Mr. Parkney, who by the way looked strong and well again, soon had everything all straight.  He and Bob went out to the barn and put the horse in his stall and brought back the five children.  Mrs. Parkney spread a red cloth on the kitchen table, for the kitchen was cozy and warm and no amount of snow from rubber boots and little shoes could harm the linoleum floor, and began to get them something to eat.

“They must be starved, poor lambs,” she said, “It is almost three o’clock.”

You see, the children had been walking ever since half-past eleven o’clock that morning and had had nothing to eat since their breakfasts.  No wonder they were tired and hungry.

“I don’t see how you could walk away out here,” said Bob Parkney, pouring milk into the bowls his mother had put out on the table.  “I did it this forenoon, and I was dead tired when I got home.”

“Bob walked to school, because the trolley cars were not running,” explained Mrs. Parkney.  “His father took the light wagon and one of the horses and went after him right after dinner to save him the walk home.  But the public schools dismissed the pupils early, just as Miss May did you, and Bob had started before his father got to the school.”

“And while I was in the building, asking for Bob, the horse took it into its head to walk away without me,” said Mr. Parkney.  “So I had to walk all the way back home myself.”

“How are we to get these children home?” said Mrs. Parkney to her husband, while Sunny Boy and his six playmates were busy with the delicious home-made bread and country milk she had given them.  “Their mothers will be wild with anxiety, Robert.  Our telephone is out of order, or we could telephone and let them know and keep the children here over night.”

“Bob and I will take them home in the sleigh,” said Mr. Parkney at once.  “It’s an old rattletrap affair, and I don’t believe it has been used for years.  Still, I reckon Bob and I can make it hold together for one trip.  But, Mother, find out where these little folks live before they go to sleep.  I might leave the wrong child at the wrong house.”

The cold and the long walk had made the children very sleepy.  Sunny Boy could hardly hold his eyes open and Jessie Smiley went to sleep with her spoon in her hand.  When Mrs. Parkney tried to wake her up and ask her where she lived, Jessie only opened her eyes and smiled and closed them again.

“My feet are warm now,” she murmured.

“I know where she lives,” said Sunny Boy to Mrs. Parkney.  “I’ll tell Bob.  I know where all the children live, don’t I, Jimmie?”

Mrs. Parkney said she would have to depend on Sunny Boy, for the others were so sleepy they almost tumbled over standing up when she tried to put their hats and coats on them.

Bob and his father went out and harnessed the old sleigh to two black horses (not the one the children had brought home, for he was tired out, of course,) and Mrs. Parkney filled bottles with hot water and wrapped hot flatirons in old cloths to keep them warm.  She insisted on coming out to the sleigh and tucking away the seven boys and girls, and every one of her own children followed to watch her.  Perhaps they wanted a sleigh ride, but Mr. Parkney said he would have his hands full with the load he had, and he did not want any extra passengers.