“Your faces are dirty enough to pass for Indians,” stated their father. “And remember that Mame is good and faithful and devoted to you children. You must always be kind to Mame and respectful and never talk back to her.” “Ethel kicked her once,” Ted tattled. “She swept up my paper doll hats. Anyway, I didn’t kick her hard and I got punished for it.” Theodore Roosevelt knew that his children, indulged as they were in many ways, were sure that retribution for any misbehavior was certain and swift, relentlessly applied after any wrongdoing. His was always the correcting hand when he was at home, Edith always resigning that job to her husband, and he comforted himself with the idea that when they were bad they were still pretty good children. At least they were truthful, only Kermit now and then letting his facile imagination run ahead of him too fast but he was always sternly corrected for it, and as a rule his brothers and sisters dealt scornfully with his fancies. “Now, the settlers will hide, and the Indians have to find them, and any redskin who is recognized gets shot,” Roosevelt outlined the rules. “I wish I had a sunbonnet,” said Alice, as she made a little nest for herself far down in the warm hay. “Settlers’ wives always wore sunbonnets.” “You’re wearing an imaginary sunbonnet,” said her father. “Tie it tightly under your chin and I’ll get my imaginary gun ready. Keep quiet, boys, and hide far down there behind the hay.” He helped the girls to crouch deep in the dry stack, Alice disliking the tickle of the hay on her neck and impatiently slapping at it while Ethel burrowed happily as a mole. “Holler when you’re ready,” called Ted from the opposite side of the stack. “Settlers never let Indians know where they are hiding,” objected their father, who had dug himself deep into a pile; more excited and intrigued by the game than the young ones. The Indians finally advanced, stealth being somewhat diminished by giggles from Archie and muttered orders to be quiet from Ted. Kermit gave a war whoop as he sprang at his father but landed in a heap where Roosevelt promptly dispatched him with an imaginary pistol and a very realistic “Bang.” Farther around the pile there were screams and snarls as Ted crept down on Ethel and grabbed her pig-tailed hair. “You’re scalped!” he shouted. “You’re dead and scalped!” Ethel promptly rolled on her back, walled up her eyes and made a melancholy face so realistic that Ted began to whimper. “Make her stop, Father! She’s scaring me!” “The game is over,” announced Roosevelt, lifting Kermit to his feet. Close by Alice and Archie had been tussling, Alice subduing the attack by tickling the Indian till he squirmed and giggled. “Brush the hay off your clothes. Now we’ll mend the stack again and see who can jump the farthest.” “Oh, that’s easy!” bragged Ethel, reviving from the dead. “I can. I always do beat the boys.” “You can’t beat me if Father will hold my glasses,” Ted objected.