Read Ebook: The Curlytops touring around; or The missing photograph albums by Garis Howard Roger Greene Julia Illustrator

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Ebook has 391 lines and 13386 words, and 8 pages

"Well, maybe you'll get it!" laughed Janet, as she cuddled him in her arms.

In spite of what her husband had said about the bears being well secured, Mrs. Martin, several times in the night, awakened, thinking she heard the shaggy cubs shuffling along through the forest.

But nothing like this occurred, and morning came without anything having happened in the night. Breakfast was served and eaten, the things straightened up and put back in place, and off to the lumber camp started the Curlytops.

"There it is!" cried Ted, a little later, as they drove along the river road. He pointed to a cluster of log cabins in the woods, cabins set down in the midst of a clearing.

"Yes, I guess this is the lumber camp all right," assented his father.

"I see the two bears!" added Janet, pointing to the cubs, chained at the rear of one of the log cabins.

"Well, this will give us a new set of adventures--stopping in a lumber camp," said Mr. Martin, as he guided the car over the not very smooth road that led up to the cluster of cabins.

At that moment, from down the road in the other direction, came some strange yells, shouts and cries:

"Yip! Yip! Yippie!" was yelled, and then followed more strange noises.

"What do you imagine that can be?" asked Mrs. Martin, wonderingly, of her husband, while several dogs in the lumber camp began to bark excitedly.

A SMASH

Mr. Martin for a time thought there must be some sort of fight or other kind of trouble among the lumbermen to cause all this noise. The lumbermen, he knew, were, some of them, rough characters, and he did not wish the Curlytops and Trouble to see any fighting or quarreling among them.

The children, however, were excited and curious. They looked toward the bend in the road whence the noise came, and a moment later Janet cried out in delight:

"Oh, it's the movie actors! See, there's Mr. Weldon!"

"That's right--the cowboys!" added her brother. "I wonder what they are doing here!"

"They probably came to take some pictures in the lumber camp," said Mr. Martin.

But taking pictures seemed very far from the thoughts of the movie actors--at least, for the time being. They were intent on having a good time, for they were laughing among themselves and many of the men were giving voice to that "yi-yippy" yell which sounded so wild.

"I guess they've just finished some hard work," said Mrs. Martin, as she laughed at some of the antics of the riders. "They're like boys out of school."

So it proved, for when Ned Weldon and some others of the men who had been friendly with the Martin family while at Dawson's Farm, saw the family, they rode up and renewed their friendship, and also told why they had come here.

"We had to have a lumber camp location for this part of the film," explained Mr. Birch, the director. "So we came here."

"But we didn't expect to find you here," added Mr. Weldon, as he made his horse prance on its hind legs, much to the amusement of Trouble.

"We didn't expect to come here," stated Mr. Martin. "But when Mr. Teeter invited us we thought it would give the children something new to see for their vacation tour."

"And they's bears, too!" exclaimed Trouble.

"I guess you mean elephants, don't you?" asked Mr. Weldon, who had more than once laughed at the little fellow's pronunciation of the name.

"No, not nellifunts--bears," insisted Trouble. "They's over there," and he pointed to the two tame bruins, chained to a tree. The movie actors had not yet seen the bears, it appeared.

But Mr. Birch had no sooner looked toward the cubs than he gave a cry of delight and said:

"Just what we want! You remember that scene, Weldon, where you go into the old cabin?"

"Yes, I remember that," answered the cowboy actor.

"Well, I've been trying to think of something funny that could happen there. The bears will be the very thing! We'll put them in the cabin, and you go in. Then the bears chase you out. It will be very funny."

"Funny for the bears, maybe, but not for me!" exclaimed Mr. Weldon. "Do you think I'm going into a cabin with a couple of bears?"

"Why, sure you are," replied the director.

"Well, sure I am not!" cried the cowboy. "I won't do such a thing! Do you think I want to be clawed by a bear and have my clothes torn?" and he made such a funny face that the Curlytops laughed.

But Trouble solved the problem by saying:

"They is tame bears. They won't hurt you, Mr. Weldon, and they eats peanuts like nellifunts."

"Oh, if they're tame bears, that's another thing," said the movie actor. "But I want to be sure they are tame."

"Yes, they are," said Mr. Martin. "The bears came to our camp last night. We thought they were wild, but they soon proved to be tame. Mr. Teeter has raised them from little cubs."

"Just the thing for us, then," said Mr. Birch. "We'll have those bears filmed to-morrow. It will make a funny scene, Weldon, with you climbing out of a cabin window chased by bears."

"All right--I'll go through with it," said the cowboy with a sigh and another funny face which made the Curlytops laugh. "But if they tear my clothes you'll have to buy me a new suit."

"I will," promised the movie director.

Mr. Birch hurried off to arrange with the tamer of the bears about using the animals in a scene with Mr. Weldon. The latter remained to talk to the Martins.

"Is Mr. Portnay here?" asked Mr. Martin. "I don't see anything of him."

"No, he doesn't take any part in this section of the film," answered the cowboy. "But we expect him to join us in a few days. Did you get back your box of albums that his man took by mistake?"

"Yes. I have the box here in the car," answered the father of the Curlytops. "We expect to reach Bentville soon, and then I will turn the old books and pictures over to Mr. Cardwell. I shall be glad to get rid of them, for I am always afraid something is going to happen to them."

One of the lumbermen came along then to say that Mr. Martin and his family could occupy one of the cabins in the woods while they were in the camp.

"It's only a rough shack," he said; "but it's the best we have."

"This will do very nicely," said Mrs. Martin, when they had driven over to it. "Cows can't poke their horns in, at any rate."

"No, ma'am, we haven't any cows here," said the lumberman, with such a puzzled look on his face that Mrs. Martin laughed and explained about the cow that tried to enter the tent while Ted was asleep.

The movie folk were distributed around the camp in the different cabins, and soon the place quieted down. This, as I have said, was not the busy season at the lumber camp in the woods, and only a few of the men were there. Because of this, many of the cabins were vacant, which gave the movie people and the Curlytops plenty of room.

The remainder of the day Ted and his sister, taking Trouble with them, watched the movie actors at work. Many short scenes were filmed, but the children were more interested in watching Mr. Weldon practice, or go through, his part with the tame bears.

At first the actor was a bit timid when with the shaggy creatures. But after he had seen Ted and Janet feed them lumps of sugar, Mr. Weldon got courage enough to let them eat from his hand. After that it was easy, and he and the two cubs were soon on friendly terms.

"Now we'll try how it goes when they chase you out of the cabin," suggested the director.

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