id, decidedly.

"We-ell," sighed Agnes. "I don't want to give that mean thing a chance
to laugh. We can't really get lost out here, can we, Neale?"

"I don't see how we can," said Neale, slowly. "I'm game to go ahead if
you girls are."

"It looks to me just as bad to go back," Ruth observed.

"Come on!" cried Agnes, and started forward again through the snow.

And, really, they might just as well keep on as to go back. They must be
half way to the edge of Milton by this time, all three were sure.

The "swish, swish, swish" of the slanting snow was all they heard save
their own voices. The falling particles deadened all sound, and they
might have been alone in a wilderness as far as the presence of other
human beings was made known to them.

"Say!" grumbled Neale, "she said there was a brook here somewhere--at
the bottom of a hollow."

"Well, we've been going down hill for some time," Ruth remarked. "It
must be near by now."

"Is--isn't there a--a bridge over it?" quavered Agnes.

"A culvert that we can walk over," said Neale. "Let me go ahead. Don't
you girls come too close behind me."

"But, goodness, Neale!" cried Agnes. "We mustn't lose sight of you."

"I'm not going to run away from you."

"But you're the last boy on earth--as far as we can see," chuckled
Agnes. "You have suddenly become very precious."

Neale grinned. "Get you once to the old Corner House and neither of you
would care if you didn't ever see a boy again," he said.

He had not gone on five yards when the girls, a few paces behind, heard
him suddenly shout. Then followed a great splashing and floundering
about.

"Oh! oh! Neale!" shrieked Agnes. "Have you gone under?"

"No! But I've gone through," growled the boy. "I've busted through a
thin piece of ice. Here's the brook all right; you girls stay where you
are. I can see the culvert."

He came back to them, sopping wet to his knees. In a few moments the
lower part of his limbs and his feet were encased in ice.

"You'll get your death of cold, Neale," cried Ruth, worriedly.

"No, I won't, Ruth. Not if I keep moving. And that's what we'd all
better do. Come on," the boy said. "I know the way after we cross this
brook. There is an unfinished street leads right into town. Comes out
there by your store building--where those Italian kids live."

"Oh! If Mrs. Kranz should be up," gasped Agnes, "she'd take us in and
let you dry your feet, Neale."

"We'll get her up," declared Ruth.