watch what he did.

Very quietly, while Baby William was trying to make one stone stay on
top of another in one side of the castle he was making, Janet stepped up
to the flap of the tent, inside which her mother was sitting sewing.

"I'm going with Ted and Hal into the woods," said the little girl. "Will
you watch Trouble, Mother?"

"Yes, Janet. But be careful, and don't go too far."

Janet did not answer but hurried away. Of course she did not do just
right, for she knew her mother would not want her to go to the cave, nor
would Mrs. Martin have let Ted and Hal go had she known it. But the
Curlytops and Hal were very desirous of finding the blue stones and of
seeing if there was any gold in them, and they did not stop to think of
what was right and what was wrong.

"Hurry up now!" exclaimed Hal as he went on ahead up the path that led
from behind the tents to the queer cave. "We want to get there before
anybody knows it."

"What'll we do if the tramps are there?" asked Ted.

"They won't be there," said Hal, though how he could tell that he did
not say.

"I've got a little hatchet and we can cut down some clubs," said Ted. He
had brought with him a little Boy Scout hatchet, with a covering over
the sharp blade. His grandfather had given it to Ted, but had told him
never to take it out alone. But Ted did, and this was another wrong
thing.

I'm afraid if I speak of all the wrong things the Curlytops did that day
I'd never finish with this story. But it wasn't often they did so many
acts they ought not to have done.

On they hurried through the woods, the boys hurrying ahead of Janet. She
did her best to keep up with them, but her legs were shorter than Ted's
or Hal's and it was hard work for the little girl.

"Oh, wait for me!" she called at last. "I'm awful tired."

"Hurry up!" begged Ted. "We want to get the blue stones before the
tramps take 'em away!"

"Are they going to?" asked Janet, sitting down on a stone to rest, after
she had caught up to the boys.

"Well, they might," answered Hal. "We've got to hurry."

They went on again, walking a little more slowly this time, and when
they came to a muddy puddle in the middle of the woodland path, Ted
tried to jump over it. But he slipped on the edge and one leg, from his
foot to above his knee, got very wet and muddy.

"Oh, wow!" he cried. "Now I've got to stop and clean this off."

He began to wipe off the worst of the mud on bunches of grass, while