lder. Hilda and the twins stood in fascinated
silence, looking at Cricket getting such a beautiful high ride. As for
George Washington, as the pole slanted more and more, making his head
lower and his rear higher, he made a few despairing steps forward. Lower
went the bucket, and George W.'s Martha lost her proud arch, and George
stuck his claws deep into the wood.

"Oh-ee!" squealed Cricket, suddenly beginning to feel slightly
uncomfortable herself. The ground looked very far below her, and she
began to feel as if she were pitching headforemost. She held on with her
hands, as tightly as George Washington did with his claws. Then the
bucket hit the water, splash. Dipping it made the big pole dance a
little.

"Oh-ee," squealed Cricket, again, clinging tighter. "Hurry up, Billy,
bring me down."

"Miau-au," wailed George Washington, suddenly, giving a mighty spring of
desperation. Alas! he missed his calculation, if he had time to make
any, and disappeared from the eyes of the children into the dark depths
of the well. Cricket, forgetting her own precarious position,
involuntarily gave a little grasp after him, thus losing her own hold,
lost her balance, and over she went,--and if she had fallen that fifteen
feet to the hard ground below, it might have brought to a sudden end her
summer at Marbury.

As it fortunately happened, however, she caught at the pole as she went
over, grasped it, and hung suspended by her strong little hands.
Frightened Billy had been holding the smaller pole all this time, in a
vise-like grip.

"Let me down!" screamed Cricket. "Carefully, Billy!" and Billy, stiff
with terror, nevertheless had the sense to obey. He raised the small
pole steadily, lest the other, with Cricket's added weight, should come
down too fast. In a moment more she was near enough to the ground to
drop lightly down.

A tremendous splashing and mewing had been going on in the well, but the
children had been too much absorbed in Cricket to notice it.

"'Tisn't as much fun as I thought it would be," was all she said, as
she darted forward to look down the well after her pet. "Let the bucket
down again, Billy, and see if he'll cling to it. Oh, you poor, poor
George Washington. Billy, do hurry up! Why, he'll _drown_."

But Billy had given out. He was so thoroughly frightened when he
discovered Cricket on her lofty perch, that, now that she was safely
down, he was shaking like a leaf. Cricket pushed him unceremoniously
a