Three little Trippertrots on their travels

“My, he is gone a terrible long time,” said Mary Trippertrot, after she and her brothers had waited, and waited, and waited some more, for the grocery boy to come back.

“Yes, perhaps he is lost himself, looking for the stable where his horse is,” suggested Johnny.

“Oh, grocery boys can’t get lost,” declared Tommy. “They have to know their way everywhere, so as to deliver groceries, and bread and butter and—and—lots of things. They can’t get lost.”

“Yes, they can,” said Johnny. “Don’t you remember when we once moved in a new house, and the grocery boy came with some groceries? Suzette told him to put them down cellar. He went down the stairs with his basket, and pretty soon we heard him hollering like anything. He was lost in the cellar, all right, so that shows you grocery boys can get lost.”

“Oh, I remember that time,” said Mary, with a laugh. “The boy hollered because Suzette forgot, and locked him in the cellar, and he couldn’t get out.”

“Well, when you can’t get to where you want to go you’re lost,” insisted Johnny, “so it’s the same thing. That grocery boy was lost, and maybe this one is, who has gone after the horse to take us home.”

“Oh, I hope not,” said Mary, “for it’s getting late, and it will soon be dark. I wish we were home. But we’ll wait here a little while longer.”

So the three little Trippertrots sat on the house-steps and watched the people walking along the street.

“Oh, dear!” exclaimed Tommy, at length, “everybody seems to have a house but us. See, they are all hurrying home, and we have to stay here.”

“Yes, let’s ask some of them to take us home, and not wait for the grocery boy,” suggested Johnny.

“Oh, no, don’t do that,” begged Mary. “It will be just as it always is. Folks will want to know where our house is, so they can take us to it, and, of course, we can’t tell them, and they’ll lead us off, and we’ll be lost more than ever. The best way will be to wait right here, until the grocery boy comes back with the horse, and then we’ll get home, for some horses know more than people, when it comes to taking lost children home to their papa and mamma.”

“All right, then we’ll wait,” agreed Tommy and Johnny.

They sat on the steps for some little time longer, and, pretty soon, along came a policeman swinging his club, and the brass buttons on his coat sparkled just like diamonds in the sunshine.

“Ah, ha, children!” he exclaimed. “What are you doing here?”

“Don’t tell him we’re lost,” whispered Tommy to Mary. So the little Trippertrot girl said:

“Oh, we are waiting here for the horse and wagon.” She meant the grocery horse and wagon, you know.

“Very good,” said the policeman. “I hope it comes soon. But don’t go away or you might be lost.” Then he walked on, swinging his club, and Johnny laughed softly, and said:

“He doesn’t know we are lost already! But we will soon be at home.”

So they still sat there, and, by-and-by, a fireman came along. He had been home to dinner, and now he was going back to the engine house, to be ready to go to put out any fires that might happen to burn things. The fireman saw the children and he smiled at them.

“Ah, little ones,” he said, “I see you are sitting on the stoop to get the fresh air. That is right, but don’t go away, or you might get lost.”

Then the fireman hurried on to the engine house, and Tommy laughed very softly and said:

“Ha, ha! He doesn’t know we are lost, either.”

And many other people passed by, and either spoke to the Trippertrot children, or laughed at them, or smiled, and still Tommy and Mary and Johnny sat on the steps waiting, and waiting, and waiting, for the grocery boy to come back with the horse and wagon.

And then, somehow or other, before she knew it, Mary began to feel sleepy.

“I will just close my eyes for a minute or two,” she said. “You boys can make-believe you are out camping in the woods, and you can sit up on guard, while I sleep.”

Well, Tommy and Johnny thought that would be fun, so they kept their eyes very wide open, but nothing happened, and pretty soon they felt sleepy, but they wouldn’t go to sleep, for they knew that soldiers never slumbered while they were on guard.

Well, it was getting toward evening now, and it was becoming somewhat cold, and still that grocery boy hadn’t come. You see, he was lost himself, and he couldn’t find the stable where the horse was, and he couldn’t find his way back to where the children were, and there they waited, and waited, and waited.

And then something happened. All at once, along came a boy with a big basket of clothes on a little wagon. Oh, it was a very large basket, and a very small wagon, but it was quite strong, and the boy was also quite strong, so he could pull it very easily. But, when he came to the stoop where the children were, he sat down on the curbstone to rest. And the basket of clothes was so big that he didn’t see the Trippertrot children because they were behind it.

But Tommy and Johnny, who hadn’t gone to sleep, but who still sat beside their sister Mary, they saw the basket of clothes. And they knew Mary was very tired, for her head had fallen over on Tommy’s shoulder. Then Tommy thought of something.

“I say, Johnny,” he exclaimed, “wouldn’t it be fine if we could put Mary in the basket of clothes, so she could have a nice rest?”

“Hum! It would be nice if we could get in ourselves,” said Johnny, “only but the boy wouldn’t let us, I guess.”

“Maybe he wouldn’t,” agreed Tommy, and just then, as truly as I’m telling you, the boy who had the basket of clothes ran across the street to look in a toy shop window; maybe he wanted to see if they had anything he could buy for a penny. Anyhow, there was the basket of clothes on the wagon, and there was no one near it except the Trippertrots.

“Now’s our chance!” exclaimed Tommy. “Quick! We’ll put Mary in the basket, and get in ourselves.”

“But what about when the grocery boy comes back with the horse for us?” asked Johnny.

“I don’t believe he’s coming back,” spoke his brother, “or else he’d be here now. We might as well get in the clothes-basket and rest, and see what happens after that.”

“All right,” agreed Johnny. So they lifted Mary up very gently, for she was a little girl, and not very heavy, and they were strong boys, if they were younger than their sister, and they carried her over toward the basket of clothes.

“Good-night, mamma,” murmured Mary, who was only half awake. “Tuck me in good, I’m so tired and sleepy.”

“She thinks she’s home,” whispered Tommy.

“Yes, we mustn’t wake her up,” said Johnny, also in a whisper. So, very gently, they lifted off the sheet that was over the top of the clean, ironed clothes, and they laid Mary down in among them. But first they put some newspapers around her shoes so they wouldn’t dirty the towels and pillow-cases, you know.

“Now let us get in ourselves,” said Johnny, and he and his brother wrapped some newspapers around their shoes, and then they crawled in the big basket of clothes beside their sister Mary. Then they pulled the sheet up over them, and then—and then—and then—they were both fast asleep almost as quickly as the pussy cat can wiggle its tail. Fast asleep in the basket of clothes were the Trippertrots.

Then the boy, who had been pulling the basket on his wagon, came back from across the street. He didn’t buy anything in the toy shop.

“Now I must take these clothes home,” he said to himself, as he began to wheel them. And then, all of a sudden, he exclaimed: “My! How heavy they are! I wonder what makes that? I guess it must be because I’m going up hill. Never mind, I’ll soon have them where they belong, and then I’ll get the money and take it home to mamma, and she’ll be happy.”

And, mind you, that boy never even dreamed that the three Trippertrot children were in his basket of clothes. He kept on wheeling them along the street, and once he slipped on a banana-skin, and almost fell down. Almost, I say, but not quite. And once a dog barked at him, not in earnest, only in fun, you know. And, all the while, the Trippertrots were fast asleep.

They even dreamed, too, as they were being wheeled along in the basket. Mary dreamed she was in a balloon, taking a trip through the air, and Tommy dreamed he was on the tail of a kite, and Johnny dreamed that he was bouncing up and down on a rocking-horse.

And, after a while, the boy who was pulling the basket of clothes on his wagon came to a house. He stopped in front of it. The house was painted green, and it had a red roof, only you couldn’t see that part of it, unless you went up in a balloon.

“Well, I’m glad I’m here with the clothes,” said the boy. “Now I’ll take them in and get my money.”

So he carried the basket of clothes up into the house. And there he found great excitement going on. The telephone bell was ringing, and there was a policeman there, and the nursemaid was running around through all the rooms, and the lady and man were almost crying.

“My children! Oh, where are my children? They are lost!” cried the lady. “Oh, have you seen my children?”

“No, I’m sorry to say I haven’t,” said the boy, and he really hadn’t, you know. “But here are your clean clothes, Mrs. Trippertrot,” he went on.

The lady took off the sheet from the basket of clothes and there she saw Mary and Tommy and Johnny, all fast asleep.

“Oh, my darlings!” she exclaimed. “Here they are! Oh, you dear washerwoman’s boy, to bring back my lost children!” And she hugged him, and then Tommy and Mary and Johnny awakened, and there they were, right in their own home. It was their own mamma’s basket of clothes into which they had crawled, never even guessing it, and the boy, not knowing it, had brought them safely home. The boy’s mamma was the washerwoman for Mrs. Trippertrot, you see, and he always delivered the clean clothes.

So there the Trippertrots were, but that wasn’t the last of their adventures. No, indeed!