CHAPTER XVI

A LOST BABY

Very much frightened and hardly knowing what he was doing, Freddie sprang toward the hammock and started to take Baby May up in his arms. It was almost more than he could do, for he did not know much about the way to carry babies. But he made up his mind to keep Baby May safe.

Freddie gave one look back over his shoulder as he reached down to take up the infant, and he saw that the old lady, whoever she was, did not intend to come into the yard. She had put her hand on the gate as if to open it, and then she seemed to change her mind.

She was muttering something to herself, but what it was Freddie could not hear.

Again he cried:

“You can’t come in here! Go away! You can’t have Baby May!”

The old woman turned away without opening the gate, and walked off down the street. Freddie’s heart stopped beating so fast.

Mrs. Bobbsey, alarmed by Freddie’s screams, came running out of the house after having answered the telephone.

“Freddie, what is the matter?” his mother asked. “You shouldn’t take Baby May up out of the hammock!” she went on. “You might drop her. Don’t lift her up!”

By this time Freddie had ceased trying to lift Baby May. He let her sink back on the soft blankets in the hammock and, then, turning to his mother, he said:

“I was going to bring her into the house.”

“Why, Freddie Bobbsey! What in the world made you do that?” his mother asked. “Didn’t I tell you never to try to carry May?”

“I didn’t want the old lady to get her!”

“What old lady?” asked Mrs. Bobbsey, though she knew, almost without asking, what person Freddie must mean.

“That same old lady,” Freddie replied. “The one with the green umbrella, but she didn’t have a green umbrella this time. She had on a faded shawl and—”

“Did she try to come in here and get May?” asked Mrs. Bobbsey, now almost as much excited as Freddie was. “Where is she? Where did she go?”

“She didn’t come in,” the little boy replied. “But she put her hand on the gate and I yelled and—”

“Yes, I heard you,” gasped Mrs. Bobbsey. “But go on—what else happened, Freddie?”

“Nothing, Mother. She just went away—down the street.”

Mrs. Bobbsey hastened to the gate and looked up and down the street, but she saw no sign of the curious old woman.

“Are you sure you saw her, Freddie?” she inquired.

“Course I’m sure!” replied Flossie’s twin brother. “I saw her with my own eyes, and so did Baby May! You can ask her!” He looked down at the cooing child as if May could answer. But May only smiled up at Freddie, and her smile was very sweet.

“I must telephone daddy about this,” decided Mrs. Bobbsey, after another look up and down the street, without, however, seeing the strange woman. “If she is back in Lakeport the police should know about it, so they can try to find out to whom the baby belongs. I’ll telephone daddy.”

This she did, and Mr. Bobbsey grew rather excited when he heard the news. He hurried home from the office at the lumber dock and at once began a search of the neighborhood for the old woman. He inquired of the neighbors and others, but, though some said they remembered seeing her, they could not tell where she had gone.

Nor did the police have any better luck, for though two of them scurried about town, looking for traces of the stranger, she could not be found.

“Well, this is very strange,” said Mr. Bobbsey that night, when Baby May had gone to sleep and they were talking over matters after supper. “At first I thought maybe Freddie might be mistaken.”

“You mean that he didn’t see any old lady at all?” asked Bert.

“Yes. I thought perhaps he might have—well, sort of dreamed it,” and Mr. Bobbsey smiled at the little boy.

“I didn’t dream it!” cried Freddie, very positively. “I saw the old woman, and so did Baby May. Anyhow, I don’t dream in the daytime with my eyes open.”

“No, I suppose not,” agreed his father. “Well, since you saw her, and since others saw her, there is no doubt but that some old lady started to come into our yard. Whether she was the same one the children saw just before Baby May was left on our doorstep—that is another question.”

“I’m sure she was!” insisted Freddie. But of course he was a rather small boy, and he might have been mistaken.

“Then the next thing to think about is,” said Mr. Bobbsey, “what did the old woman want?”

“She wanted to take Baby May back!” said Nan promptly.

“I guess she’s sorry she gave her away,” added Bert.

“It’s hard to guess a reason for her strange acts,” observed Mr. Bobbsey. “If she wanted to get rid of the baby, why, now, does she want the child back?”

“I don’t want to lose Baby May,” said Mrs. Bobbsey softly. “I have grown to love her too much. But of course if her real father and mother wanted her I would be glad to give her up. But I don’t believe that old woman is her mother. Do you, Daddy?” she asked her husband.

“No,” he replied, “I don’t. I think there is some mystery here that we don’t understand. Though I can’t see why we haven’t heard some news in some of the papers about a missing or kidnapped baby. It certainly is very strange. But I have decided on one thing. We shall have no more scares such as Freddie had to-day.”

“How are you going to stop it?” asked Bert.

“We will go away for a time,” answered Mr. Bobbsey.

“Go away!” echoed the Bobbsey twins.

“Yes. On a little vacation trip,” went on Mr. Bobbsey. “We will go to the country where the old woman can’t find us.”

“Oh, to the country!” cried Nan, in delight.

“To Meadow Brook?” asked Bert.

“No, we can hardly go as far away as Meadow Brook,” said his father. “Though, no doubt, Uncle Daniel would be glad to see us. But I heard to-day of a nice boarding house in a small country town not far away, and we will go there for a vacation trip.”

“Oh, goodie!” cried Flossie.

“Have they got cows?” Freddie demanded.

“I guess so,” his father answered. “So, Mother, you had better get ready to go and take Baby May with you,” he added.

“If they have cows they must have horses,” was Freddie’s comment. “And if they have horses I’m going to go horseback riding.”

“Why must they have horses if they have cows?” Flossie wanted to know.

“Oh, ’cause they always do. When they take the milk to the station they have to carry the cans in a wagon, don’t they? And horses have to pull the wagon, don’t they?”

“I’ll ride in the wagon. I don’t want to go on a horse’s back,” said Flossie.

There were busy times during the next few days, and then came a short but delightful trip to Pine Hill, a little country town where a farmer and his wife took a few boarders during the summer.

The Bobbsey family about filled the place, and there were only two other people as boarders, two old ladies. Mr. and Mrs. Meekin, who kept the boarding house, welcomed the Bobbsey twins, their parents and Baby May.

“Oh, what a sweet child!” exclaimed Mrs. Meekin. “How old is she?”

“I don’t know exactly,” replied Mrs. Bobbsey.

“You don’t?” cried the two old lady boarders, in surprise.

“No. You see May isn’t my child. She is a foundling left on our doorstep,” explained Mrs. Bobbsey. She thought it best to tell the true story of Baby May. If she did not, one of the twins would be sure to do so.

Another reason for giving out the fact about Baby May was that Mrs. Bobbsey wanted all in the house to know about the strange old woman in the faded shawl, so, if by any chance she should appear at Pine Hill, the alarm would be given promptly.

“She is a dear, sweet baby, whoever owns her,” said Miss Himson, one of the old lady boarders.

“Indeed she is!” agreed Miss Jackson, the other old lady boarder.

Happy were the days the Bobbsey twins spent at Pine Hill. Not only were there cows, to Freddie’s delight, but there were sheep and horses, besides ducks and chickens.

Freddie never tired of watching the ducks swim, and once he fell into a mud puddle as he tried to fasten a long string to one of the ducks. The string was tied to a boat Freddie had made, and he wanted the duck to pull it. My, you should have seen Freddie after he fell into the duck pond! Oh, so muddy and wet!

But the Bobbsey twins had lots of fun, and Baby May grew fat and rosy-cheeked in those days spent in the fresh air of the country.

One day Nan was allowed to wheel the baby in her carriage to a little clump of woods not far from the house. Bert, Flossie and Freddie also went along, and the children took a lunch with them.

The twins had a regular picnic under the trees in the cool, shady grove, and played games, having a lovely time. Baby May went to sleep in her carriage on top of a little hill, covered with slippery pine needles, down which Freddie and Flossie slid. The needles made the hill almost as slippery as snow or ice would have done.

After a while Bert wandered away to see if he could find a place to fish, for he had brought a hook and line and some bait with him. Flossie and Freddie begged Nan to go with them to look for wild flowers.

“All right, I’ll go a little way,” agreed Nan. “I guess Baby May will be all right asleep in her carriage.”

The two girls and Freddie were gone rather longer than they meant to be, and when they returned to the grove where they had left May in the carriage, the carriage and the baby were gone.

“Oh! Oh!” gasped Nan. “Where is May?”

“Maybe Bert came back and wheeled her around ’cause she was crying,” suggested Flossie.

“Oh, maybe! I hope so!” murmured Nan.

But when Bert came back a little later, having found no place to fish, he said he had not wheeled away Baby May.

“Then where is she?” gasped Nan, her heart fluttering strangely.

“She—she’s lost!” cried Flossie, and then, as the dreadful thought became clearer to her she sobbed: “Baby May is lost!”