Chapter Six WOODEN SHOES

HANNY would not admit that Vevi had guessed which tulip her uncle intended to enter in the blue ribbon contest.

All the Brownies clustered about the plant, exclaiming at the beauty of the single bloom.

“The petals look like spun gold!” declared Connie, peering down into the tulip’s deep cup.

“This is the tulip your uncle developed, isn’t it?” demanded Vevi. She wanted to force Hanny to tell.

However, Hanny only laughed.

Quickly, she led the Brownies on to another section of the field, devoted entirely to purple flowers.

“You may each pick a bouquet of these,” she told the girls. “They are the common type of tulips—not special like the others. Next week, you may have all the tulips you can pick.”

“Loads and loads of them?” Sunny asked eagerly.

“We’ll have more than we can sell,” Hanny explained. “Uncle Peter likes to have the blossoms picked off, so that the strength of the bulb will not be sapped.”

The little girl told the Brownies that during the next week, hundreds of visitors likely would come to the farm to see the flowers in bloom. Many would order bulbs for fall delivery, selecting the color and type they liked best.

“If Uncle Peter receives many orders, I may be able to stay in America,” Hanny declared. “I hope people like the new varieties he has developed.”

The little Dutch girl next took the Brownies to an adjoining field, ablaze with rare and splendid colors.

“Uncle Peter calls these his ‘Rembrandt’ tulips,” Hanny said.

“Wasn’t Rembrandt a famous painter?” inquired Connie.

“The tulips were named for him because of their beautiful colors,” Hanny explained. “When Darwin tulips ‘break’ into fantastic color combinations, they are called Rembrandts.”

“I like this one,” declared Rosemary.

She pointed to a tulip which was very exotic appearing with flame-red petals on a white background.

“It is very pretty,” said Vevi, “but I like the Golden Beauty much better.”

Connie asked Hanny what caused tulips to change color or to “break” as horticulturists called it.

“Uncle Peter says ‘breaking’ is really a tulip disease, caused by the combined action of two viruses,” the little Dutch girl explained. “The flowers change color, but the plant keeps growing normally.”

“My, there must be a lot to growing tulips,” sighed Sunny.

As the children trooped out of the Rembrandt field, they spied Peter Van Der Lann near the office. He was watering a display of potted plants as he chatted with Miss Mohr and the Brownie Scout leader.

Hanny immediately sought him to ask if he would have time to make wooden shoes for the girls.

The nurseryman put aside his watering can. “And why should I make wooden shoes?” he asked, smiling indulgently at his beloved niece.

“Because the Brownie Scouts need them to wear at Mrs. Langley’s flower show. You can’t turn them down, Uncle Peter, because they have invited me to be a Brownie too! May I, Uncle Peter?”

Miss Gordon and the librarian already had talked to the nurseryman about his niece joining the organization. So Peter had his answer ready.

“You may join, little Hanny,” he declared. “And I will make the shoes.”

“It must be done quickly, for the flower show is next week,” Hanny said anxiously. “When will you make the shoes, Uncle Hanny?”

“I will take the measurements now,” he said. “Run for my tape measure.”

Miss Mohr and Miss Gordon protested that the nurseryman was far too busy to take time to carve wooden shoes for the children.

“I will do it at night,” he replied. “To whittle wood provides relaxation after a hard day in the fields.”

The two young women declared that they would pay for the work. Mr. Van Der Lann would not hear of such a thing. He insisted that the children were Hanny’s friends and his, and that it was little enough he could do to show his liking.

Soon Hanny came running back with a tape measure. Peter sat the children on a bench, and one by one, measured their feet.

Carefully, he marked down the figures on a sheet of paper.

“Connie has the largest foot,” he reported. “For her shoes I must have a very long piece of white wood.”

“What will our shoes look like when they are finished?” asked Rosemary.

“I will show you,” Hanny said.

Off she darted to the house again. In a moment she returned, two pairs of wooden shoes tucked under her arms.

The shoes were too small for Connie and Jane, but the other Brownies tried them on. First Sunny tried to walk in them.

Her feet felt very stiff and awkward. After she had taken four steps one of the shoes slipped off.

“You don’t do it right,” laughed Hanny. “See, I will show you.”

She slipped into the shoes which were an exact fit. Instead of walking, she ran across the yard toward the cheese house. The door was open.

One moment the children saw Hanny and her long braids framed in the doorway. The next instant she had disappeared into the building.

But setting neatly by the door were the wooden shoes!

“How did she do that?” cried Vevi in admiration. “Why, she didn’t even slow down when she went through the doorway!”

“I never saw her slip off her shoes,” added Jane. “She did it in a flash.”

“Hanny learned that trick when she was very young,” Peter chuckled. “She did not like to take time to remove her shoes before entering the house, so she learned to take them off on the fly.”

Hanny only stayed in the cheese house a moment. Soon she came out to pick up her shoes again.

“Let me see if I can do that!” cried Vevi.

Hanny gave her the shoes, putting on her leather ones again.

“I like these American shoes much better,” she said. “Wooden shoes are clumsy.”

Vevi slipped into the sabots. She took four little choppy steps and then one of the shoes sailed off.

“I can’t run in them at all,” Vevi said, very much discouraged.

She went after the shoe which had rolled down a slope toward the canal. Hanny skipped after her to the water’s edge.

“I’ll show you something else you can do with a wooden shoe,” she told the Brownies. “Watch!”

Picking up the wooden shoe that Vevi had lost she carefully set it down in the shallow water.

“See, a boat!” she laughed.

The wooden shoe turned slowly around in the sluggish water. Then toe forward, it began to drift lazily away.

“Hey, get it quick!” cried Vevi in alarm.

“Oh, it won’t sail far,” laughed Hanny.

She was right too, because in just a minute the shoe snagged on a stick and was held fast.

“Say, that’s fun, sailing boats!” cried Vevi. “Where is the other shoe?”

“On your foot, stupe!” laughed Jane.

The joke certainly was on Vevi, for in the excitement of watching the “boat” she had forgotten that its mate still was on her left foot.

All the Brownies were eager to play “boat.”

“Is it safe?” Miss Gordon anxiously asked the nurseryman.

“Oh, they can’t any more than splash their clothing,” he replied. “The water barely is deep enough to float the boat.”

Reassured, Miss Gordon told the children to have a good time, but to be very careful. She and Miss Mohr then went off with Peter to see some of the tulips.

Connie watched the three walk away. She noticed that the nurseryman seemed especially friendly with Miss Mohr.

“I think he likes her,” she whispered to Vevi. “See, he is picking her a bouquet of tulips.”

“He likes Miss Gordon too,” Vevi replied carelessly. All her attention now had centered on the wooden shoe boats.

“Not the same way though,” insisted Connie. “He smiles at her sort of special. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if they’d fall in love? Then Hanny could stay here always—”

Vevi gave her friend a sharp jab in the ribs.

“Hush!” she warned. “Do you want Hanny to hear? Anyway, you get crazy ideas, Connie Williams!”

For the next twenty minutes the Brownies had a wonderful time at the water’s edge. They peeled off their stockings and sat on the bridge, splashing their toes.

It was great fun sailing the wooden shoes in the lazy current. Now and then a “boat” would fill with water and sink. Then one of the girls would wade to its rescue.

“My shoe is a torpedo boat!” Vevi shouted. “I’m coming after your boat, Jane.”

She propelled the shoe, making it crack into the other.

The Brownies played “war” for a few minutes before discovering that the wooden shoes made good sand scoops. Sand castles occupied them after that.

Connie noticed that Miss Mohr, Miss Gordon and Peter had started back from the tulip fields.

“It must be nearly time to leave,” she said anxiously. “Vevi McGuire, just look at your dress! What will Miss Gordon say?”

“Yours is splashed too!” Vevi replied, trying to brush off the water drops from her skirt. “It has a spot of mud on the sleeve.”

“We’d better quit this game before we get any dirtier,” Rosemary declared uneasily. “Let’s clean up the wooden shoes.”

She gathered up one pair and began to wash out the sand.

Vevi looked about for the other shoes. One lay at the water’s edge. The other was nowhere to be seen.

“Connie, did you have Hanny’s shoe?” she inquired.

Connie shook her head.

“You had it last,” she reminded Vevi. “Remember? When you were playing torpedo.”

“I don’t recall taking it out of the water,” Vevi said, glancing anxiously down the canal. “Did anyone else pick it up?”

No one had seen the shoe.

“It must have drifted away,” Hanny said. “Oh, dear, it belonged to my best pair too.”

“Where does the canal lead?” Connie questioned.

“Past the Mattox farm and on to a drainage ditch. The shoe couldn’t have drifted far though, because the Mattoxes have a footwalk across the water. That would stop the shoe if it went that far.”

“Let’s go see!” proposed Vevi. She started off toward the adjoining property which was separated from the Van Der Lann place by a tall fence.

“No! No!” Hanny called after her. “We must not trespass.”

Vevi did not climb over the fence. But she crawled high up on it so she could see far down the canal.

“I don’t see the shoe anywhere,” she said, and then she corrected herself. “Oh, yes, I do!”

“Where?” cried Hanny.

“It has snagged on a pile of sticks there where the canal turns a bit!”

Hanny climbed up on the fence beside Vevi. She too saw the runaway shoe.

“I’ll run and get it,” Vevi offered. She was not afraid to cross the Mattox land.

“No, no!” Hanny said in earnest protest. “Uncle Peter has told me that I must never set foot on their property. They are so very unpleasant.”

“Then how will we get the shoe?” Vevi demanded.

Hanny thought hard for a second and then had an idea.

“The watercourse belongs to everybody,” she declared. “I will take the boat and fetch the shoe!”