plained the case, to which the old man listened with interest.
"Well! well! well!" exclaimed Mr. Roscoe, in a high piping voice. "Going to take a sail through the air, was he? You'll have to build him a balloon, eh?"
"I think he had better stay on the ground after this."
"He must be a high-flyer of a cat," and the old man chuckled over his joke.
"Will you lend me a ladder?" went on Bert.
"Certainly, my lad. The ladder is in the cow-shed yonder. But you'll have to raise it yourself, or get somebody to raise it for you. My back is too old and stiff for such work."
"I'll try it alone first," answered the boy.
He soon had the long ladder out and was dragging it across the common. It was very heavy and he wondered who he could get to help him raise it. Just then Danny Rugg came along.
"What are you doing with old Roscoe's ladder?" he asked.
Bert was on the point of telling Danny it
