"What'll we make it of, worsted or pasteboard?" "Whistlebinkie," observed Mollie, severely, "you are almost as absurd as the old man himself. The idea of making a visit out of worsted or pasteboard! Come along. Stop your joking and let us start." The rubber doll was quite willing to agree to this, and off they started. In a very little while they were down under the spreading branches of the great oak tree, but, singular to relate, the little red house that had stood there the last time they had called was not to be seen. "Dear me!" cried Mollie, "what can have become of it, do you suppose, Whistlebinkie?" "I give it up," said the rubber doll,[Pg 32] scratching his hat so that he could think more easily. "Haven't an idea—unless the old man discovered that its roof was made of strawberry icing, and ate it up." [Pg 32] "Ho! Ho! Ho!" laughed some one from behind them. Mollie and Whistlebinkie turned quickly, and lo and behold, directly behind them stood the little Unwiseman himself, trying to dig the oak tree up by the roots with a small teaspoon he held in his hand. "The idea of my eating up my house! Hoh! What nonsense. Hoh!" he said, as the visitors turned. "Well, what has become of it, then?" asked Mollie. "I've moved it, that's what," said the Unwiseman. "I couldn't get any apples on this oak tree, so I moved my house over under the willow tree down by the brook." "But you can't get apples on a willow tree, either, can you?" asked Mollie. [Pg 33] [Pg 33] "I don't know yet," said the Unwiseman. "I haven't lived there long enough to find out, but I can try, and that's all anybody can do." "And what are you doing with that teaspoon?" asked Whistlebinkie. [Pg 34]
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