that the big boy cried: "Oh, come on, Jimmie! There's Tom and Harry! We can have a game of ball," and he pointed to some boys who were running around the lots, through which the brook was now flowing. "What shall we do with the Lamb?" asked the small boy. "Leave it here on the raft," answered the older boy. "Maybe we'll want to play Noah's Ark again, and we can find the raft here. Now we'll go and play ball!" They shoved the raft over toward the shore of the brook, and then the two boys jumped off. They left the Lamb behind them. "Dear me! how fast things do happen," said the Lamb, speaking out loud to herself, as there was no one near just then. "A little while ago Mirabell was pulling me along the sidewalk with a string. Then she left me and the dog ran off with me. Then he left me, and the boys carried me off on the raft. Now they have left me. I wonder who will take me next?" The raft was smooth in places, and the Lamb was just going to start to roll along a board toward shore when, all at once, she heard a noise, and a voice cried: "Whoa!" "My goodness!" thought the Lamb, coming to a stop almost as soon as she had started along on her wheels, "what's that? I wonder if some one is driving the White Rocking Horse along here!" She looked through the weeds growing on the edge of the brook and saw a real horse and wagon and a real man driving down to the water through the vacant lot. And as the man was real the Lamb dared not move while he was in sight. "Whoa!" called the real man, and it was to his real horse he was speaking, and not to the White Rocking Horse. "Whoa now, Dobbin!" went on the man, "and I'll let you have a drink here if the water is clean. I know you are thirsty, and there is a brook here somewhere." So that is why the man was driving his horse down through the lot—to give his horse a drink. The man climbed down off his wagon and walked toward the brook, right at the place where the raft had gone ashore with the Lamb on board. "I wonder if this can be the junkman who carried the Sawdust Doll away in his wagon," thought the Lamb. "If it is I am in for another adventure!" As the man came to look at the brook, to see if the water was clean enough for his horse to drink, the man saw the raft. "Oh, ho! There are some good boards and planks I can carry home to break up for kindling wood," said the man. "That's what I'll do. I'll have some good firewood from these boards! Or maybe I can sell some." Then he came nearer and saw the Lamb. "Well, I do declare!" the man cried. "There is a white woolly Lamb toy! I must take that, too, though I don't know what I can do with it. Maybe I can sell it. I am in luck to-day, getting a load of wood and a toy. Now come on, Dobbin!" he called to his horse. "The brook is nice and clean for you to drink from, and while you are drinking I will load the wood on my wagon and take the Lamb on Wheels. Come on, Dobbin!" The horse walked toward the water, for he was thirsty. And while he was drinking the man laid aside the Lamb, placing her on some soft grass. Then he piled the boards and planks on his wagon, and next he took up the Lamb again, putting her on top of the load of wood. "I'll give the Lamb a ride!" said the man. CHAPTER X MIRABELL IS HAPPY Away rattled the wagon with the load of wood. The man sat on the seat, driving the horse, and behind him, where he had placed her on a board so she would not roll off, was the Lamb on Wheels. "Are my adventures never going to end?" thought the Lamb. "Here I am riding on a wagon, while, a short time ago, I was on a raft, sailing over the ocean like Uncle Tim." The Lamb did not know the difference between the brook and the ocean, but we can hardly blame her, as she had not traveled very much. "I rather like this wagon ride, though," said the Lamb, as the man drove away from the brook and up through the lots. His horse was no longer thirsty. The man who had picked up the pieces of the boys' raft to take home to be chopped up for firewood, did all sorts of odd jobs in the neighborhood. He would cut grass, beat rugs, cart away rubbish, and do things like that for people who lived near the brook. And soon after loading his wagon with wood and taking away the Lamb on Wheels the man said to himself: "I'll go around to the Big House and ask if they have any trash that needs carting away. I can't take it now, because I have this load of wood on, but I could come to-morrow and get it. Yes, I'll drive to the Big House and see if they need me." The "Big House," as the man called it, was a place where a gardener, a cook, and a maid were kept by a rich family, and the gardener used to rake up the trash in the yard and keep it until the rubbish man called with his wagon to take it away. So along rattled the wagon with the Lamb on Wheels up on the pile of wood. She slid from side to side, as the road was now rough, and once she almost fell out. But the man looked around just in time and saw her. "Oh, ho! Mustn't have that happen!" he exclaimed. "I don't want to lose the Lamb I found. It's an almost new toy, and maybe I can sell it. I must not lose it!" Then he reached back and took the Lamb on Wheels from along the loose pieces of wood. "I'll set it up on the seat beside me," said the man, talking aloud to himself, as he often did. "I can hold it on as we go over the rough places." But soon the man drove out of the lots to a smooth road, and then the Lamb felt better. "Now we'll stop at the Big House," said the man, as he drove up along a back road and stopped at a gate in a high fence. "Whoa!" he called to his horse, and when the horse stopped the man got down off the seat, leaving the Lamb still there. The man who had the load of wood opened the gate in the fence, and just then another man came out. "Hello, Patrick!" called the wood man. "I was driving past and I just thought I'd stop and see if there was any trash you wanted carted off to the dump. Of course I can't take it now, as I have on a load of wood," he added. "But I can come back later." "Oh, so you have a load of wood, have you?" asked Patrick, who had a garden rake in his hand. "Where did you get it?" and he walked toward the wagon, letting the garden gate swing shut behind him. "Found it down in the lot near the brook. Some boys had made a raft, but I guess they got tired of playing with it, so I took the planks and boards. I found something else, too, Patrick!" "You did? What was that, Mike?" "A toy woolly Lamb on Wheels," answered the odd-job man. "It was on the raft. I brought it along with me. There it is, up on the seat," and he pointed to the toy. "A Lamb! A toy Lamb on Wheels!" exclaimed Patrick. "Well, if this isn't strange! I never would have believed it!" "What's the matter?" asked the odd-job man, as Patrick looked more closely at the Lamb on the wagon seat. "What's the matter?" "Why, this is Mirabell's Lamb! The one she has been looking for!" cried Patrick. "I hunted down in our cellar for this Lamb, but I didn't find her. And now you have her on a load of wood! How strange! Where did you say you found her?" "On the raft," answered the odd-job man. "But who is Mirabell?" "A little girl who lives next door," explained Patrick, the gardener. "She plays with our Dorothy, and Mirabell's Uncle Tim brought her a Lamb on Wheels. Mirabell had her Lamb out in the street, but she left it for a moment and then it disappeared. Now here it is!" "Are you sure it's the same one?" asked the odd-job man. "Quite sure," answered Patrick, and, oh, how the Lamb wished she dared speak out and say that she certainly was that very same toy! And how she wished they would take her to Mirabell! "We can soon tell if this is Mirabell's Lamb," went on Patrick. "I'll take it to her. If you want to you can unload that wood here. My master will buy it and I can chop it up. Then you can cart away some trash in your wagon." "I'll do that," said the odd-job man. "I guess the Lamb brought me good luck. I was thinking maybe I could sell this wood after I had chopped it up myself, but I'd rather sell it as it is. And I can then cart away the trash." "Well, you be unloading the wood," said Patrick, "and I'll go see if this is Mirabell's Lamb. But I am very sure it is." Leaning his rake up against the back fence, Patrick walked up the garden path, around the "Big House," as the odd-job man had called it, and then the gardener went toward the house where Mirabell lived. The little girl, who had hunted all over for her Lamb on Wheels and was feeling very sad because she had not found it, was in the kitchen getting a cookie from Susan, the cook, when Patrick knocked on the back door. "I'll go and see who it is!" cried the little girl. And when she opened the door, and saw Patrick from the "Big House" standing there with the Lamb on Wheels, Mirabell was so surprised that she dropped her cookie. It fell on the floor, and it almost rolled down the back steps, but Patrick caught it in time. [Illustration: "I Hardly Remember," Said Lamb on Wheels.] "Oh! Oh!" exclaimed Mirabell, clasping her hands. "Where did you find her? Where did you find my Lamb on Wheels, Patrick?" "Then she is yours?" asked the gardener. "Of course she's mine!" cried Mirabell, as she took her toy in her arms. "I've been looking everywhere for her! Oh, where did you find her?" "I didn't find her. Another man did," explained the gardener. "But as soon as I saw this Lamb on the seat of his wagon, I thought she was yours. And she is!" "Yes, she is!" cried Mirabell, who was very happy now. "This is my Lamb on Wheels, and I'm never going to lose her again. Oh, Patrick, I'm so glad!" she cried. "Will you thank the other man for me?" "You may come and thank him yourself if you like," said the good-natured gardener. "He's unloading wood at our back gate, and he's going to take away a load of trash for me. Come and thank him yourself." And Mirabell, holding the Lamb in her arms, did so. "I can't tell you how glad and happy I am," said Mirabell. "I am glad I happened to find your toy for you," replied the odd-job man. Then, the little girl, nodding and smiling at Patrick and Mike, ran laughing across the yard to tell her mother the good news. "I'm never going to lose my Lamb on Wheels again!" said Mirabell. "I wonder where she was, and how she got on the raft by the brook," said Arnold, when he and Dick and Dorothy had heard the story of the finding of the lost toy. "I don't know," answered Mirabell. "All I know is that I have her back again, and, oh! I'm so happy!" "I certainly am glad to get back to Mirabell again," said the Lamb on Wheels to herself. "And what a remarkable adventure I shall have to tell the Sawdust Doll and the White Rocking Horse when I see them again!" This happened very soon, for a few days later Mirabell carried the Lamb on Wheels over to Dorothy's house. Arnold went with his sister, taking with him his toy fire engine. "Now we'll have some fun!" cried Dick, as he got his White Rocking Horse. "We'll go horseback riding." "And I'll get my Sawdust Doll!" exclaimed Dorothy. The children had fun playing with their toys, and when they laid them down for a moment to go to the kitchen to get some crackers and milk, the Lamb found a chance to tell the Sawdust Doll and the White Rocking Horse about her adventures. "My, I think they are perfectly wonderful!" exclaimed the Doll, when she heard about the trip on the raft. "But what is that little squeaky noise, Lamb?" asked the White Rocking Horse suddenly. "I've noticed it every time you have moved." "Oh, my dear!" cried the Sawdust Doll, "are you sure these dreadful adventures have not hurt you?" "It's really not very much," answered the Lamb on Wheels. "You know an ocean trip such as mine is apt to be rather damp, and I have been left with a little rheumatism in my left hind wheel. But now that I am back with Mirabell it will soon be all right." "She ought to have her mother put a little oil on it," said the Sawdust Doll. "That would cure it at once." "And did the odd-job man's horse go faster than I can go?" asked the Rocking chap. "I hardly remember," the Lamb answered. "But I was almost seasick riding on that wagon." "Hush! The children are coming back!" neighed the White Rocking Horse, and the toys had to be very still and quiet. "I know what we can do!" cried Dick, after he had helped Arnold put out a make-believe fire with the toy engine. "We can play soldier!" "That will be fun!" said Arnold, who liked games of that sort. "I wish I had some toy soldiers," he went on. "I saw some in the same store where your Rocking Horse came from, Dick. I wish I had a set of tin soldiers, with a captain and a flag and everything!" "Maybe you'll get 'em!" exclaimed Dick. "Maybe," echoed Arnold, "Oh, I hope he does," thought the Lamb on Wheels. And if you children want to know whether or not Arnold got his wish you may find out by reading the next book in this series, called: "The Story of a Bold Tin Soldier." As for the Lamb on Wheels, she lived with Mirabell for many, many years, and had a fine time. She had some adventures, too, but none more strange than the one of riding down the brook on a raft. THE END End of Project Gutenberg's The Story of a Lamb on Wheels, by Laura Lee Hope *** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF A LAMB ON WHEELS *** Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will be renamed. Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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