"Isn't my nose flatter'n
yours? Look at it!"

"How can I look at your nose when I'm looking at mine?" asked Bunny.

He, too, had pushed his nose against the glass of his window, the
children standing in the dining room where two large windows gave them a
good view of things outside.

"You must look at my nose to see if it's flatter'n yours!" insisted Sue.
"Else how you going to know who beats?"

"Well, I can make mine a flatter nose than yours!" declared Bunny. "You
look at mine first and then I'll look at yours."

This seemed a fair way of playing the game, Sue thought. She left her
window and went over to her brother's side. The rain seemed to come down
harder than ever. If the children had any idea of being allowed to go
out and play in it, even with rubber boots and rain coats, they had
about given up that plan. Mrs. Brown had been begged, more than once, to
let Bunny and Sue go out, but she had shaken her head with a gentle
smile. And when their mother smiled that way the children knew she
meant what she said.

"Now, go ahead, Bunny Brown!" called Sue. "Let's see you make a flat
nose!"

Bunny drew his face back from the window. His little nose was quite
white where he had pressed it--white because he had kept nearly all the
blood from flowing into it. But soon his little "smeller," as sometimes
Bunny's father called his nose, began to get red again. Bunny began to
rub it.

"What you doing?" Sue wanted to know, thinking her brother might not be
playing fair in this little game.

"I'm rubbing my nose," Bunny answered.

"Yes, I know. But what for?"

"'Cause it's cold. If I'm going to make my nose flatter'n yours I have
to warm it a little. The glass is cold!"

"Yes, it is a little cold," agreed Sue. "Well, go ahead now; let's see
you flat your nose!"

Bunny took a long breath. He then pressed his nose so hard against the
glass that tears came into his eyes. But he didn't want Sue to see
them. And he wouldn't admit that he was crying, which he really wasn't
doing.

"Look at me now! Look at me!" cried Bunny, talking as though he had a
very bad cold in his head.

Sue took a look.

"Yes, it is flat!" she agreed. "But I can flatter mine more'n that! You
watch me!"

Sue ran to her window. She made up her mind to beat her brother at this
game. Closing her teeth firmly, as she always did when she was going to
jump rope more times than some other girl, Sue fairly banged her nose
against the window pane