And then, all of a sudden, the _Bird_ shot ahead more
swiftly than before.
The wind was blowing more strongly, and when Freddie moved the rudder he
steered the ice-boat so that the wind sent it straight ahead instead of a
little to one side.
"Oh! oh!" cried Flossie, "this is too fast! How can we stop the ice-boat,
Freddie?"
"I--I don't know," answered the little boy. "Don't you like to go fast,
Flossie?"
"Not so fast as this. I can't make my nose work--I can't get any air!"
Indeed they were sailing even more swiftly than when Bert was steering,
and Flossie was frightened. So was Freddie, but he was not so quick to say
so.
"Please stop the boat!" cried Flossie again.
"Well, I'll try," promised Freddie. "I guess this is the rope you pull
on," and he took hold of the one fast to the end of the sail--the rope
that kept the big piece of white canvas from blowing away.
Freddie pulled on this, but it could not have been the right rope, or else
he pulled it the wrong way, for, in an instant, the ice-boat seemed to
"stand on its ear," as Bert spoke of it afterward. Flossie and Freddie
were almost tossed out.
"Oh, don't do that!" cried the little girl.
"I--I didn't mean to," Freddie told her. "I guess I pulled on the wrong
rope. Here's another. I'll try that."
By this time the ice-boat was more than two miles down the lake, for the
wind was blowing hard and the _Bird_ sailed swiftly. The children could
not see their father, mother, Bert or Nan now.
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