over one eye. In one hand he held a stick. And it
seemed to Jolly Robin that the queer man was just about to hurl it at
something.

In spite of his uneasiness, Jolly peeped around his tree and watched
the stranger. But he did not throw the stick. He stood quite still and
seemed to be waiting. And Jolly Robin waited, too, and stared at
him.

"Maybe there's a squirrel hiding behind a tree," he said to himself.
"Perhaps this man in white is going to throw the stick as soon as the
squirrel shows himself."

But no squirrel appeared. And Jolly Robin was just about to start for
the farmhouse again when he saw somebody pop out of the woodshed door
and come running toward the orchard.

"Here's Johnnie Green!" Jolly exclaimed. He knew Johnnie at once,
because neither Farmer Green nor the hired-man ever went hopping and
skipping about like that.

Pretty soon Jolly saw Johnnie Green stop and make an armful of
snowballs. And then he went straight toward the stranger in white.
Though Johnnie began to shout, the man in white did not even turn his
head. And then Johnnie Green shied a snowball at him.

The snowball sailed through the air and struck the stranger's battered
hat, knocking it off into the snow. And, of course, Jolly Robin
couldn't help laughing. He was more surprised than ever, too, because
the moon-faced man did not move even then. Anyone else would have
wheeled about and chased Johnnie Green. But this odd gentleman didn't
seem to know that his hat had been knocked off.

"That's queer!" said Jolly Robin to himself. "He must be asleep. But I
should think he would wake up."

While Jolly was wondering, Johnnie Green threw another snowball. And
when it struck the stranger a very peculiar thing happened.

And Jolly Robin did not laugh. He was too frightened to do anything
but gasp.

XI

WHAT A SNOWBALL DID

Jolly Robin was too frightened to laugh when he saw Johnnie Green's
second snowball strike the moon-faced stranger in the orchard. You
see, the snowball hit one of the stranger's arms. And to Jolly's
amazement, the arm at once dropped off and dashed upon the ground,
breaking into a dozen pieces.

That alone was enough to startle Jolly Robin. But the moon-faced man
paid not the slightest attention to the accident. There was something
ghostly in the way he stood there, all in white, never moving, never
once saying a word.

But Johnnie Green did not seem frightened at all. He set up a great
shouting