STORY XXII

FLOP AND THE MARSHMALLOWS

“Boys,” said Uncle Wiggily Longears, the old gentleman rabbit, to Curly and Flop, the piggie chaps, one morning.  “Boys, do you think you can get along by yourselves this afternoon?”

“Why, I guess so,” answered Curly, as he looked off across the beach at Raccoon Island in Lake Hopatcong.  “But where are you going, Uncle Wiggily?”

“Oh, Pop Goes the Weasel wanted me to come down to his store and have a game of Scotch checkers after dinner,” said the old gentleman rabbit.  “He says he is lonesome since all the summer folk went away.”

“Of course, we can get along all right,” spoke Flop.  “We’ll have our lunch and, we’ll do the dishes, so you can go and play Scotch checkers with Pop Goes the Weasel.”

“But what are Scotch checkers?” asked Curly.

“Oh, when you play that game,” said Uncle Wiggily, “you have a nice Scotchman standing near you all the while to cook Scotch scones over a hot fire.  And scones are good to eat; something like pancakes, with maple syrup on, only different.  It is fun to play Scotch checkers.”

“I should think so,” said Flop.  “And could you bring us a few scones, Uncle Wiggily!”

“I’ll try,” said the old gentleman rabbit, “though Pop Goes the Weasel and I are very fond of eating them when we play checkers.”

So in the afternoon Uncle Wiggily went to visit his friend at the store on Raccoon Island, and the two piggie boys stayed home to keep house.  And, when they had washed the dishes, Curly said: 

“Now, Flop suppose we go looking for adventures.  I’ll go one way and you can go the other, and we’ll see who can find an adventure first.”

“All right,” said the other little piggie boy.  So they started away from the bungalow.  But as Curly fell asleep before he had gone much farther than the Sylvan Way (which is a nice little rustic bench on the island) no adventure happened to him.  But wait until I tell you what happened to Flop.

Off he started, and he had not gone very far before he heard some one crying out: 

“Oh, what shall I do with them?  Oh, so many as there are!  I never can eat them all!”

“My!” exclaimed Flop, “I wonder if that is a bad bear who has caught a whole lot of piggie or rabbit children?  Who ever it is can’t eat them all, so it must be something extra good.  I wonder what it is?”

So he hid behind a stump, and after a bit he peeked out and there he saw his old friend, little Cora Janet, of Montclair, walking around in the woods with a big box in her arms.  And on the box was a sign which read: 

CANDY

“My gracious sakes alive and some lollypops!” exclaimed Flop.  “She has so much candy she doesn’t know what to do with it!  I wonder if I can help her?”

So Flop jumped out from behind a bush, made a low bow, and said, most politely: