“Well, we’ll go now,” said Mr. Bobbsey, when he and his wife had spent some little lime admiring the decorations. “Come, Freddie. Where’s Flossie?” he asked, as he looked around and did not see his “little fat fairy.”’
“She was here a little while ago,” replied Nan. “I saw her with Freddie.”
“Where did Flossie go, Freddie-boy?” asked his mother.
“Up there!” and the little chap pointed to a broad flight of stone steps.
“Oh, she has wandered away,” said Mrs. Bobbsey.
“I’ll run up and get her!” offered Mr. Bobbsey. Up the stairs he hurried, but he came back in a little while with an odd look on his face. “I can’t find her,” he said.
“Oh, Flossie’s lost!” cried Freddie. “Oh, maybe she falled down stairs and got lost!”
CHAPTER XI
The President
Really it was nothing new for one of the Bobbsey twins to become lost—especially the younger set, Flossie and Freddie. Some years before, when they were younger, it had often happened to Nan and Bert, but they were now old enough, and large enough, to look after themselves pretty well. But Flossie or Freddie, and sometimes both of them, were often missing, especially when the family went to some new place where there were strange objects to see, as was now the case in the Congressional Library.
“Where do you suppose Flossie could have gone?” asked Mrs. Bobbsey, as she glanced around the big rotunda in which they stood with some other visitors who had come to the city of Washington.
“I’ll have to ask some of the men who are in charge of this building,” replied Daddy Bobbsey. “Are you sure you saw Flossie go up those stairs, Freddie?” he asked the little fireman.
“Well, she maybe went up, or she maybe went down,” answered the boy. “I was lookin’ at the pishures on the wall, and Flossie was by me. And then—well, she wasn’t by me,” he added, as if that explained it all. “But I saw a little girl go up the stairs and I thought maybe it was Flossie.”
“But why didn’t you tell mother, dear?” asked Mrs. Bobbsey. “If you had called to me when you saw Flossie going away I could have brought her back before she got lost. Why didn’t you tell me that Flossie was going away?”
“’Cause,” answered Freddie.
“Because why?” his father wanted to know.
“’Cause I thought maybe Flossie wanted to slide down a banister of the stairs and maybe you wouldn’t let her, and I wanted to see if she could slide down and then I could slide down too!”
“Well, that’s a funny excuse!” exclaimed Mr. Bobbsey. “I don’t believe Flossie would slide down any banister here. But she has certainly wandered away, and we’ll have to find her. You stay here with the children, so I’ll know where to find you,” Mr. Bobbsey said to his wife. “I’ll go to look for Flossie.”
“I want to come!” exclaimed Nan.
“No, you had better stay with mother,” her father told her. “But I will take Bert along. He can take a message for me in case I have to send one. Come along!” he called to Nan’s brother.
“All right, Daddy,” answered Bert.
Up the big stone stairs went Daddy Bobbsey and Bert. Mrs. Bobbsey, with a worried look on her face, remained in the big rotunda with Nan and Freddie. The two children were worried too.
“Do you s’pose Flossie is hurt?” asked Nan.
“Oh, no, I don’t believe so,” and Mrs. Bobbsey tried to speak easily. “She has just gone into some room, or down some long hall, and lost her way, I think. You see there are so many rooms and halls in this building that it would be easy for even daddy or me to be lost. But your father will soon find Flossie and bring her back to us.”
“But if they don’t find her, Mamma?”
“Oh, they’ll be sure to do that, Nan. There is nobody around this building who would hurt our little Flossie.”
“What an awful big building it is,” remarked Nan. “And just think of the thousands and thousands of books! Why, I didn’t know there were so many books in the whole world! Mamma, do you suppose any of the people down here read all these books?”
“Hardly, Nan. They wouldn’t have time enough to do that.”
And now we shall see what happens to Mr. Bobbsey and Bert. Flossie’s father decided to try upstairs first, as Freddie seemed to think that was the way his little sister had gone.
“Of course, he isn’t very sure about it,” said Mr. Bobbsey to Bert; “but we may as well start one way as the other. If she isn’t upstairs she must be down. Now we’ll look around and ask questions.”
They did this, inquiring of every one they met whether a little blue-eyed and flaxen-haired child had been seen wandering about. Some whom Mr. Bobbsey questioned were visitors, like himself, and others were men who worked in the big library. But, for a time, one and all gave the same answer; they had not seen Flossie.
Along the halls and into the different rooms went Mr. Bobbsey and Bert. But no Flossie could they find until, at last, they approached a very large room where a man with very white hair sat at a desk. The door of this room was open, and there were many books in cases around the walls.
“Excuse me,” said Mr. Bobbsey to the elderly gentleman who looked up with a smile as Flossie’s father and Bert entered the room. “Excuse me for disturbing you; but have you seen anything of a little girl—”
“Did she have blue eyes?” asked the old man.
“Yes!” eagerly answered Mr. Bobbsey.
“And did she have light hair?”
“Oh, yes! Have you seen her?”
Softly the man arose from his desk and tiptoed over to a folding screen. He moved this to one side, and there, on a leather couch and covered by an office coat, was Flossie Bobbsey, fast asleep.
“Oh! Oh!” exclaimed Bert.
“Hush!” said the old man softly. “Don’t awaken her. When she arouses I’ll tell you how she came in here. It’s quite a joke!”
“You stay here, Bert,” said Mr. Bobbsey to his son, “and I’ll go and get your mother, Nan and Freddie. I want them to see how cute Flossie looks. They’ll be glad to know we have found her.”
So while Bert sat in a chair in the old man’s office Mr. Bobbsey hurried to tell his wife and the others the good news. And soon Mrs. Bobbsey and the rest of the children were peeping at Flossie as she lay asleep.
And then, suddenly, as they were all looking down at her, the little girl opened her eyes. She saw her mother and father; she saw Nan and Bert and Freddie; and then she looked at the kind old man with the white hair.
“Did you find a story book for me?” were the first words Flossie said.
“Well, I’m afraid not, my dear,” was the old man’s answer. “We don’t have story books for little girls up here, though there may be some downstairs.”
“Is that what she came in here for—a story book?” asked Mr. Bobbsey.
“I believe it was,” answered the old man, with a smile. “I was busy at my desk when I heard the patter of little feet and a little girl’s voice asking me for a story book. I looked around, and there stood your little one. I guessed, at once, that she must have wandered away from some visitors in the library, so I gave her a cake I happened to have in my lunch box, and got her to lie down on the sofa, as I saw she was tired. Then she fell asleep, and I covered her up and put the screen around her. I knew some one would come for her.”
“Thank you, so much!” exclaimed Mrs. Bobbsey. “But, Flossie, how did you happen to come up here?”
“Oh, I wanted a story book,” explained the little girl, as she sat up. “We have story books in our library, an’ there ought to be story books here. I looked in this room an’ I saw a lot of books, so I did ask for one with a story in it. I like a story about pigs an’ bears an’—an’ everything!” finished Flossie.
“Well, I wish I had that kind of story book for you, but I haven’t!” laughed the old man.
“All my books are very dull, indeed, for children, though when you grow up you ma
y like to read them,” and he waved his hand at the many books in the room.
So Flossie was lost and found again. The old man was one of the librarians, and he had taken good care of the little girl until her family came for her. After thanking him, Mr. and Mrs. Bobbsey led their twins downstairs and Mr. Bobbsey said:
“Well, I think we have seen enough of the library for a time. We had better go and see the Martins.”
“Oh, yes!” cried Bert. “Billy said he’d take me to see the President.”
“And I want to go, too!” added Nan.
“We’ll see!” half promised her mother.
In an automobile the Bobbsey family rode to where the Martin family lived. And you can well believe that Billy and Nell were glad to see the Bobbsey twins once more. Mrs. Martin welcomed Mrs. Bobbsey, and soon there was a happy reunion. Mr. Martin was at his office, and Mr. Bobbsey said he would go down there to see him.
“Then couldn’t we go out and see the President while mother stays here and visits with Mrs. Martin?” asked Nan. “Nell and Billy will go with us.”
“I think they might go,” said Mrs. Martin. “Billy and Nell know their way to the White House very well, as they often go. It isn’t far from here.”
“Well, I suppose they may go,” said Mrs. Bobbsey slowly.
“And I want to go, too!” exclaimed Freddie. “I want to see the dent.”
“It isn’t a dent—it’s President—the head of the United States!” explained Bert. “Our teacher told us about him, and she said if ever I came to Washington I ought to see the President.”
“I want to see him too,” cried Flossie.
“Let all the children go!” said Mrs. Martin. “I’ll send one of my maids to walk along with them to make sure that they keep together. It is a nice day, and they may catch a glimpse of the President. He often goes for a drive from the White House around Washington about this time.”
“Well, I suppose it will be a little treat for them,” said Mrs. Bobbsey.
“Oh, goodie!” shouted Freddie.
So, a little later, the Bobbsey twins, with Nell and Billy Martin and one of the Martin maids, were walking toward the White House.
“There it is!” exclaimed Billy to Bert, as they turned the corner and came within view of the Executive Mansion, as it is often called.
“Oh, it is white!” cried Nan.
“Just like the pictures!” added Bert.
“It’s got a big iron fence around,” observed Freddie. “Is that so the President can’t get out?”
“No, I guess it’s so no unwanted people can get in,” answered Nell.
The children and the maid walked down the street and looked through the iron fence into the big grounds, green even now though it was early winter. And in the midst of a great lawn stood the White House—the home of the President of the United States.
Suddenly two big iron gates were swung open. Several policemen began walking toward them from the lawn and some from the street outside.
“What’s the matter?” asked Bert. “Is there a fire?”
“The President is coming out in his carriage,” said Billy. “If we stand here we can see him! Look! Here comes the President!”
CHAPTER XII
Washington Monument
Down the White House driveway rolled the carriage, drawn by the prancing horses. It was coming toward the iron gate near which, on the sidewalk, stood the Bobbsey twins, with their new friends, Billy and Nell Martin.
On the front seat of the carriage, which was an open one, in spite of the fact that the day was cool, though not very cold, sat two men. One drove the horses and the other sat up very straight and still.
“I should think he’d have an automobile,” remarked Bert.
“He has,” answered Billy. “He has an auto—two of ’em, I guess. But lots of times he rides around Washington in a carriage just as he’s doing now.”
“That’s right,” chimed in Nell. “Sometimes we see the President and his wife in a carriage, like now, and sometimes in a big auto.”
By this time the carriage, containing the President of the United States, was passing through the gate. A crowd of curious persons, who had seen what was going on, as had the Bobbsey twins, came hurrying up to catch a glimpse of the head of the nation. The police officers and the men from the White House ground kept the crowd from coming too close to the President’s carriage.
The Chief Executive, as he is often called, saw the crowd of people waiting to watch him pass. Some of the ladies in the crowd waved their hands, and others their handkerchiefs, while the men raised their hats.
Billy put his hand to his cap, saluting as the soldiers do, and Bert, seeing this, did the same thing. Nell and Nan, being girls, were not, of course, expected to salute. As for Flossie and Freddie they were too small to do anything but just stare with all their eyes.
As the President’s carriage drove along he smiled, bowed, and raised his hat to those who stood there to greet him. The President’s wife also smiled and bowed. And then something in the eager faces of the Bobbsey twins and their friends, Nell and Billy, attracted the notice of the President’s wife.
She smiled at the eager, happy-looking children, waved her hand to them, and spoke to her husband. He turned to look at the Bobbseys and their friends, and he waved his hand, He seemed to like to have the children watching him.
And then Flossie, with a quick little motion kissed the tips of her chubby, rosy fingers and fluttered them eagerly toward the President’s wife.
“I threw her a kiss!” exclaimed Flossie with a laugh.
“I’m gin’ to throw one too,” exclaimed Freddie. And he did.
The President’s wife saw what the little Bobbsey twins had done, and, as quick as a flash, she kissed her hand back to Flossie and Freddie.
“Oh, isn’t that sweet!” exclaimed a woman in the throng, and when, afterward, Nan told her mother what had happened, Mrs. Bobbsey said that when Flossie and Freddie grew up they would long remember their first sight of a President of the United States.
“Well, I guess that’s all we can see now,” remarked Billy, as the President’s carriage rolled off down the street and the crowd that had gathered at the White House gate began moving on. The gates were closed, the policemen and guards turned away, and now the Bobbsey twins and their friends were ready for something else.
“Where do you want to go?” asked Billy of Bert.
“Oh, I don’t know. ‘Most anywhere, I guess.”
“Could we go to see the Washington Monument?” asked Nan. “I’ve always wanted to see that, ever since I saw the picture of it in one of daddy’s books at home.”
“I don’t believe we’d better go out there alone,” said Nell. “It’s quite a way from here. We’d better have our mothers or our fathers with us. But we can walk along the streets, and go in the big market, I guess.”
“Let’s do that!” agreed Billy. “There’s heaps of good things to eat in the market,” he added to Bert. “It makes you hungry to go through it.”
“Then I don’t want to go!” laughed Bert. “I’m hungry now.”
“I know where we can get some nice hot chocolate,” said Nell. “It’s in a drug store, and mother lets Billy and me go there sometimes when we have enough money from our allowance.”
“Oh, I’m going to treat!” cried Bert. “I have fifty cents, and mother said I could spend it any way I pleased. Come on and we’ll have chocolate. It’s my treat!”
“We may go, Mayn’t we, Jane?” asked Nell, of the maid who had accompanied them.
“Oh, yes,” was the smiling answer. “If you go to Parson’s it will be all right.”
And a little later six smiling, happy children, and a rosy, smiling maid were seated before a soda counter sipping sweet chocolate, and eating crisp crackers.
After that Billy and Nell took the Bobbsey twins to the market, which is really quite a wonderful place in Washington, and where, as Billy said, it really makes one hung
ry to see the many good things spread about and displayed on the stands.
“I think we’ve been gone long enough now,” said the maid at last. “We had better go back.”
So, after looking around a little longer at the part of the market where flowers were sold and where old negro women sold roots, barks, and herbs, the Bobbsey twins and their friends started slowly back toward the Martin house.
On the way they passed a store where china and glass dishes were sold, and there were many cups, saucers and plates in one of the windows.
“Wait a minute!” cried Bert, as Billy was about to pass on. “I want to look here!”
“What for?” Billy asked. “You don’t need any dishes!”
“I want to see if Miss Pompret’s sugar bowl and cream pitcher are here,” Bert answered. “If Nan or I can find them we’ll get a lot of money, and I could spend my part while I was here.”
“Why Bert Bobbsey!” cried Nan, “you couldn’t find Miss Pompret’s things here—in a store like this. They only sell new china, and hers would be secondhand!”
“I know it,” admitted Bert. “But there might be a sugar bowl and pitcher just like hers here, even if they were new.”
“Oh, no!” exclaimed Nan. “There couldn’t be any dishes like Miss Pompret’s. She said there wasn’t another set in this whole country.”
“Well, I don’t see ’em here, anyhow!” exclaimed Bert, after he had looked over the china in the window. “I guess her things will never be found.”
“No, I guess not,” agreed Billy, to whom, and his sister, Nan told the story of the reward of one hundred dollars offered by Miss Pompret for the return of her wonderful sugar bowl and cream pitcher, while Bert was looking at the window display.
“Well, did you have a good time?” asked Mrs. Bobbsey, when her twins came trooping back.
“Yes. And we saw the President!” cried Nan.
And then they told all about it.
The Bobbseys spent the rest of the day visiting their friends, the Martins, and returned to their hotel in the evening. They planned to have other pleasure going about the city to see the sights the next day and the day following.
The Bobbsey Twins Megapack Page 140