The Bobbsey Twins Megapack

by Laura Lee Hope

  “Wait a minute, Nan,” he said.

  “What for?” she asked.

  “Until Bert and I talk this over,” went on Billy, who, though he was not much older than Nan, seemed to be, perhaps because he had lived in a large city all his life. “You don’t want to rush in and buy those dishes so quick.”

  “Why not?” demanded Nan. “If I don’t get ’em somebody else may, and you know Miss Pompret offered a reward of a hundred dollars. These are the two pieces missing from her set. Her set is ‘broken’ as she calls it, if she doesn’t have this sugar bowl and pitcher.”

  “Yes, I remember your telling me about Miss Pompret’s reward,” said Billy. “But you’d better go a bit slow.”

  “Maybe somebody else’ll buy ’em!” exclaimed Nan.

  “Oh, I don’t believe they will,” said Nell, “This is a quiet street, and this shop doesn’t do much business. We only come here once in a while because some things are cheaper. We never bought any second-hand things.”

  “There’s nobody coming down the street now,” observed Bert, who was beginning to agree with Billy in the matter. “If we see any one going in that we think will buy the dishes, we can hurry in ahead of ’em. We’ll stand here and talk a minute. What is it you want to say, Billy?”

  “Well, it’s like this,” went on the Washington boy. “I know these second-hand men. If they think you want a thing they’ll charge you a lot of money for it. But if they think you don’t want it very much they will let you have it cheap. I know, ’cause a fellow and I wanted to get a baseball glove in here one day. It was a second-hand one, but good. The fellow I was with knew just how to do it.

  “He went in, and asked the price of a lot of things, and said they were all too high. Then he asked the price of the glove, just as if he didn’t care much whether he got it or not. The man said it was a dollar, but when Jimmie—the boy who was with me—said he only had eighty cents, the man let him have the glove for that.”

  “Oh, I see what you mean!” cried Nan. “You mean we must try to get a bargain.”

  “Yes,” said Billy. “Otherwise, if you go in and want to buy those dishes first thing, the man may want five dollars for ’em.”

  “Oh, we haven’t that much money!” cried Nan, much surprised.

  “That’s why I say we must go slow,” said Billy. “Now you leave this to me and Bert.”

  “I think it would be a good idea,” declared Nell.

  “All right! I will,” agreed Nan. “But, oh, I do hope we can get those dishes for Miss Pompret.”

  “And I hope we can get the reward of a hundred dollars,” murmured Bert.

  “I only hope they’re the right dishes,” said Billy.

  “Oh, I’m sure they are,” declared Nan. “They have the blue lion on and everything. And if they have the letters ‘J. W.’ on, then we’ll know for sure. Let’s go in and see.”

  “We’ve got to go slow,” declared Billy. “Mustn’t be too fast. Let Bert and me go ahead.”

  “I want to come in, too!” declared Freddie. “I want to buy a whistle. Do they have whistles in here?”

  “I guess so,” answered Bert. “It will be a good thing to go in and ask for, anyhow.”

  “Sort of excuse for going in,” suggested Nell.

  “Do they have ice cream cones?” asked Flossie. “I want something to eat.”

  “I don’t believe they have anything to eat in here,” said Nell. “But we can get that later, Flossie. Now you and Freddie be nice when we go in, and after we come out I’ll get you some ice cream.”

  “I’ll be good!” promised Flossie.

  “So’ll I,” agreed Freddie. “But I want a whistle, and if they have a little fire engine I want that.”

  “You don’t want much!” laughed Bert.

  “Well, let’s go in!” suggested Billy.

  So, with the two boys in the lead, followed by Nell and Nan and Flossie and Freddie, the children entered the second-hand and souvenir store.

  A bell on the door rang with a loud clang as Billy opened it, and when the children stepped inside the shop an old man with a black, curly beard and long black hair that seemed as if it had never been combed, came out from a back room.

  “What you want to buy, little childrens?” he asked. “I got a lot of nice things, cheap! Very cheap!”

  “Well, if you’ve got something very cheap we might buy it,” answered Billy, with as nearly a grown-up manner as he could assume. “But we haven’t much money.”

  “Ha! Ha! That’s what they all say!” exclaimed the old man. “But everybody has more money that what I has. I’m very poor. I don’t hardly make a living I sell things so cheap. What you want to buy, little childrens?”

  “Have you got any whistles or fire engines?” burst out Freddie, unable to wait any longer.

  “Whistles? Lots of ’em!” exclaimed the man. “Here is a finest whistle what ever was. Listen to it!”

  He took one from the show case and blew into it. Not a sound came out.

  “Ach! I guess that one is damaged,” he said. “But I got other ones. Here! Listen to this!”

  The next one blew loud and shrill.

  “I want that!” cried Freddie.

  “Ten cents!” said the man, holding it out to the little boy.

  “What?” cried Billy. “Why, I can buy those whistles for five cents anywhere in Washington! Ten cents? I guess not!”

  “Oh, well, take it for seven cents then,” said the man. “What I care if I die poor. Take it for seven cents!”

  “No, sir!” exclaimed Billy firmly. “Five cents is all they cost, and this is an old one.”

  “Oh, well. Take it for five then. What I care if you cheats a poor old man? Such a boy as you are! Take it for five cents!” and he handed the whistle to Freddie. But before he could take it Nan said, gently:

  “I think it would be better for him to have a fresh one from the box. That is all dusty.”

  The truth was she did not want Freddie to take a whistle the old man had blown into.

  “Oh, well, I gives you a fresh one,” he said, and he took a new and shining one from the box. Freddie blew it, making a shrill sound.

  “What else you want to buy, little childrens?” asked the old man. “I sell everythings cheap—everythings!”

  “Ask how much the dishes are,” whispered Nan to Billy. But he shook his head, and looked around the shop. He looked everywhere but at the window where the dishes were.

  “Any sailboats?” asked Billy, as if that was all he had come in to inquire about.

  “Sailboats?” cried the man. “Sailboats?”

  “Yes, toy sailboats.”

  “No, I haven’t got any of them, but I got a nice football. Here I show you!”

  “I don’t want a football. You can’t play football when the snow is on the ground!” exclaimed Bert, as the man started toward some shelves on the other side of the room.

  “I want a doll,” whispered Flossie. “Just a little doll.”

  “A doll!” exclaimed the man. “Sure I gots a fine lot of dolls. See!”

  Quickly he held out a large one with very blue eyes and hair just like Flossie’s.

  “Only a dollar seventy-five,” he said. “Very cheap!”

  “Oh, that’s too much!” exclaimed Nan. “We haven’t that much money. She wants only a little ten-cent doll.”

  “Oh, well, I have them kinds too!” said the man, in disappointed tones. “Here you are!”

  He held out one that did not appear to be very nice.

  “You can get those for five cents in the other stores,” whispered Nell.

  “Better take it,” said her brother. “Then I’ll ask about the dishes.”

  “Yes, we’ll take it,” agreed Nan.

  So Flossie was given her doll, and, even though it might have been only five cents somewhere else, she liked it just as well.

  “What else you wants to buy, childrens?” asked the old man. “I got lots more things so cheap—oh
, so very cheap!”

  Billy and Bert strolled over to the window. They looked down in. Nan crowded to their side. She felt sure, now, that the two pieces of china were the very ones Miss Pompret wanted. If they could only get that sugar bowl and pitcher!

  “I wish you had a sailboat!” murmured Billy, as if that was all he cared about. Then, turning to Nan he asked: “Would you like that sugar bowl and pitcher?”

  “Oh, yes, I think I would!” she exclaimed, trying not to make her voice seem too eager.

  “You might have a play party with them,” Billy went on. If Miss Pompret could have heard him then I feel sure she would have fainted, or had what Dinah would call “a cat in a fit.”

  “You want those dishes?” asked the old man, as he reached over and lifted the sugar bowl and pitcher from his window. “Ach! them is a great bargain. I let you have them cheap. And see, not a chip or a crack on ’em. Good china, too! Very valuable, but they is all I have left. I sells ’em cheap.”

  Bert took the sugar bowl and looked closely at it, while Nan took the pitcher. The children felt sure these were the same pieces that would fill out Miss Pompret’s set.

  “Look at the mark on the bottom,” whispered Nan to Bert, as the storekeeper hurried to the other side of the room to rescue a pile of chairs which Freddie seemed bent on pulling down. “Is the blue lion there?”

  “Yes,” answered Bert, “it is.”

  “And the letters ‘J. W.’?”

  “Yes,” Bert replied. “But, somehow, it doesn’t look like the one on Miss Pompret’s plates.”

  “Oh, I’m sure it’s the same one!” insisted Nan. “We’ve found the missing pieces, Bert, and we’ll get—”

  “Hush!” cautioned Billy, for the old man was coming back.

  “You want to buy them?” he asked. “I sell cheap. It’s a great bargain.”

  “Where did they come from?” asked Bert.

  “Come from? How shoulds I know. Maybe I get ’em at a fire sale, or maybe all the other dishes in that set get broken, and these all what are left. Somebody bring ’em in, and I buys ’em, or my wife she buys ’em. How can I tells so long ago?”

  “Oh, well, maybe we might take ’em for the girls to have a play party with their own set of dishes,” went on Billy. “But I wish you had a toy ship. How much for these dishes—this sugar bowl and pitcher?”

  “How much? Oh, I let you have these very cheap. They is worth five dollars—very rare china—very thin but hard to break. These is a good bargain—a great bargain. You shall have them for—two dollars!”

  CHAPTER XXI

  Just Suppose

  Nan Bobbsey gave gasp, just as if she had fallen into a bath tub full of cold water. Bert quickly glanced at his friend Billy. Nell had hurried over to the other side of the room to stop Flossie from pulling a pile of dusty magazines from a shelf down on top of herself. Billy seemed to be the only one who was not excited.

  “Two dollars?” he repeated. “That’s a lot of money.”

  “What? A lot of money for rich childrens? Ha! Ha! That’s only a little moneys!” laughed the man, rubbing his hands.

  “We aren’t rich,” said Bert. “And I don’t believe we have two dollars.” He was pretty sure he and Nan had not that much, at any rate.

  “How much you got?” asked the man eagerly. “Maybe I let you have these dishes cheaper, but they’s worth more as two dollars. How much you all got?”

  “How much have you?” asked Billy of Bert. Bert pulled some change from his pocket. The two boys counted it.

  “Eighty-seven cents,” announced Bert, when they had counted it twice.

  “Oh, that isn’t half enough!” cried the old man.

  “I have some money,” announced Nan, bringing out her little purse.

  “How much?” asked the man. That seemed to be all he could think about.

  Nan and Nell counted the change. It amounted to thirty-two cents.

  “How much is thirty-two and eighty-seven?” asked Nell.

  Bert and Billy figured it on a piece of paper.

  “A dollar and twenty-nine cents,” announced, Bert.

  “No, it’s only a dollar and nineteen,” declared Billy, who was a little better at figures than was his chum.

  “How much?” asked the old man, for the children had done their counting on the other side of the room, and in whispers.

  “A dollar and nineteen cents!” announced Billy.

  “Oh, I couldn’t let you have these dishes, for that,” said the old man, and he seemed about to take them from the counter where they had been put, to place them back in the window.

  “Wait a minute,” said Billy. “These dishes are worth only a dollar, but I have fifteen cents I can lend you, Bert. That will make a dollar and thirty-four cents. That’s all we have and if you don’t want to sell the dishes for that, we can go and get ’em somewhere else.”

  Nan was about to gasp out: “Oh!” but a look from Billy stopped her. She saw what he was trying to do.

  “A dollar thirty-four—that’s all the moneys you got?” asked the old man.

  “Every cent we’re going to give!” declared Billy firmly. “If you’ll sell the play dishes for that all right. If you won’t—”

  He seemed about to leave.

  “Oh, well, what I cares if I die in the poor-house?” asked the old man. “Here! Take ’em. But I am losing money. Those is valuable dishes. If I had more I could sell ’em for ten dollars maybe. But as they is all I got take ’em for a dollar and thirty-four. You couldn’t make it a dollar thirty-five, could you?”

  “No,” said Bert decidedly, “we couldn’t!”

  “Oh, dear!” sighed the old man. “Take ’em, then.”

  “They’re awfully dusty,” complained Nell, as she looked at the sugar bowl and pitcher.

  “That’s ’cause they’re so old and valuable, my dear,” snarled the old man. “But my wife she dust them off for you, and I wrap them up, though I ought to charge you a penny for a sheet of paper. But what I care if I dies in the poorhouse.”

  “Are you goin’ there soon?” asked Flossie. “We’ve got a poorhouse at Lakeport, and it’s awful nice.”

  “Oh, well, little one, maybe I don’t go there just yet,” said the man who spoke wrong words sometimes. “Here, Mina!” he called, and a woman, almost as old as he, came from the back room. “Wipe off the dust. I have sold the old dishes—the valuable old dishes.”

  “Ah, such a bargain as they got!” murmured the old woman. “Them is valuable china. Such a bargains!”

  “Where did you get them?” asked Nan, as the dishes were being wrapped and the old man was counting over the nickels, dimes and pennies of the children’s money.

  “Where I get them? Of how should I know? Maybe they come in by somebody what sell them for money. Maybe we buy them in some old house like Washington’s. It is long ago. We have had them in the shop a long time, but the older they are the better they get. They is all the better for being old—a better bargain, my dear!” and the old woman smiled, showing a mouth from which many teeth were missing.

  “Well, come on,” said Billy, when the dishes had been wrapped and given to Bert, who carried them carefully. “But I wish you had some sailboats,” he said to the old man, as if that was all they had come in to buy.

  “I have some next week,” answered the old man. “Comes around then and have a big bargains in a sailsboats.”

  “Maybe I will,” agreed Billy.

  Out of the shop walked the Bobbsey twins and their chums, the Martin children of Washington. And the hearts of Bert and Nan, at least, were beating quickly with excitement and hope. As for Flossie, she was holding her doll, and Freddie was blowing his whistle.

  “I’m a regular fire engine now,” declared Freddie. “Don’t you hear how the engine is blowing the whistle?”

  “You’ll have everybody looking at you, Freddie Bobbsey!” exclaimed Flossie. “Nan, do make him stop his noise.”

  “Oh, let him blo
w his whistle if he wants to,” said Bert. “It isn’t hurting anybody.”

  “I know what I’m going to do when I get home,” said Flossie. “I’m going to put a brand new dress on this doll, and give her a new hat, too.”

  “That will be nice,” said Nan.

  At that moment they had to cross at a street corner which was much crowded. There was a policeman there to regulate the coming and going of the people and carriages and automobiles, and when he blew his whistle the traffic would go up and down one street, and then when he blew his whistle again it would go up and down the other.

  The policeman had just blown on his whistle, and the traffic was going past the Bobbsey twins when Freddie gave a sudden loud blow. Immediately some of the carriages and automobiles going in one direction stopped short and the others commenced to go the other way.

  “For gracious sake, Freddie! see what you have done,” gasped Bert.

  The traffic policeman who stood in the middle of the two streets looked very much surprised. Then he saw it was Freddie who had blown the whistle, and he shook his finger at the little boy in warning.

  “He wants you to stop,” said Nan, and made Freddie put the whistle in his pocket for the time being.

  Then the Bobbseys and their friends hurried on their way.

  “I’ll give you the fifteen cents as soon as we get back to the hotel, Billy,” said Bert.

  “Oh, that’s all right,” his chum answered. “I’m in no hurry. Do you think we paid too much for the dishes?”

  “Oh, no!” exclaimed Nan. “I’d have given the two dollars if I’d had it. Why, Miss Pompret will give us a hundred dollars for these two pieces.”

  “That’s fifty dollars apiece!” exclaimed Nell. “It doesn’t seem that they could be worth that.”

  “Oh, but she wants them to make up her set,” said Bert. “Just these two pieces are missing. I wonder how they came to be in that second-hand store?”

  “Maybe the tramp who took them years ago brought them here and sold them,” suggested Nan. “But I don’t suppose we’ll ever really find out.”

  Eager and excited, the Bobbsey twins and their friends walked back toward the hotel.

  “Won’t mother and father be surprised when they find we have the Pompret china?” asked Nan of her brother.