Three days after that, when Mrs. Bobbsey came in from shopping with the two sets of twins, she heard some one moving about in their apartment as she entered.

“Oh, it’s Daddy!” cried Flossie, as some one caught her up in his arms.  “Daddy’s come back!”

“I’m so glad!” called Freddie, running to get a hug and kiss from his father.  “And we almost had a goat!” he added.

CHAPTER XXI

UNCLE JACK’S REAL NAME

“Well!  Well!” laughed Mr. Bobbsey, when he heard what Freddie said.  “That’s great!  Almost had a goat, did you?  I must hear about that!”

“But first tell us about Uncle Jack,” begged Nan.  “Is he going to get better?”

“Oh, I hope he is going to get better!” broke in Freddie.  “It isn’t a bit nice to be sick.  You have to stay in bed, and sometimes you have to have your head all bound up, and sometimes you have to take the awfullest kind of medicine ever was.”

“You don’t always have to stay in bed when you’re sick,” put in Flossie.  “And sometimes the medicine isn’t bad a bit.  It’s sweet and nice.”

“But tell us about Uncle Jack,” begged Nan again.  “He’ll get better, won’t he?”

“That is something the doctors can’t tell,” answered her father.  “I saw him in the hospital.”

“Was he glad to see you?” asked Mrs. Bobbsey.

“Well, to tell you the truth he didn’t know me.  He was very ill and was out of his head with fever.  I did what I could for him, and saw that he would be well taken care of, and then went to Mr. Todd’s house to stay all night.  I said I’d go back to the hospital in the morning, but Uncle Jack was no better, and, after waiting two or three days, I decided to come back here.”

“Didn’t he know you at all?” asked Nan.

“No, he was out of his head with fever all the while.  Before I came, he had told some of the doctors that he had something very important to tell me—­something that had to do with his friends or relations, they said.  He would tell no one else but me, but when I got to his bedside he could not talk so that I could understand him.  So really I don’t know any more about him than before.  I don’t even know what his real name is.

“Sometimes he used to call himself Jackson, and again it would be some other name.  I think he may not have known who he really was.  But if he does, it will be some time before he can tell me, or any one else.  He was still out of his head when I came away.”

“Are you going back?” asked Mrs. Bobbsey.

“Not until they send for me, which will be when he takes a turn for the better or worse.  I want to do all I can for the poor old man, for he was so good to Flossie and Freddie.  But now tell me about the goat.”

Freddie and Flossie took turns doing that, and a very funny story they made of it, too.  Mr. Bobbsey laughed, and laughed again.  Then he had to hear about everything else that had happened while he was in Lakeport.