The Curlytops on Star Island | Page 7

a minute but Trouble did not growl.
"Why don't you make a noise?" asked Janet.
Trouble gave a grunt.
"What's the matter?" asked Ted.
"I--I can't growl 'cause I'm all stuck under here," answered the voice of
the little fellow, from far under the couch. "I can't wiggle!"
"Oh, dear!" cried Janet.
Teddy stooped and looked beneath the couch.
"He's caught on some of the springs that stick down," he said. "I'll poke
him out."

He caught hold of Trouble's clothes and pulled the little fellow loose.
But Trouble cried--perhaps because he was sleepy--and then his mother
came and got him, leaving Teddy and Janet to play by themselves,
which they did until they, too, began to feel sleepy.
"You'll want to go to bed earlier than this when you go camping, my
Curlytops," said Grandpa Martin, as the children came out of the
sitting-room.
"Are you really going to take them camping?" asked Mother Martin
after Jan and Ted had gone upstairs to bed.
"I really am. There are some tents in the barn. I own part of Star Island
and there's no nicer place to camp. You'll come, too, and so will Dick
when he comes back from Cresco. We'll take Nora along to do the
cooking. Will you come, Mother?" and the Curlytops' grandfather
looked at his gray-haired wife.
"No, I'll stay on Cherry Farm and feed the hired men," she answered
with a smile.
"Why do they call it Star Island?" asked Ted's mother.
"Well, once upon a time, a good many years ago," said Grandpa Martin,
"a shooting star, or meteor, fell blazing on the island, and that's how it
got its name."
"Maybe it was a part of the star shining that the children saw to- night,"
said Grandma Martin. "Though I don't see how it could be, for it fell
many years ago."
"Maybe," agreed her husband.
None of them knew what a queer part that fallen star was to have in the
lives of those who were shortly to go camping on the island.
Early the next morning after breakfast, Ted and Jan went out to the
barn to get Nicknack to have a ride.

"Where is you? I wants to come, too!" cried the voice of their little
brother, as they were putting the harness on their goat.
"Oh, there's Trouble," whispered Ted. "Shall we take him with us,
Jan?"
"Yes, this time. We're not going far. Grandma wants us to go to the
store for some baking soda."
"All right, we'll drive down," returned Ted. "Come on, Trouble!" he
called.
"I's tummin'," answered Baby William. "I's dot a tookie."
"He means cookie," said Jan, laughing.
"I know it," agreed Ted. "I wish he'd bring me one."
"Me too!" exclaimed Janet.
"I's dot a 'ot of tookies," went on Trouble, who did not always talk in
such "baby fashion." When he tried to he could speak very well, but he
did not often try.
"Oh, he's got his whole apron full of cookies!" cried Jan. "Where did
you get them?" she asked, as her little brother came into the barn.
"Drandma given 'em to me, an' she said you was to have some,"
announced the little boy, as he let the cookies slide out of his apron to a
box that stood near the goat-wagon.
Then Baby William began eating a cookie, and Jan and Ted did also,
for they, too, were hungry, though it was not long after breakfast.
"Goin' to wide?" asked Trouble, his mouth full of cookie.
"Yes, we're going for a ride," answered Jan. "Oh, Ted, get a blanket or
something to put over our laps. It's awful dusty on the road to- day,
even if it did rain last night. It all dried up, I guess."

"All right, I'll get a blanket from grandpa's carriage. And you'd better
get a cushion for Trouble."
"I will," said Janet, and her brother and sister left Baby William alone
with the goat for a minute or two.
When Jan came back with, the cushion she went to get another cookie,
but there were none.
"Why Trouble Martin!" she cried, "did you eat them _all?"_
"All what?"
"All the cookies!"
"I did eat one and Nicknack--he did eat the west. He was hungry, he
was, and he did eat the west ob 'em. I feeded 'em to him. Nicknack was
a hungry goat," said Trouble, smiling.
"I should think he was hungry, to eat up all those cookies! I only had
one!" cried Jan.
"What! Did Nicknack get at the cookies?" cried Ted, coming back with
a light lap robe.
"Trouble gave them to him," explained Janet. "Oh dear! I was so
hungry for another!"
"I'll ask grandma for some," promised Ted, and he soon came back
with his hands full of the