Daddy Takes Us to the Garden | Page 3

do something Mab.
Let's have some fun. What can we do, Mother?" and back the children
were, just where they started.
"Why don't you get Roly-Poly and play with him?" asked Mrs. Blake.
"He's gone away. I guess he ran down to Daddy's office like he does
sometimes," said Mab.
"Let's go down after him," exclaimed Hal. "That'll be some fun."
"I don't want to," spoke Mab. "I'd rather play with my doll."
"You never want to do anything I want to play?" complained Hal.
"Can't she come with me after Roly-Poly, Mother?"
"Well, I don't know. Can't you both play something here until Daddy
comes home? Why don't you play bean-bag?"
"We did, but Hal always throws 'em over my head and I can't reach,"
Mab said.
"She throws crooked," complained Hal.
"Oh, my dears! I think you each must have the Spring Fever!" laughed
Mother Blake. "Try and be nicer toward one another. Let me see now.
How would you like to help me bake a cake, Mab?"
"Oh, that will be fun!" and Mab jumped up from the porch, where she
had been sitting near her mother's rocking chair, and began to clap her
hands. "May I stir it myself, and put the dough in the pans?
"Yes, I think so."
"Pooh! That's no fun for me!" remarked Hal. "I want to have some fun,

too."
"You may clean out the chocolate or frosting dish--whichever kind of a
cake we make," offered Mab. "You always like to scrape out the
chocolate dish, Hal."
"Yes, I like that," he said, smiling a little.
"Well, you may have it all alone this time, if I make the cake," went on
Mab. Nearly always she and Hal shared this pleasure--that of scraping
out, with a knife or spoon, the chocolate or sugar icing dish from which
Mother Blake took the sweet stuff for the top and inside the layers of
the cake. "Come on, Hal!"
Hal was willing enough now, and soon he and his sister were in the
kitchen, helping Mother Blake with her cake-making. Though, to tell
the truth, Mab and Mrs. Blake did most of the work.
While the three were in the midst of their cake-making, into the kitchen
rushed a little poodle dog, whirling around, barking and trying to catch
his tail.
"Oh, Roly-Poly, where have you been?" cried Hal. "Did Daddy come
home with you?"
"Bow-wow!" barked Roly-Poly, which might mean "no" or "yes," just
as you happened to listen to his bark.
"Oh, don't get in my way, Roly!" called Mab as the little dog danced
about in front of her, while she was carrying a pan filled with cake
dough toward the oven. "Look out! Oh, there it goes."
Just what Mab had feared came to pass. She tripped over the poodle
dog, and, to save herself from falling, she had to drop the pan of cake
dough. Down it fell, right on Roly-Poly's back.
"Bow-wow-wow!" he barked and growled at the same time.
"Oh, look at him!" laughed Hal "He's a regular cake himself."

"Don't let him run through the house that way!" called Mother Blake.
"He'll get the carpets and furniture all dough. Get him, Hal!"
Hal made a grab for the little pet dog, and caught him by his tail. This
made Roly-Poly howl louder than ever, until Hal, not wishing to hurt
his pet, managed to get him in his arms. But of course this made Hal's
waist all covered with cake dough.
"Never mind," said Mother Blake, as she saw Hal looking at himself in
dismay. "It will all wash off. Better to have it on your waist than on the
carpets. Why, Mab! What's the matter?" for Mab was crying softly.
"Oh--Oh, my--my nice ca-cake is all spoiled," she sobbed.
"Oh, no it isn't!" comforted Mother Blake. "Only one pan of dough is
spilled, and there is plenty more. The kitchen floor can easily be
washed, and so can Roly Poly.
"Hal," went on his mother, "you take the dog up to the bath tub and
give him a good scrubbing. He'll like that. Take off your own waist and
let the water run on that. I'll wipe up the floor and you can fill another
pan and put it in the oven, Mab. Don't cry! We'll have the cake in time
for supper yet."
So Mab dried her tears and once more began on the cake, while Mrs.
Blake cleaned up the dough from the floor. In a little while the cake
was baking in the oven, and Hal came down stairs, rather wet and
splattered, but clean. With him was Roly-Poly, looking half drowned,
but also clean.
"Well, we did a lot of things!" said Hal, when he had on dry clothes,
and he and Mab