Daddy Takes Us Skating | Page 5

get his bundle away from
Roly-Poly.
Opening it, Hal found in the package a pair of shining ice skates, just
like those Mab was trying on her shoes.
"Oh, thank you, Daddy!" Hal cried.
"And I thank you, too!" added Mab. I'd get up and kiss you, only my
mouth is all jam. I'll kiss you twice as soon as I've washed."
"That will do," laughed her father. "Do you like your skates, children?"
"Oh, do we?" they cried, and by the way they said it you could easily
tell that they did.
"And Daddy's going to take us skating; aren't you?" asked Hal as he
measured his skates on his shoes to see if they would fit. They did. Oh!
Daddy Blake knew just how to buy things to have them right, I tell you.
"Yes, I'll take you skating, and show you how to stand up on the
ice--that is as soon as it is thick enough on the pond to make it safe, and
hold us up," promised the children's father.
Just then Mamma Blake came running up from down the cellar. She
was much excited.
"Oh, come quickly!" she called to her husband. "Something has
happened to the stationary wash-tubs. The water is spurting all over the
cellar. Oh, do hurry!"

CHAPTER IV
THE FROZEN POND

Daddy Blake hurried down cellar. Hal and Mab carefully putting away
their new skates, followed their father. Roly-Poly, the little fat poodle
dog looked around to see if he could find anything to drag off and hide,
but, seeing nothing, he went down cellar also, barking loudly at each
step.
"Hal! Mab!" called Aunt Lolly. "Come back here, dears!"
"We want to see what has happened!" answered Hal.
"Oh, you'll get hurt! I'm sure you will!" exclaimed the dear, little, fussy
old lady aunt.
"No, it isn't anything serious!" called Daddy Blake when he saw what
had happened. "Only one of the water pipes has burst. We must send
for the plumber. Wait, children, until I shut off the water, and then you
can come down. It is like a shower-bath now."
Daddy Blake found the faucet, by which he could shut off the water at
the stationary wash-tubs, and then, when it had stopped spurting from
the burst pipe, he called to Hal and Mab:
"Now you may come and see how strong ice is. Not only does it burst
glass bottles, but it will even crack an iron pipe."
"Just like it cracked a cannon ball!" cried Hal, and he was in such a
hurry to get down the cellar steps that he jumped two at a time.
That might have been all right, only Roly-Poly, the little fat poodle dog,
did the same thing. He became tangled up in Hal's legs, and, a moment
later, the little boy and the dog were rolling toward the bottom of the
steps, over and over just like a pumpkin.
"Oh!" cried Mab, holding fast to the handrail, a little frightened.
"Oh my!" exclaimed Mamma Blake at the top of the cellar steps. "What
has happened?"
"Oh my goodness me sakes alive and some orange pudding!"

exclaimed Aunt Lolly. "I just knew something would happen!"
But nothing much did, after all, for Daddy Blake, as soon as he heard
Hal falling, ran to the foot of the stairs, and there he caught his little
boy before Hal had bounced down many steps.
"There you are!" cried Daddy Blake, as he set Hal upright on his feet.
"Not hurt a bit; are you?"
"N-n-n-n-no!" stammered Hal, as he caught his breath, which had
almost gotten away from him. "I'm not hurt. Is Roly-Poly?"
Roly was whirling about, barking and trying to catch his tail, so I guess
he was not much hurt. The truth was that both Hal and Roly were so fat
and plump, that falling down a few cellar steps did not hurt them in the
least.
"Well, now we'll look at the burst water pipe," said Daddy Blake, when
the excitement was over. The water had stopped spurting out now,
though there was quite a puddle of it on the cellar floor by the tubs.
Mr. Blake lifted Hal across this, and showed him where there was a big
crack in the water pipe. Then he showed Mab, also lifting her across the
little pond in the cellar.
"You see the pipe was full of water," Mr. Blake explained, "and in the
night it got so cold down cellar that the water froze, just as it did in the
glass bottle out on the back porch.
"Then the ice swelled up, and it was so strong that it burst the strong
iron pipe, splitting it right down the side."
"But why didn't the water spurt out when I came down