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CHAPTER IX

OUT TO SEA

Sand ran down into the eyes of the Plush Bear. Grains of sand tickled his plush toes. Some even got in his plush mouth that he opened when he gave his growls. Other grains of sand trickled between the joints of his paws and his body.

“Oh, dear, this is terrible!” said Mr. Bruin, as he found himself in darkness when the hole into which Arthur had placed him caved in from the feet of the pony. “This is simply terrible!”

But though the Plush Bear, being by himself, was allowed to talk and move about, pretending to come to life, he soon found that it was not wise to open his mouth. The wider he opened it the more sand came in.

“What shall I do?” thought the Plush Bear to himself, not opening his mouth to say anything this time. “How am I ever going to get out of here?”

Well might he ask himself that, for the sand was so closely packed in about him that he could hardly move. Even though the spring inside him was wound up, the Plush Bear could not turn his head nor wave his paws. As for growling, he knew better than to try that.

“Well, something must be done!” thought the Plush Bear. “If I stay in this sand hole too long I’ll smother! I wonder why Arthur doesn’t come and take me out? He always said he was fond of me!”

But Arthur, the fat boy, was just then having a glorious ride on a pony, and Nettie, his sister, was also having a ride. For the time being the children had forgotten about their toys. Nettie had left her Rag Doll and Arthur his Plush Bear. But the Rag Doll was not buried in the sand.

Up and down along the sand rode the children on the backs of the beach ponies. But at last Mrs. Rowe decided that Nettie and Arthur had had fun enough, so she helped them out of the little saddles.

“Get your playthings and come to the hotel. We must dress for dinner,” she said. “Where is your Rag Doll, Nettie? And your Plush Bear, Arthur?”

“I left my Rag Doll on the sand,” answered Nettie. “I’ll get her.”

“And I left my Plush Bear–Oh, I left him in the sand circus cage, where I was playing he was a wild Bear!” cried Arthur. “Oh, I forgot, I left my nice Plush Bear in a hole!”

“You’d better get him out as soon as you can,” said his mother.

The children remembered the spot where they had been playing on the sand before they took the pony rides. Nettie ran back there, and soon found her Rag Doll.

“But where’s my Plush Bear?” asked Arthur anxiously, looking up and down the beach. “I made a hole here, right by Nettie’s Doll, and I put sticks in the hole, like bars in a circus cage, and I left my Plush Bear in the hole.”

“Are you sure this is the place?” asked Mrs. Rowe, as she, too, looked searchingly up and down the sand. She did not want Arthur to lose his toy.

“It was right here,” declared the fat boy.

“I don’t see any hole,” went on Mrs. Rowe. Of course she did not know that the pony had scattered the sand, filling up the little cave Arthur had made.

“Oh, where is my Plush Bear?” cried the little fat boy, and he was almost ready to cry. His mother and Nettie helped him look. So did other children, wandering up and down the beach, but there was no sign of the toy. Then a coast guard, one of the men who march up and down the sands, keeping watch for shipwrecks, came along the boardwalk.

“Have you lost something?” asked the guard, as he came down the steps from the boardwalk to the beach.

“We lost a Bear,” said Arthur.

“A bear?” cried the guard, in surprise. “A–a bear?”