Ethel Mortons Holidays | Page 7

by the coat collar the laughing,
squirming figure of George Foster.
It was unanimously agreed that George did not have the appearance of
a bride, and then they went back to the hall to bob for apples. Roger
spread a rubber blanket on the floor and drew the tub from its hiding
place in the corner where it had been waiting its turn in the games.
While the boys were making these arrangements Dorothy and Helen
were busily trying to dispose of the two ends of the same string which

stretched from one mouth to the other with a tempting raisin tied in the
middle to encourage them to effort. It was forbidden to use the hands
and tongues proved not always reliable. Now Dorothy seemed ahead,
now Helen. Finally the victory seemed about to be Helen's, when she
laughed and lost several inches of string and Dorothy triumphantly
devoured the prize.
When the girls turned to see what the boys were doing, Gregory and
James were already bobbing for apples. One knelt at one side of the tub
and the other at the other, and each had his eye, when it was not full of
water, fixed on one of the apples that were bouncing busily about on
the waves caused by their own motions.
"I speak for the red one," gasped Gregory.
"All right! I'll go for the greening," agreed James, and they puffed and
sputtered, and were quite unable to fix their teeth in the sides of the
slippery fruit until James drove his head right down to the bottom of
the tub where he fastened upon the apple and came up dripping, but
triumphant.
Stimulated by the applause that greeted James, Tom and Roger tossed
in two apples and began a new contest.
"This isn't a girls' game is it?" murmured Helen as Tom won his apple
by the same means that James had used.
"Not unless you're willing to forget your hair," replied Dr. Watkins.
"You can't forget it when it takes so long to dry it," Helen answered.
"I'm content to let the boys have this entirely to themselves."
While the half drowned boys went up to Roger's room to dry their faces
the girls prepared nut boats to set sail upon the same ocean that had
floated the apples. They had cracked English walnuts carefully so that
the two halves fell apart neatly, and in place of the meats they had
packed a candle end tightly into each.

"We have the comfort of the apple even when we're defeated," said
Gregory, coming down stairs, eating the fruit that he had not been able
to capture without the use of his hands. "What have you got there?"
"Here's a boat apiece," explained Helen. "We must each put a tiny flag
of some sort on it so that we can tell which is which."
"This way?" George asked. "I've put a pin through a scrap of corn husk
and stuck it on to the end of this craft."
"That's right. We must find something different for each one. Mine is a
black-alder berry. See how red and bright it is?"
It was not hard for each to find an emblem.
"Watch me hoist the admiral's flag at the mainmast," said Roger, but
the match that he set up for a mast caught fire almost as soon as the
candles were lighted in the miniature fleet. His flag fell overboard,
however, and was not injured.
"See that?" he commented. "That just proves that the flag of the U. S. A.
can never perish," and the others greeted his words with cheers.
It was a pretty sight--the whole fleet afloat, each bit of candle burning
clearly and each little craft tossing on the waves that Dr. Watkins
produced by gently tipping the tub.
"This is also an attempt to gain some knowledge of the future," said
Helen. "We must watch these boats and see which ones stay close
together and which go far apart, and whether any of them are
shipwrecked, and which ones seem to have the smoothest voyage."
"Della's and mine are sticking together just the way our nuts did," cried
Ethel Blue, and she slipped her hand into Della's and gave it a little
squeeze.
After the loss of its mainmast at the very beginning Roger's craft had
no more mishaps. It slid alongside of James's and together they bobbed

gently across life's stormy seas.
"It looks as if you and I were going into partnership, old man," James
interpreted their behavior.
The other boats seemed to need no especial companionship but floated
on independently, only Gregory's coming to an untimely end from a
heavy wave that washed over it and capsized it.
"I seem to hear a summons from the Witches' Cave," murmured Helen
in an