as he could
splash through the water.

CHAPTER XIII

JAN'S QUEER RIDE

"What's the matter? What is it?" cried Nora from the bank where she was
tossing bits of wood into the lake for Trouble to pretend they were
little boats. "Have you got a cramp, Teddy boy?"

"It's a--a big fish--or--somethin'," he panted, as he kept on running
and splashing the water all about, which, after all, did not matter as
he was in his bathing suit.

"It's a shark after him!" cried Jan, who, by this time, was safe on
shore, stopping on her way to grasp Trouble by the hand and lead him
also to safety. "It's a shark!"

She had heard her mother read of bathers in the ocean being sometimes
frightened by sharks, or by big fish that looked like sharks.

"Oh, a shark! Good land! We mustn't bathe here any more!" cried Nora.

By this time Ted was in such shallow water that it was not much above
his ankles. He could see the bottom, and he hoped no very big fish could
swim in so little water. So he thought it would be safe to stop and look
back.

"Oh, it's coming some more!" cried Jan, from where she stood on the bank
with Nora and Trouble. "Look, Ted! It's coming."

The animal, fish, or whatever it was, indeed seemed to be coming
straight for the shore near the place where the Curlytops were playing.
Ted, Jan and Nora could see the sharp nose and the bright eyes more
plainly now. As for Trouble, he did not know what it was all about, and
he wanted to go back in the water to wade, which was as near swimming as
he ever came.

Then the strange creature turned and suddenly made for a small rock,
which stood out of the water a little way from the sandy beach. It
climbed out on the rock, while the children and Nora watched eagerly,
and then Ted gave a laugh.

"Why!" he exclaimed, "it's nothing but a big muskrat!"

"A muskrat?" echoed Jan.

"Yes."

"And see, he has a mussel, or fresh-water clam," said Nora. "Look at
him crack the shell."

And this is what the muskrat was really doing. It had been swimming in
the lake--for muskrats are good swimmers--when it had found a
fresh-water mussel, which is like a clam except that it has a longer
shell that is black instead of white. Muskrats like mussels, but they
cannot eat them in water.

They have to bring them up on shore, or to a flat rock or stump that
sticks up out of water, where they can crack the shell and eat the
mussel inside.

"If I'd a known what it was I wouldn't 'a' bee