Across the storeroom a rope was placed and on this they hung a sliding curtain, made out of a discarded blanket. Then at one side they arranged chairs, and Nan and Flossie brought out their dolls to be the audience. "They won't clap their hands very much," said Bert. "But then they won't make any disturbance either." The performance was a great success. It was their own version of Rip Van Winkle, and Bert as old Rip did many funny things which caused Freddie and Flossie to roar with laughter. Nan as the loving wife recited a piece called "Doughnuts and Daisies," pretending to be working around the kitchen in the meantime. The climax was reached when Bert tried to imitate a thunderstorm in the mountains and pulled over a big trunk full of old clothes and some window screens standing in a corner. The show broke up in a hurry, and when Mrs. Bobbsey appeared on the scene, wanting to know what the noise meant, all the actors and the doll audience were out of sight. But later, when mamma went below again, Bert and Nan sneaked back, and put both the trunk and the screens in their proper places. CHAPTER XIII NAN'S FIRST CAKE-BAKING "Let's!" cried Nan. "Yes, let's!" echoed Flossie. "I want to help too," put in Freddie, "Want to make a cake all by my own self." "Freddie can make a little cake while we make a big one," said Bert. It was on an afternoon just a week before Christmas and Mrs. Bobbsey had gone out to do some shopping. Dinah was also away, on a visit to some relatives, so the children had the house all to themselves. It was Bert who spoke about cake-making first. Queer that a boy should think of it, wasn't it? But Bert was very fond of cake, and did quite some grumbling when none was to be had. "It ought to be easy to make a nice big plain cake," said Bert. "I've seen Dinah do it lots of times. She just mixes up her milk and eggs and butter, and sifts in the flour, and there you are." "Much you know about it!" declared Nan. "If it isn't just put together right, it will be as heavy as lead." "We might take the recipe out of mamma's cook-book," went on Bert; and then the cry went up with which I have opened this chapter. The twins were soon in the kitchen, which Dinah had left spotlessly clean and in perfect order. "We mustn't make a muss," warned Nan. "If we do, Dinah will never forgive us." "As if we couldn't clean it up again," said Bert loftily. Over the kitchen table they spread some old newspapers, and then Nan brought forth the big bowl in which her mother or the cook usually mixed the cake batter. "Bert, you get the milk and sugar," said Nan, and began to roll up her sleeves. "Flossie, you can get the butter." She would have told Freddie to get something, too--just to start them all to work--but Freddie was out of sight.