So Jackie, and Curly and Flop hurried along together toward the school, when, all at once, they came to a nice, big, slanting cellar door, just right for sliding down, and on it was a sign which read: 

    “No one must slide down
     this cellar door!”

“Now isn’t that queer,” said Jackie Bow Wow.

“It certainly is,” agreed Curly.

“I wonder why no one is allowed to slide down,” spoke Flop.  “It’s a dandy door for sliding.  I’ve a good notion to try it.”

“No, you mustn’t!” said his brother.  “We are almost late for school now.”

“Oh, but I would just love to slide down it,” went on Flop, sort of hanging back, while his brother and Jackie went on ahead.  “I wonder if a giant lives under that door, or a fairy?”

“Maybe that’s the reason no one must slide down it,” went on the little piggie boy.  But no one answered him and, though he looked all around the cellar door, he could see no reason why he should not slide down it.

“Maybe it’s got slivers in, and they’d stick in me,” went on Flop, as he came closer to the door, but it was as nice and smooth as heart could wish.

“Well, this is certainly queer,” said Flop.  “Here is the nicest sliding cellar door in all the world and no one is allowed to slide down it.  I wonder who lives in the house,” and he looked up at the house to which the cellar door belonged, but it was all closed up, and shutters were over the windows.

“I guess no one is at home,” thought the little piggie boy.

“Say, aren’t you coming to school?” called back Jackie Bow Wow, for he and Curly were some distance down the street by this time.

“Yes, come on, or you’ll surely be late,” said Flop Ear’s brother.

“I’m coming!” cried Flop, but he thought he would take just one more look at the sliding door.

“I would like to have just one slide on it,” he said.  “I believe I’ll try it.”

He looked ahead to where his brother and Jackie were and decided that if he did take one slide he could run and catch up to them, and not be late.

“Here goes;” said Flop, and he laid his books down on a clean stone.

Then he read the sign once more: 

    “No one must slide down
     this cellar door!”

“I guess it’s only a joke,” decided Flop.  “Now for one good slide and then I’ll go to school.”

So he went around to the side of the door, where there was a stone, and, by stepping on this, and giving a little jump, the piggie boy got to the top part of the sliding door, ready for a coast down.

Of course he had no sled on which to slide, but his trousers were good and thick, and he knew he could not wear a hole in the seat just this once.  So he gathered his legs together under him, gave himself a little push and down the slanting door he went as nicely as an icicle in the middle of the Fourth of July.