“What did he mean—­tell on him?” asked Bert.

“I don’t know, exactly,” answered Bob Guess.  “It was all sort of queer.  Maybe Mr. Hardy meant he was going to tell about Mr. Blipper taking your father’s coat and the lap robe.”

“I’m sure Mr. Blipper must have daddy’s coat,” declared Nan.  “This letter dropped from the pocket, and there was money and there were other papers, too.”

“I don’t know anything about them,” murmured Bob.

“Well, I know something!” cried Bert.  “And that is this!  What Mr. Hardy said he was going to tell on Blipper about was you, Bob Guess!”

“Me?” cried the strange boy.

“Yes, you!  I don’t believe you belong to Mr. Blipper at all!”

CHAPTER XXII

JOYOUS TIMES

Bob Guess could, for a moment, only stare at Bert after this strange remark.

“What do you mean?” asked the boy from the merry-go-round.  “Don’t I have to stay with Mr. Blipper if I don’t want to?”

“I don’t believe you do,” went on Bert.  “I heard my father and mother talking about it,” he explained to the others.  “My father said he was going to find out if Mr. Blipper had really adopted you.  And if you stay here until my father comes back he’ll have this Mr. Blipper arrested for taking his coat.  Just you stay here, Bob!”

“I’d like to,” sighed the unhappy lad.  “I don’t like Blipper.  And if I go back now, after having run away again, he’ll beat me!”

“We won’t let him!” exclaimed Aunt Sarah.  “Here, I’ll get you some dry clothes.  Harry has a suit you can wear.  And then we’ll see about this Blipper man!”

As she started to leave the room to get some dry clothing for Bob Guess, who was soaking wet, there was a noise and some excitement out in the yard.  Then Nan caught the sound of a voice she well knew.

“Oh, it’s Flossie!” she cried.  “It’s Flossie!  They’ve found them!”

Instantly there was a mad rush for the door, and a little later into the warm, comfortable farmhouse came Mr. and Mrs. Bobbsey with the missing twins—­poor little wet twins, but happy for all that.

“Oh, hurray!” cried Bert, grabbing hold of Harry and dancing around the room with him.  “Now everything’s all right!”

“Oh, what happened to you?” asked Nan through her tears, as she kissed first Freddie and then Flossie and then both the twins at the same time.

“Well, we found them!” said Mr. Bobbsey to Uncle Daniel.

“Where?”

“On Hemlock Island, where the balloon came down.  The motor-boat we got to go across the lake was also wrecked on the same island.  And Flossie and Freddie started out in a rowboat to come to shore, but they got lost in the fog and had to turn back.  And they heard us on the island and came to us.”

“How did you get off if your motor-boat was wrecked?” asked Bert.

“Oh, Captain Craig managed to patch it up, and it got us back to the mainland.  We went back to where we had started from—­Captain Craig’s dock—­and then we came on here in my auto.  Oh, what a day this has been!” exclaimed Mr. Bobbsey, sinking wearily into a chair.