James scratched his head as he saw the bent and crooked nails Freddie had piled up on a bundle of shingles near by.  Then the watchman glanced at the tangle of string.

“As soon as I find a stone for a hammer we’ll start,” Freddie said.  “You can get out the boards.”

James wanted to be kind and amuse Freddie all he could, for he liked the little boy.  But to pull boards out of the neat piles in Mr. Bobbsey’s lumber yard was not allowed, unless the boards were to be put on a wagon to be carted off and sold.

“I’ll tell you what we’d better do, Freddie,” said the watchman at last.

“What?” Freddie asked.

“We’d better make a little ship first.  That will be easy and we can make it like a big one.  Then we’ll have something to go by—­a sort of pattern, such as your mother uses when she makes a dress for your little sister.”

“Oh yes!” cried Freddie.  “That’s what we’ll do—­make a little pattern ship first.  It will be easier.”

“Much easier,” said James.  “Now I’ll find some small pieces of board for you, and——­”

But just then one of the workmen in the yard called to the watchman to come and help him pile some lumber on a wagon.

“Wait just a minute, Freddie,” said James.  “I’ll be back soon and help you.”

“All right,” answered Freddie.  He sat down on a pile of shingles, and thought of the time when he and Tommy Todd should set off on their ship to find the shipwrecked Mr. Todd.

The watchman was gone longer than he expected.  Freddie grew tired of waiting for him, and finally said to himself: 

“I’m going to look for some wood myself.  I guess I can find it.”  He looked for some on the ground, but, though there were many chips, and broken pieces, there was none of the kind Freddie thought would be good for a toy ship—­the pattern after which the real one would be made.

“I guess I’ll climb up on one of these piles of lumber,” thought Freddie, “and see if there are any small pieces of board on top.  It is easy to climb up.”

This was true enough, and once or twice before Freddie had made his way to the top of a pile.  Each stack of lumber was made in a sort of slanting fashion, so that the back of it was almost like a pair of steps.  Lumber is piled this way to let the rain run off better.

Freddie went up the back part of a pile, some distance away from the bundles of shingles where he had been talking to James.

“This is an easy place to climb,” Freddie said to himself.  “I hope I shall find what I want on top.”

Step by step he went up the pile of lumber, until he was at the top.  But, to his disappointment, he found there nothing which he could bring James to use in making a small ship.  The boards were all too long and wide.

“I might bring one down, and have James cut it smaller with his knife,” said Freddie, speaking aloud.  “That’s what I’ll do.”