The Story of a Lamb on Wheels | Page 9

her that make her coast so nice," explained Arnold, when the Lamb was half way down the ironing-board hill. "If she didn't have them she wouldn't roll down at all. A Sawdust Doll can't do it, nor a Rocking Horse. It's got to be something with wheels."
When the Lamb heard this, as, of course, she did hear, having ears, she thought to herself:
"Well, maybe this will not be so bad, after all. I can do things, it seems, that the Sawdust Doll and Rocking Horse cannot do. Not that I am going to be proud, or stuck up," went on the Lamb to herself.
"Oh, look at her go!" cried Dick.
"Yes, but I hope she won't be hurt," said the little girl. "I wouldn't want my Lamb on Wheels that Uncle Tim just gave me to be hurt."
"I should say not!" thought the Lamb to herself. "Sliding down ironing- board hills may be something not many other toys can do, but I don't want anything to happen."
Faster and faster she went, and finally she reached the end of the board and came to the smooth oilcloth on the floor. Then the wheels carried her across that to the far side of the room, and the Lamb brought up with a little bump against the baseboard.
"Oh, I hope she isn't hurt!" cried Mirabell, as she ran to pick up her toy.
And the Lamb was all right--there was not even a kink out of place in her soft, woolly coat.
So Mirabell and Arnold had fun letting the Lamb on Wheels coast down the ironing-board hill. Again and again they gave her a nice, long slide across the smooth oilcloth on the kitchen floor.
"Now this is the last," said Mirabell, after a while. "I want to put her to sleep."
Once more the Lamb was lifted to the high part of the ironing board and allowed to coast down on her wheels. But, alas! this time, just as she was rolling over the kitchen floor, one of the wheels hit against Arnold's foot. Instead of going in a straight line the Lamb swung off to one side. Straight toward the outside door she rolled, and just then Susan, the cook, came in from out-of-doors.
Susan held the door open for a moment, and before either Mirabell or Arnold could stop the Lamb, out she rolled to the back steps.
"Oh, my Lamb! My Lamb!" cried Mirabell. "She'll break her legs if she falls down the steps!"
Down the back steps, bumpity-bump went the Lamb on Wheels. But she did not break any of her four legs, I am glad to say.
Just how it happened I do not know, but when Mirabell and Arnold ran out to pick up the Lamb on Wheels the children found that the toy was not in the least hurt, except, maybe, the wool was ruffled up a little.
"Dear me, what a lot of adventures I am having!" thought the Lamb, as Mirabell picked her up. "I wish I could tell the Calico Clown or the Bold Tin Soldier something about them. They are quite remarkable, I think!"
"Is she hurt?" asked Arnold, as he saw his sister holding her new toy.
"No, she seems to be all right," replied Mirabell. "But I'm not going to slide her down the ironing-board hill any more to-day. She must go to sleep."
So the board was hung away, and soon the Lamb was put in a little stable Mirabell made for her out of a pasteboard box. The stable was set in a corner of the playroom, near a little Wooden Lion that had once lived in a Noah's Ark. He was the only one of the Ark animals left. Arnold or Mirabell had lost all the others.
"Don't be afraid of me! I won't bite you," said the Wooden Lion to the Lamb on Wheels, when they were left alone in the playroom. The children had gone downstairs to supper with Uncle Tim, and the sailor was telling them many jolly stories of the sea.
"Oh, I'm not afraid of you," said the Lamb on Wheels to the Wooden Lion. "I am much larger than you, even if you are like the jungle animals."
"It isn't my fault that I am small," said the Wooden Lion, a little crossly, the Lamb thought. "I had to be made that way to fit in the Ark. You ought to see the Elephant. He isn't much larger than myself!"
"Did he have on roller skates?" asked the Lamb.
"Roller skates!" exclaimed the Wooden Lion. "Why! who ever heard of such a thing? A Noah's Ark Elephant on roller skates! The idea!"
"Oh, you needn't get so excited," said the Lamb, as she wiggled her short tail the least bit. "In the toy store, where I came from, we had an Elephant who put on roller skates and