"But when are you going to tell me _yours?_" Nan managed to whisper to her
brother when the dessert was being served.
"Come down to the lumberyard to-morrow afternoon," he whispered. "It's
almost done."
Without telling Flossie or Freddie anything about it, Nan slipped off by
herself the next afternoon, and from the watchman in her father's
lumberyard learned that Bert and another boy were in one of the sheds. As
Nan came closer she could hear the noise of hammering and sawing.
"Oh, Bert, what are you making?" cried Nan, as she saw her brother and
Tommy Todd busy with sticks, boards, hammer and nails.
"This is the _Bird!_" cried Bert, waving a hammer at something that, so
far, did not look like much of anything.
"A bird?" cried Nan. "It looks more like a scare-crow!"
"Just wait until it's finished!" said Tommy Todd. "When we get the sail
on----"
"Oh, Bert! is it a _boat?_" cried Nan eagerly.
"Yes, it's going to be an ice-boat, and I've called it the _Bird_," was
the answer. "I got the idea of building it after I'd seen Mr. Watson's.
Father said I might, and he gave me the lumber, and let me have a
carpenter to help, for Tommy and I couldn't do it all. But now the
ice-boat is almost done and in a few days I'll sail it."
"And may I have a ride?" asked Nan.
"Of course. I'll take the whole family," said Bert. "Just you wait," and
then he and Tommy went on hammering and sawing.
CHAPTER III
A RUNAWAY
"All aboard!"
"Don't forget your baggage!"
"This way for your tickets!"
"The ice-boat _Bird_ makes no stops this side of the lake! All aboard!"
Bert Bobbsey and Tommy Todd thus were calling at the end of one of the
lumberyard docks one day about a week after Nan had seen her brother
building the ice-boat.
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