“I’m a regular fire engine now,” declared Freddie.  “Don’t you hear how the engine is blowing the whistle?”

“You’ll have everybody looking at you, Freddie Bobbsey!” exclaimed Flossie.  “Nan, do make him stop his noise.”

“Oh, let him blow his whistle if he wants to,” said Bert.  “It isn’t hurting anybody.”

“I know what I’m going to do when I get home,” said Flossie.  “I’m going to put a brand new dress on this doll, and give her a new hat, too.”

“That will be nice,” said Nan.

At that moment they had to cross at a street corner which was much crowded.  There was a policeman there to regulate the coming and going of the people and carriages and automobiles, and when he blew his whistle the traffic would go up and down one street, and then when he blew his whistle again it would go up and down the other.

The policeman had just blown on his whistle, and the traffic was going past the Bobbsey twins when Freddie gave a sudden loud blow.  Immediately some of the carriages and automobiles going in one direction stopped short and the others commenced to go the other way.

“For gracious sake, Freddie! see what you have done,” gasped Bert.

The traffic policeman who stood in the middle of the two streets looked very much surprised.  Then he saw it was Freddie who had blown the whistle, and he shook his finger at the little boy in warning.

“He wants you to stop,” said Nan, and made Freddie put the whistle in his pocket for the time being.

Then the Bobbseys and their friends hurried on their way.

“I’ll give you the fifteen cents as soon as we get back to the hotel, Billy,” said Bert.

“Oh, that’s all right,” his chum answered.  “I’m in no hurry.  Do you think we paid too much for the dishes?”

“Oh, no!” exclaimed Nan.  “I’d have given the two dollars if I’d had it.  Why, Miss Pompret will give us a hundred dollars for these two pieces.”

“That’s fifty dollars apiece!” exclaimed Nell.  “It doesn’t seem that they could be worth that.”

“Oh, but she wants them to make up her set,” said Bert.  “Just these two pieces are missing.  I wonder how they came to be in that second-hand store?”

“Maybe the tramp who took them years ago brought them here and sold them,” suggested Nan.  “But I don’t suppose we’ll ever really find out.”

Eager and excited, the Bobbsey twins and their friends walked back toward the hotel.

“Won’t mother and father be surprised when they find we have the Pompret china?” asked Nan of her brother.

“Yes,” he answered, “I guess they will.  But, oh, Nan!  Just suppose!”

“Suppose what?” she asked, for Bert seemed worried over something.

“Suppose these aren’t the right dishes, after all?  S’posin’ these aren’t the ones Miss Pompret wants?”

Chapter XXII