d Aunt Sallie to the boys and girls as
they started from the cabin. They were warmly dressed, as it was getting
colder, just as Uncle Toby had declared.

"We'll watch him!" called back Jan.

Off through the trees, under which, here and there, were patches of
snow, wandered the Curlytops and their playmates. They laughed and
shouted, running here and there until they were nearly as warm as on a
summer's day. It was sheltered under the trees, but out in the open was
getting colder, and in places thin ice was forming on Crystal Lake.

They walked along, sometimes all together and again with the boys
running ahead of the girls, until they came to a little hill, covered
with pine trees. The wind had swept the ground bare of snow here, or
else it had melted, and in places were patches of the long, smooth and
slippery pine needles.

Tom, Ted, and Harry had run off to one side, for Skyrocket had scared up
a rabbit and the boys wanted to see the bunny, though they would not
have let the dog harm it. Trouble started to follow his brother and the
other two lads, but as he reached the top of the pine-needle-covered
hill Janet called him back.

"Trouble, come here!" she exclaimed.

"No!" he answered. "I go see bunny rabbit!"

"No, you must stay with me," said Janet, starting after him. Trouble
gathered himself to spring away on a run, but suddenly there was a queer
screeching call in a tree over his head, and a moment later the little
fellow went sliding and slipping down the hill and out of sight.

"Oh, dear!" cried Janet

"Was it an eagle that screamed?" asked Lola, who did not know much about
birds.

"Maybe the eagle carried him off," suggested Mary, who knew even less
about the creatures of the woods.

"There aren't any eagles around here, I hope," said Janet. "But
something happened to Trouble! I hope he isn't hurt!"

Again came that shrill, harsh call. It sounded like:

"Hay! Hay! Hay!"

"Somebody is laughing because Trouble fell downhill," said Lola. "I
wonder if it's that horrid old man?"

A moment later there was a rustling in the bushes, and a large bird with
bright blue feathers marked with patches of white flew up into a tree
harshly crying:

"Hay! Hay! Hay!"

"Oh, it's a blue jay!" exclaimed Janet, as she ran to the top of the
hill to see what had happened to William. It was nothing serious. He had
merely slid down on the smooth brown pine needles which covered the
ground and made it almost as sli