“What is it?” asked Russ.  “I can guess it, easy.”

“No, you can’t!” declared his brother.

“I can so!”

“You can not!”

“Well, let’s hear it,” demanded Russ.

“It’s when is a rat not a rat?” asked Laddie.  “That’s the riddle.  When is a rat not a rat?”

“It’s always a rat,” said Rose.

“Do you mean when a cat is after him?” asked Russ, trying to guess the riddle.

“No,” answered Laddie.  “That isn’t it.  I’ll give you another guess.”

Russ tried to think of several other reasons why a rat was sometimes not a rat, but at last he gave up.

“This is it,” said Laddie.  “A rat isn’t a rat when he’s a bell-ringer; like the one in the attic was last night.”

“Yes, that’s a pretty good riddle,” agreed Russ, after a bit.  “Some day I’m going to make a riddle.  Now I’m going to make snowshoes.”

“How do you make them?” asked Laddie.

Russ was going to tell his brother, and take him out to the barn to show him, when Mother Bunker called up: 

“Who wants to go for a ride with Grandpa?”

“I do!  I!  Take me!  I want to go!” came in a chorus.

“Well, he has room for all of you, so come along.  He’s going to Tarrington to get some friends to come out to the Thanksgiving dinner, and you six may all go along,” said Mother Bunker.

So the six little Bunkers had another fine sleigh ride, and came back to Great Hedge with fine appetites.  They also brought back in the sled with them Mr. and Mrs. Burton, old friends of Grandpa Ford, who generally spent the Thanksgiving holiday with him.

For the next few days there were so many things going on at Great Hedge that if I only told about them I’d fill this book.  But, as I have other happenings to relate to you, and the ghost to tell about, I will just skip over this part by saying that every one, even down to Mun Bun, helped get ready for the Thanksgiving dinner.

Such goings-on as there were in Grandma Ford’s kitchen!  Such delicious smells of cake and pie and pudding!  Such baking, roasting, boiling, frying and stewing!  Such heaps of good things in the pantry!

And then the dinner!  The big roast turkey, and celery, and a big dish of red cranberries, and other good things!

“I got the wish-bone!” cried Rose, as she finished her plate.

“Let me help pull it with you, when it gets dry!” begged Russ, and then, in a whisper, he said:  “If I get the wish I’ll wish we could find the ghost.”

“So’ll I,” said Rose.

After dinner the children played games in the house, as it blew up cold and blustery and was not nice to go out in the snow.  Rose had put the wish-bone over the kitchen stove to dry, and, late in the afternoon, she and Russ went out to get it to break, and wish over it.  The one who held the larger part could make a wish.

“Snap!” went the wish-bone.