Mr. Bobbsey had his talk with the chief of the Lakeport police. Meanwhile, because of Mr. Bobbsey’s earlier telephone message, inquiries had been made of other officers, and a search started for the strange old woman, but she could not be found.
“You see, Mr. Bobbsey,” said Chief Gallagher at the town hall, “we haven’t any matron or police woman here, and if you turn the baby over to us I’ll have to send to Hilldale for a woman to look after her. They have a matron at Hilldale.”
“Well, we can keep the baby for a day or so,” said Mr. Bobbsey. “My wife seems rather fond of her. I guess I’d better put an advertisement in the papers—what do you think?”
“I would,” agreed the chief. “That’s right—advertise for the baby’s father and mother. And I’ll be on the lookout for any news. If the child was stolen away from some other city we’ll hear about it. There’ll be a piece in the papers. You just wait a few days.”
The Bobbsey twins, talking of the big storm and the new baby, reached school. Before entering the yard where the other children were at play, Bert said:
“Now, Flossie and Freddie, don’t say anything about the baby.”
“Why not?” Flossie asked. “I was going to tell Mary Holmes. She’s got a baby at her house an’ she’s always saying we haven’t any. Now I can tell her we _have_!”
“No, don’t say anything about it,” warned Bert. “Mother and daddy might not like it. Wait until we find out who the baby belongs to. Now mind, Flossie and Freddie, don’t tell any of your friends about the baby.”
“Oh, all right,” agreed Flossie, for her mother had told her she must do as Bert said while at school.
“I don’t care about a girl baby,” murmured Freddie. “If she was a boy, so I could have a brother littler’n what I am, I’d like it all right.”
“Well, don’t say anything,” warned Bert. He turned to say the same thing to Nan, but she had walked on ahead to talk with some of her girl chums, and Bert did not bother to follow. “I guess Nan won’t say anything, anyhow,” he thought.
But he little knew Nan Bobbsey. She was just bursting with the news and longing to whisper it to her best chum, Nellie Parks, who sat with her.
But the Bobbsey twins had been delayed a little that morning, because of finding the baby, and the last bell rang as they reached the school yard. So Nan had to hurry into her classroom without a chance to tell Nellie the news.