cold in this room. Maybe we'll all get the croup if we can't have a
better fire."

"It isn't the croup you mean, Vi," put in Rose again, but without
stopping to explain to her smaller sister where and how she was wrong
about William's illness.

"Say, Russ, why don't the steampipes hum any more?" broke in the voice
of Margy, the next to the very littlest Bunker, who was playing with
that latter very important person at one of the great windows
overlooking the street.

Russ chuckled. He had just put the very last crooked piece of the puzzle
into place.

"You don't expect to see humming birds in winter, do you, Margy?" he
asked.

"Just the same, winter is the time for steampipes to hum," said Rose,
shivering a little. "Oh! See! It's beginning to snow!"

"So 'tis," cried Russ, who was the oldest of the six. "Supposing it
should be a blizzard, Rose Bunker?"

"S'posing it should!" repeated his sister, quite as much excited as Russ
was at such a prospect.

"Buzzards fly and eat dead things. We saw 'em in Texas at Cowboy
Jack's," announced Laddie, forgetting his riddle-making for the moment.