Three little Trippertrots on their travels

One very windy day the three little Trippertrots were up in the playroom of their house, looking out of the window and wondering what they could do to have a good time.

“Now I do hope you children will not run off anywhere to-day,” their mamma had said to them as she went downtown to the five-and-ten-cent store to buy a new fur coat—excuse me, I meant a dipper. “Please stay in the house unless something special, extra-extraordinary happens.”

“Oh, yes, we will,” promised Mary; and Tommy and Johnny, her brothers, promised the same thing.

Well, as they were looking out of the window of the playroom, they saw a nice old gentleman crossing the street in front of their house. The old man was going very slowly, because he had rheumatism, I guess, or maybe the epizootic, when all at once, the wind, which was blowing very hard, blew right up under his tall silk hat, and blew it off his head. It almost blew off the hair on the old gentleman’s head, and if it had not been fastened tightly there, something like that surely would have happened.

“Oh, there goes his hat!” cried Tommy.

“And see how it rolls along the street!” exclaimed Johnny. “It’s almost as good as a football,” and he laughed out loud.

“Oh, you shouldn’t laugh when any one is in trouble,” spoke Mary, kindly.

“He can’t hear me,” answered Johnny. “Besides, I am really sorry for him.”

“If you are sorry I should think you would go out and help him catch his hat,” spoke Tommy. And truly, the hat of the old man was now rolling swiftly along the street, where the wind blew it, and the old gentleman was chasing after it—after his hat, I mean, not after the wind. Oh, my goodness me, no, and a basket of onions besides!

“We are not to leave the house—mamma said so,” spoke Mary, firmly.

“But I think this is a special, extra-extraordinary occasion,” declared Tommy. “Mamma would want us to go out and help catch the hat for the old man if she were here. I’m sure she would, for she always likes us to be kind to old people, and that gentleman can’t catch his hat all by himself. He can’t run fast enough.”

“That’s right,” agreed Johnny. “See him run! Oh, see him run!”

And, surely enough, the old gentleman was running after his hat as fast as anything. But, no matter how fast he ran, the wind blew his hat still faster, and it rolled along just in front of him. Every once in a while the old man would think he had the hat, and then the wind would come in a sudden puff, and presto-chango! away the hat would roll again, down the street.

“Oh, we ought to help him!” exclaimed Mary Trippertrot. “There is no one else out in the street to do it.”

“Then I will!” cried Tommy. “I’m going to get his hat for him.”

“And so am I,” added Johnny. “Come on, Mary.”

Then they got ready to run out of doors to help the old man get back his hat.

“Oh, dear, we really oughtn’t to go,” spoke Mary, “for we will be sure to be lost, as we always are. But I can’t let you boys go alone. I must be with you. I suppose this is one of those special, extra-extraordinary occasions, and mamma won’t mind very much.”

So Mary Trippertrot and her brothers, Tommy and Johnny, slipped softly down the front stairs, so Suzette, the nursemaid, wouldn’t see them, and out of doors they went.

“Hurry up!” called Tommy, as he ran on ahead, “the old man is nearly around the corner chasing his hat. We must help him, or his hat will be spoiled.”

“That’s right!” said Mary, and away they raced, forgetting everything that their mamma had told them about not going out of the house. But they wanted to do a kindness, you see.

Pretty soon they turned around the corner, and there, down the street, they saw the old man still chasing after his hat. The Trippertrot children soon caught up to him.

“Well, what do you want, little ones?” the man asked, as he turned around and saw them.

“If you please, sir,” said Mary, “we have come to help you chase your hat.”

“Ha! That is very kind of you,” spoke the old man, in a most polite voice. “I am sure I will get my hat now, with so many of us after it. If only the wind didn’t blow so hard my hat would stop rolling along the ground, and then I could get it alone. But I am glad you have joined me. Come on, now, we’ll see if we can’t race after that hat.”

So on ran the Trippertrots, and on ran the nice old man, after his hat, which the wind was making go faster and faster, just like when you roll a hoop.

“Oh, I’m afraid my hat will be ruined!” cried the old man, as he saw it roll into a puddle of water, and bounce out again. “And it is a nice new hat, and inside the lining is a dollar bill that I was saving to buy a Christmas present for my little grandson.”

“Oh, then we must surely get that hat!” said Mary, and she ran on faster than ever, and Tommy and Johnny Trippertrot also ran faster, and the old man ran as fast as he could.

“Look out!” suddenly cried Mary. “That automobile is going to run over your hat, and if it does it will squash it flatter than a sheet of paper.”

“So it will!” agreed the old man, as he looked up in time to see a big automobile rushing along the street, and his hat was almost under the fat wheels of the car.

“Hi, there, Mr. Auto Man! Stop your machine, if you please!” cried the old man. “Don’t run over my hat!”

And the auto man stopped his car just in time—that is, almost in time—for he just ran over a little part of the rim of the hat, and broke off a small piece.

“Oh, that’s too bad!” exclaimed Mary, as she made a grab for the tall silk hat, but she was just too late.

“Oh, never mind,” spoke the old man, as the hat went rolling on down another street, just as Tom-Tom the piper’s son ran roaring down the street after he took the pig, you know. “I can mend the broken place with court-plaster, if only I can get my hat.”

“We’ll help you,” said Tommy, and then the Trippertrot children ran on faster than ever after the old man’s hat.

But the hat was blown very hard by the wind, which didn’t seem to want to let go of it. Once the hat was nearly blown under a big, heavy wagon, and the wheels almost rolled over it. Then, a little later, some horses almost stepped on it, and one horse thought it was something good to eat, and was going to chew it, only his driver wouldn’t let him.

And then, all of a sudden, along came a trolley car, and this nearly ran over the hat, only the motorman stopped his car in time. He even got off, and tried to grab the hat, but the wind blew it on farther still, for the breeze was very strong.

“Oh, hadn’t we better go back home?” asked Mary, when they had been chasing the hat for some time. “We might get lost.”

“We’re lost now,” spoke Johnny, as he looked around, though he didn’t stop running. “We’ve never been in this part of the city before.”

“Well, if we’re lost we can’t get any more lost than we are,” said Mary. “We might as well keep on, and try to get the hat for the old gentleman. I like him, as he looks so much like the kind fisherman.”

“All right,” agreed Tommy and Johnny, for they also liked the old gentleman. So on they ran, after the old man who was chasing his hat.

Once the hat blew into the canal, and got all wet, and the next minute it blew out and went almost under the wheels of a choo-choo locomotive, but it rolled away just in time.

And then, all of a sudden, the wind gave a big puff, as if it was blowing out a candle, and presto-chango! the hat blew up into a tree, and there it stuck.

“Well, it’s fast, anyhow,” said the old man, who had almost no breath left, after running so far.

“Yes, it can’t go any more, unless the tree blows with it,” spoke Johnny.

“But how are you going to get it down?” asked Tommy.

“Oh, I know,” said Mary. “One of you boys must climb up the tree, or we can borrow a step-ladder from the house next door, and use that.”

“Let me climb!” cried Johnny.

“No, let me,” said his brother.

“You may both climb up,” declared the old gentleman, with a laugh. “I want my hat as quickly as I can get it, for I am catching cold.”

So up into the tree scrambled Johnny and Tommy, and soon they had the old man’s hat safe. It was a little bit battered and torn, by bouncing along so much, but that didn’t hurt it much. Then the old man put it on his head.

All of a sudden Mary began to cry.

“Why, what is the matter?” asked the nice old man. “Are you hungry?”

“No, I am not hungry,” answered Mary, “but we are—lost!”

“And we don’t know our way home!” added Tommy, and he cried, too, but only a little.

“And we’re always getting lost,” went on Johnny, as he started to cry a tear or two. “We’re always getting lost, and this time it was because we chased after your hat.”

“That is too bad,” said the old man. “And, as you have been so kind to me I will be kind to you. Come along, I will take you back home. I know where it is, because my hat blew off right in front of there. Come along, Trippertrots.”

So he brushed the dust off his hat, and put it on his head—put on his hat, I mean, not the dust—and then he took hold of Mary’s hand and Johnny’s, and Johnny took hold of Tommy’s hand, and away they started for the Trippertrot home.