at the top of Court Hill. Most of them knew him by sight and he,
it seemed, knew all their names. "I'm glad you didn't all go to
dancing school. Do you feel like a little coast?"

"Let me steer, Blake?" asked Harry Winn.

Blake and another boy, Fred Carr, who was with him, laughed.

"I'll do the steering, Harry," said Blake firmly. "You other
youngsters pile on where you please, but I'll keep Sunny Boy near me.
If he fell off we might lose him entirely, he's so little."

Sunny Boy smiled, but he did not say anything. He was having a
beautiful time. The six small boys got on the sled, and Blake and
three other high school friends of his got on, too. The big bob
started. Sunny Boy closed his eyes. My, how the wind whistled! How
the snow flew up and stung their faces! And how soon they came to the
bottom of the hill and shot across the little bridge that was at the
foot.

"Do it again," said Sunny Boy to Blake.

They did it again, half a dozen times in fact, before Blake and Fred
said that it was quarter to five and time to stop. Then they put the
small boys on the sled and gave them a ride home. Blake said no one
need say "thank you" to him, because he had had more fun than anybody!

That evening, as Sunny Boy sat in Grandma Horton's lap after dinner and
watched the fire burn merrily in the grate, he remembered that Oliver
had said the next day would be New Year's Day.

"What do we do on New Year, Grandma?" Sunny Boy asked curiously.

"Oh, people come to see us," replied Grandma Horton, giving him a kiss.
"And you may pass them the New Year's cakes that Harriet has baked for
us. You will like that, won't you?"

CHAPTER VI

THE PARKNEY FAMILY

"Happy new year, precious!" said Mother, coming into Sunny Boy's room
to put down his window the next morning.

"Happy New Year, Sunny Boy!" cried Grandpa and Grandma Horton, when
they met him in the hall on the way to breakfast.

"Happy New Year, Son!" said Daddy Horton, catching him in his arms and
lifting him as high as the Christmas tree which still stood in one
corner of the parlor.

"Happy New Year, Sunny Boy!" cried Harriet, waving a dish towel at him
when he peeped into her kitchen.

"I think New Year is nice," said Sunny Boy, when Mother said he might
have two waffles for his breakfast because of the holiday. Usually
Mother said that hot cakes were not good for little boys.

After breakfast Sunny Boy brought down his lead soldiers f