Four Little Blossoms and Their Winter Fun | Page 4

not hurt a bit. But I'm stuck in this old bush."
He had had the good fortune, for he might have been seriously hurt if
he had struck the ground, to tumble into a large bush planted a short
distance from the porch. This bush had not been trimmed for years, and
new shoots had grown up and mingled with the old branches until it
was very tough and tangled and strong. Plunged in the middle of this
sturdy old friend, was Bobby.
"Why don't ye come out?" demanded Norah, relieved to find that he
was not hurt. "I left the teakettle boiling over to come and see if ye
were killed."
"I can't get out," said Bobby, struggling. "Lend us a hand, can't you,
Twaddles?"
Bobby had fallen with enough force to wedge himself tightly into the
heart of the bush, and indeed it was no easy matter to dislodge him.
Norah took one hand and Meg the other, and they tugged and pulled till
Norah was afraid they might pull him out in pieces.
"Where's Sam?" panted Meg. "He could bend down some of the
branches."
"Sam," said Norah, "has gone to meet your father with the car."
"Here comes Mother!" shouted Twaddles, as a familiar figure came up
the path. "Oh, Mother, Bobby's stuck!"
Mother Blossom was used to "most anything." She said so often. The
four little Blossoms had heard her. So now, though Aunt Polly gasped
to see the front door wide open and the hall light streaming out over the
snow, three children dancing about in the cold with no wraps on and a
fourth nearly buried in a tall bush, Mother Blossom merely put down
the two or three bundles she carried, leaned her weight against the bush
and directed Norah how to bend down other branches. Then, holding on
to his mother's arm, Bobby crawled out.

"Run in, every one of you, before you take cold," commanded Mother
Blossom quickly. "What have you been doing? Dot looks as though she
had been through a mill."
Sweeping them before her, Mother Blossom soon had them marshaled
into the house. Aunt Polly closed the door and Norah flew to her
neglected kitchen. It was dark outside by this time, and the steadily
falling snow had spread a thick carpet on the ground.
"Did you bring us something?" asked Dot expectantly, her hair-ribbon
over one eye and both pockets torn from her apron.
"Did you bring us something?" inquired Twaddles, shaking Mother
Blossom's packages to try to find out what was in them.
"Did you bring us something?" said Meg and Bobby together, each
holding out a hand for overshoes.
Mother Blossom gave hers to Bobby, and Aunt Polly handed hers to
Meg, to be put away in the hall closet under the stairs. Just as Meg
closed the door of the closet the doorbell rang.
"There's the boy now," announced Mother Blossom. "He's bringing you
the something nice I promised."
The boy from Gobert's, the hardware store uptown, probably had never
received a more enthusiastic welcome in his life than that he
experienced at the Blossom house. Four children flung open the door
for him and fell upon him crying: "Where is it? Who's it for? Let me
see it!"
He was a tall, thin boy, with a wide, cheerful grin, and four children
pouncing upon him at once could not shake his self-possession.
"Got two sleds," he said impressively. "Mrs. Blossom said to send 'em
right up. Where do you want them?"
"Put them down there on the rug," directed Mother Blossom, smiling.

"Don't you want to come in and get warm, Ted?"
"No thanks," replied Ted, putting on his cap, again. "Want to hustle
right home to supper. Looks like a big storm."
He stamped down the steps into the snow, and Meg closed the hall
door.
"Two sleds!" Twaddles was round-eyed with admiration. "Now I won't
have to wait all afternoon for my turn."
"Unwrap them," said Mother Blossom. "They're just alike, one for the
girls, and one for you and Bobby. Aunt Polly bought one as her gift."
Aunt Polly had gone upstairs to take off her hat, but the shouts of
excitement brought her back quickly.
"Flexible flyers!" cried Bobby. "Oh, Mother, can't we go out to-night?"
"Mercy, no," answered Mother Blossom. "To-morrow's Saturday, and
you'll have plenty of time to play in the snow. Hurry now, and get
ready for supper. I shouldn't want Daddy to come home and find his
family looking like wild Indians."
It was too much to expect that the children could think or talk anything
but sleds and snow that evening, and many were the anxious peeps
taken through the living-room windows after supper to see how deep
the feathery stuff was.
"Still snowing," reported