He turned the key that wound up the spring, and as soon as it was tight enough the Plush Bear began to move his paws, shake his head from side to side and growl in a gentle voice, just as Santa Claus had intended he should do.

“He’s all right,” said Arthur.

“Thank goodness for that!” exclaimed the Plush Bear to himself.  “One never knows what may happen when one falls out of a car window and then from a wheeled chair to the boardwalk.  I might have got a lot of slivers in me, or have loosened a wheel!  I’m glad I’m all right.”

After an hour spent on the boardwalk, seeing the many sights and looking at the waves of the ocean rolling up on the sandy beach, Arthur and his sister, with their father and mother, went back to their hotel.  Evening was coming on and it was time for supper, or dinner as it is called in fashionable seaside hotels, for the principal meal is served in the evening instead of at noon.

“I wish we could go down and play on the sand,” said Nettie, as she and her brother got out of the wheeled chair.  “My Rag Doll wants to go barefoot on the beach.”

“And I think my Plush Bear would like it, too,” said Arthur.

“You may go down and play in the sand all day to-morrow,” promised their mother.

“Oh, won’t we have fun!” cried Nettie.  “Maybe my Rag Doll can learn to swim.”

“Well, swimming won’t hurt her,” said Arthur; “but I’m not going to let my Plush Bear get in the water.  I’m going to make a sand cave for him to live in.”

“Well, it seems I am to have some fun,” thought the toy, as he was taken up in the elevator.

The Plush Bear did not like the elevator very much.  It gave him a queer feeling among his wheels and spring; and his grunter, by means of which he growled, seemed to be turning over and over.  But this did not last long, and while Arthur and Nettie, with their parents, were at dinner in the hotel, the Bear and the Doll had a chance to talk.

“How do you like it at this fashionable seaside hotel?” asked the Bear.

“Quite well,” answered the Doll, lifting her eyebrows the way she had seen some ladies doing in the hotel parlor as she was carried in.  “I wish Nettie would put a different dress on me, though,” the Doll added.  “It is fashionable to dress here in the evening, but she has left my old clothes on.”

“Old clothes are best,” growled the Bear.  “You feel more comfortable in them.  I don’t need any, I’m glad to say, not even at the cold North Pole.  But say, Rag Doll, now we’re alone, let’s do something.”

“I know what we can do!” the Rag Doll exclaimed.  “All my life I have wanted to play with the glistening things in a hotel bathroom.  I want to work the shower, and turn the shiny handles.  There are ever so many more than we have at home.  Come on into the bathroom, and let’s turn every handle we see!”

“All right,” agreed the Plush Bear.  “That’ll be fun!”