orn in it.

"Was it really Danny?" questioned Nan, when Bert came back to the front
piazza.

"Yes, and he tore his coat--I heard it rip."

"What do you think of that?"

Nan pointed to an object on the piazza, half under the door mat. There
lay a dead rat, and around its neck was a string to which was attached a
card reading, "Nan and Bert Bobbsey's Ghost."

"This is certainly awful," said Bert.

The noise on the piazza had brought Mrs. Bobbsey to the door. At the
sight of the dead rat, which Freddie had picked up by the tail, she
gave a slight scream.

"Oh, Freddie, leave it go!" she said.

"It won't hurt you, mamma," said the little boy. "The real is gone out
of it."

"But--but--how did it get here?"

"Danny Rugg brought it," said Bert. "Look at the tag."

He cut the tag off with his pocket-knife and flung the rat into the
garbage can. All went into the house, and Mrs. Bobbsey and her husband
both read what Danny Rugg had written on the card.

"This is going too far," said Mr. Bobbsey. "I must speak to Mr. Rugg
about this." And he did the very next day. As a result, and for having
torn his jacket, Danny received the hardest thrashing he had got in a
year. This made him more angry than ever against Bert, and also angry at
the whole Bobbsey family. But he did not dare to do anything to hurt
them at once, for fear of getting caught.

Winter was now going fast, and before long the signs of spring began to
show on every hand.

Spring made Freddie think of a big kite that he had stored away, in the
garret, and one Saturday he and Bert brought the kite forth and fixed
the string and the tail.

"There is a good breeze blowing," said Bert. "Let us go and fly it on
Roscoe's common."

"I want to see you fly the kite," said Flossie. "Can I go along?"

"Yes, come on," said Bert.

Flossie had been playing with the kitten and hated to leave it. So she
went down to the common with Snoop in her arms.

"Don't let Snoop run away from you," said Bert. "He might not find his
way back home."

The common was a large one with an old disused barn at one end. Freddie
and Bert took the kite to one end and Freddie held it up while Bert
prepared to let out the string and "run it up," as he called it.

[Illustration: THE KITE WENT UP INTO THE AIR AND SNOOP WITH IT.--P.
177.]

Now, as it happened, the eyes of Snoop were fixed on the long tail of
the kite, and when it went trailing over the ground Snoop leaped from
Flos