Toby told her, before they reached the hummock, that this stream
rose in the winter and flooded all about the farm, so that the
latter really was an island. Unless the ice remained firm they
sometimes could not drive out with either wagon or sled for days
at a time.
"Then you live on an island," cried Nan.
"Huh! Ye might say so," complained Toby. "And sometimes we feel
like as though we was cast away on one, too."
But the girl thought it must really be great fun to live on an
island.
They went up to the house along the bank of the clear stream. On
the side porch, vine-covered to the eaves, sat an old woman
rocking in a low chair and another figure in what seemed at a
distance, to be a child's wagon of wickerwork, but with no tongue
and a high back to it.
"Here's Gran'pop!" cried a shrill voice and the little wagon
moved swiftly to the edge of the steps. Nan almost screamed in
fear as it pitched downward. But the wheels did not bump over
the four steps leading to the ground, for a wide plank had been
laid slantingly at that side, and over this the wheels ran
smoothly, if rapidly.
"You have a care there, Corson!" shrilled the old lady after the
cripple. "Some day you'll break your blessed neck.
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