So Mirabell played with her Lamb until it was time for the little girl to go to bed. Uncle Tim came up to see Mirabell and Arnold to say good- bye, for he was going on a sea voyage.

"And bring me a parrot when you come back!" begged Arnold.

"Would you like a monkey, Mirabell?" asked the jolly sailor.

"No, thank you," she answered. "A monkey is nice, but he might pull the wool off my Lamb."

"That's so--he might!" laughed the jolly sailor. "Well, good-bye, Mirabell, Arnold, and the Lamb on Wheels."

Then Uncle Tim went away and the children went to bed, while the Lamb on Wheels was put in the pasteboard box stable, near the Wooden Lion. And in the night they played together and had a fine time.

The Lamb on Wheels, in the days that followed, began to feel quite at home in Mirabell's house, and she liked her little girl mistress better and better, for Mirabell was very kind.

"Some day, when it gets warmer, I'll take my Lamb over to Dorothy's house and let her see the Sawdust Doll," said Mirabell to her brother.

"And I'll take my fire engine over and I'll ride on Dick's Rocking Horse," said Arnold. "But it is so cold now the water in my engine might freeze if I took it over to Dick's house."

"Yes, it is cold," agreed Mirabell. "I guess I'll take my Lamb down to the sitting room, where there's a fire on the hearth."

"I'll come too," said Arnold. "I'll bring my little fire engine."

Soon the two children were having a good time with their toys in front of the fireplace in the sitting room. On the hearth blazed a snapping, crackling warm fire of logs.

"Now you can get nice and warm," said Mirabell to her Lamb, as she set her down close to the fireplace. "You stay here and get warm, and I'll go and ask Susan for some cookies to eat."

Arnold also went to the kitchen with his sister, and when the two children came back to the sitting room they saw a dreadful sight. A spark had popped out from the hearth and set fire to a piece of paper on the floor near the Lamb on Wheels.

"Oh, she'll burn! My Lamb on Wheels will burn!" cried Mirabell, as she rushed forward.

CHAPTER VI

DOWN THE COAL HOLE

Mirabell and Arnold had been told to be very careful whenever they played in the sitting room, if a fire were burning on the open hearth. But, for the moment, the little girl forgot about this. All she thought of was that her Lamb on Wheels might be burned by the blazing paper, which had been set on fire by a spark popping out from the blazing logs on the hearth.

"Oh, my Lamb! My poor Lamb!" cried Mirabell.

"Look out!" shouted Arnold. "Don't go too close!"

"Why not?" asked his sister. "I have to get my Lamb on Wheels away from the fire!"

"No, you mustn't!" Arnold said. "Your dress might catch on fire!"

The piece of paper was burning on the wide brick hearth of the fireplace, and not on the carpet, and the Lamb was close to the piece of paper that was on fire. Altogether too close to the fire was the Lamb. She was in great danger.

"But I've got to save her! I must save my pet Lamb!" cried Mirabell. She was going to rush forward, but her brother caught hold of her and held her back.

"Wait!" cried Arnold. "I can put out the fire and save your Lamb."

"How!"

"With my fire engine! It has real water in it, and I'll pump some on the paper and save your Lamb from burning up. Watch me, Mirabell, but don't go near the blaze!"

The piece of paper, close to the Lamb on Wheels, was now sending up a bright blaze. It would have been pretty if it had not been so dangerous.

Arnold quickly wheeled his fire engine as close to the blazing paper as he felt it was safe to go. The engine had a little pump on it, as I have told you, and it spurted out real water, with which it was now filled.

"Toot! Toot! I'm a fireman, and I'm going to put out a real fire!" cried Arnold.

He pressed back the little catch that held the pump from working. There was a whirring sound as the wheels spun around, and then the little rubber hose on the pump of the engine filled with water.

A moment later a small stream spurted out, and Arnold aimed it right for the piece of blazing paper. The water fell in a small shower on the fire, and then with a hiss and spluttering, and sending up a cloud of smoke, the paper stopped burning.

"Toot! Toot! The fire is out!" cried the boy, making believe blow his engine whistle. "Now your Lamb is saved, Mirabell."

"Oh, I'm so glad! Thank you, Arnold!" exclaimed his sister.

She ran forward and picked up her Lamb on Wheels. And, I am glad to say, the wool was not even scorched, not the least, tiny bit.

"Oh, she's all right! She's all right! My Lamb isn't hurt a bit, Arnold," cried Mirabell.

"I told you I'd save her," said the boy. "But you mustn't ever run near a fire yourself, Mirabell. Wait for me to put it out with my engine. That's what fire engines and fire departments are for."

"Dear me! that came near being a terrible adventure for me," thought the Lamb on Wheels, as Mirabell carried her back from the fireplace. "In another minute I would have been all ablaze from that paper, and wool does burn so fast!"

When the Lamb had been saved, the mother of the two children came into the sitting room.

"What is burning?" she cried. "Have you been playing with fire?"

"No, Mother," answered Arnold, and he told what had happened.

As the days passed Mirabell came to love her Lamb on Wheels more and more. Sometimes the little girl would tie a string to the wooden platform, on which her toy stood, and pull the Lamb around the house, as Arnold used to pull his little express wagon.

"I like to ride that way," thought the Lamb. "It is much more fun than it would be to be crowded into a Noah's Ark like the Wooden Lion and thrown into the flooded bathtub."

The Lamb was wishing Mirabell would take her next door, to see the Sawdust Doll, but, as it happened, Dorothy was ill, and it was not thought best for Mirabell to go in for a few days. However, Mirabell could look from her windows over to those in the house where Dick and Dorothy lived. And though Dorothy was too ill to be out of bed, Dick was not.

Dick would stand at the window in his house, and Mirabell and Arnold would stand at the window in their front room, and look across. The children waved to one another, and Dick would hold up the head of his Rocking Horse for Mirabell and Arnold to see.

Once Mirabell held up her Lamb on Wheels at the same time that Dick had his Rocking Horse close to the window, and the two toys saw each other for the first time since they had been separated.

"Oh, there is my old friend, the White Rocking Horse!" thought the Lamb on Wheels. "How I wish I could talk to him."

The Horse wished the same thing, and he even thought perhaps he might get a chance to run over some evening after dark and talk to the Lamb. But the doors of both houses were locked each night, and though the Horse and Lamb could roam about and seem to come to life when no one was watching them, they could not unlock doors. So they had to be content to look at each other through the windows.

"I wish I could see the Sawdust Doll," thought the Lamb, when she had looked over at the Horse one day. "I'd like to speak to her."

There came a few days of bright sunshine, when the weather was not so cold. One afternoon Arnold said to Mirabell:

"I'm going to take my little express wagon out on the sidewalk in front of the house. Why don't you bring out your Lamb?"

"I will, if Mother will let me," said Mirabell.

And Mother did. Soon the two children were running up and down in front of the house, Mirabell pulling her Lamb along by a string, and Arnold pretending to be an expressman with his wagon.

"Oh, there comes a man to put some coal in Dorothy's house!" called Arnold, as a big wagon, drawn by two strong horses, stopped in front of the place where the Sawdust Doll and the White Rocking Horse lived. "Let's go down and watch!" he said.

"All right," agreed Mirabell. So she pulled her Lamb on Wheels down the sidewalk, and Arnold hauled his express wagon along.

At Dorothy's house the coal bin was partly under the pavement, and to put in coal a round, iron cover was lifted up from a hole in the sidewalk, and the coal was dumped through this hole. As the children watched, and as Dorothy, who was now better, stood at the window with her brother Dick, also looking on, the coal man took the cover off the