His father, however, stepped in front of him, and said quietly: 

“One child in there is enough at a time.  I’ll get Flossie!”

And Flossie, not at all thinking of danger, if danger there was, kept going on to get her apple.

The elephant, as it happened, was chained by one leg to a heavy iron ring in the side of his cage, and he could move only a short distance.  But he was so anxious to get the apple that he stretched his legs as far as he could, pulling hard on the chain, and then he stretched out his trunk.

And truly it seemed made of rubber, that elephant’s trunk did, from the way he stuck it out.  But, stretch as he did, the elephant could not quite reach the apple, which he wanted very much.

“No, you mustn’t take it!” Flossie was saying.  “You can’t have my apple!  I was only going to let you smell it, Mr. Elephant.  It isn’t good for you to eat it, my mother says.  I’ll take it back and maybe some day I’ll bring you another.”

By this time Flossie was almost within reach of her red-cheeked apple, but, what was worse, she was also almost within reach of that trunk, which, however soft and gentle it might seem when picking up a peanut, was very strong, and could squeeze a big man or a little girl very hard indeed—­that is, if the elephant was a bad one and wanted to do such a thing.

“Oh, Flossie!  Come back!  Come back!” cried Mrs. Bobbsey, who had been so frightened at first that she could not say a word.

“I want to get my apple,” answered the little girl.  “The elephant can’t have it!  I only wanted to let him smell how good it would taste if he could eat it.”

She was stooping over now, to pick up the fruit, and the tip of the long trunk was brushing the fluffy hair on Flossie’s head.  Nan covered her face with her hands, and Bert looked eagerly about, as though for something to throw at the big animal.

Mr. Bobbsey was climbing over the rail that was in front of the elephant’s cage, and the people around were calling and shouting.

The elephant really did have the end of one of Flossie’s curls on the tip of his trunk, when along came one of the keepers, or animal trainers.  Somebody had sent him word, that a little girl was in one of the animal cages.  The keeper knew right away what to do.

“Back, Ganges!” he cried to the big elephant.  “Get back there!  Back!  Back!”

The elephant raised his trunk high in the air, and made a funny trumpeting noise through it, as though half a dozen big men had all blown their noses at once.  Then, as the keeper himself went in between the bars, the elephant slowly backed to the far end, his chain clanking as he did so.

“There!  I got my apple!” cried Flossie, as she picked it up from where it had rolled in the straw.  And then, before she knew what was happening, the keeper picked her up and carried her to the outside rail, where he placed her in Mr. Bobbsey’s arms.