This was not the first time Teddy had gotten in trouble when he and Janet were alone together. Often it happened at home, and so the Curlytop girl was not as much surprised as she might have been if this was the first time.  
Janet left the end of the log where she was keeping guard, to catch the fox if it should rush out, and she hurried around to the end in which Ted¹ had crawled.
 
“Can’t you crawl in any farther?” she asked.
 
The still muffled² voice of her brother answered:
 
“No, I can’t crawl a bit more! I’m stuck!”
 
“Well, then,” said Janet, in the most natural way possible, “never mind about the fox. We don’t want him anyhow. Crawl out and we’ll go home.”
 
[151]“But I can’t!” cried Teddy, and now his voice sounded as if he might be going to cry.
 
“What can’t you do?” Janet wanted to know.
 
“I can’t crawl out!” By this time Teddy was very much frightened. Janet could tell that by the catch in his voice. “I can’t crawl in and I can’t back up. I’m stuck! I’m stuck! You’d better go and get some one to help me out!”
 
But Janet was not going to run away so soon. She made up her mind to try something herself first.
 
“I’ll take hold of your feet and pull you out,” she offered. “Keep your feet still, now!” she commanded, as she went closer to the flapping shoes of her brother. “Keep ’em still or you’ll kick me!”
 
“All right,” said Teddy. “You can try, but I don’t believe you can pull me out.”
 
Janet could not. Though she tugged³ and tugged with both hands at Ted’s shoes, bracing⁴ her own feet against the end of the log, she could not stir her brother one inch.
 
“Why don’t you wiggle?” she finally asked, quite out of breath.
 
“Why don’t I what?” asked Ted.
 
“Why don’t you wiggle a little an’ help[152] yourself?” demanded Janet. “I can’t do it all alone! When I pull, you wiggle, an’ maybe you’ll get out that way.”
 
“All right,” agreed Ted. “But I can’t wiggle very much. It’s awful tight in here!”
 
Once more Janet took hold of his shoes and began to pull. At the same time Ted pushed with his hands backward inside the log and “wiggled.”
 
But it seemed to be of little use. No more of Ted’s legs stuck out from inside the log than at first.
 
Then he suddenly cried:
 
“Stop! Quit!”
 
“What’s the matter?” asked Janet. “Am I hurting you?”
 
“No, but my shoes are coming off!” answered Ted. And even as he spoke⁵ Janet pulled so hard that the left shoe came completely off Ted’s foot, and the other was partly off.
 
“Well, now I’ve got to push you,” decided⁶ Janet, as she dropped the one shoe. “If I can’t pull you I got to push you! Maybe you’ll come out the other end with the fox.”
 
“There isn’t any fox in here,” said Teddy.[153] “I can see clear through to the other end and there’s nothing in the log but me—I’m here all right, an’ I wish I could get out! Oh, dear!”
 
“I’ll help you! I’ll push,” offered Janet.
 
She was about to push on Ted’s feet as they stuck from the log, but he stopped her with a cry.
 
“Don’t do it! Don’t do it!” he begged. “If you push me any farther I’ll be stuck worse!”
 
“What’ll I do then?” asked Janet.
 
“You go get somebody! Get somebody to help me out!” wailed⁷ Ted.
 
“I will!” cried his sister, and without trying any more she hurried away through the woods.
 
She expected to have to go all the way to the bungalow⁸ to tell her father or mother about the plight⁹ of poor Teddy. But half way there Janet met two of the lumbermen and to them she told of her brother’s plight.
 
“Caught in a hollow log, is he?” asked one man. “Well, we’ll soon have him out.”
 
“Show us where he is, little girl,” said the other man, and Janet led the way.
 
On her way back through the woods with the lumbermen, the little Curlytop girl half[154] feared that when she reached the place where she had left Ted stuck in the log she might find his feet being nibbled¹⁰ by the same fox they had tried to catch. But nothing like this had happened.
 
There was the log; there was no sign of a fox or other wild animal; and Ted’s feet were still sticking out, waving slowly.
 
“Here we are, Ted!” cried Janet. “I’ve brought back two lumbermen with me.”
 
“Oh, get me out! Get me out!” wailed Ted, in a muffled voice.
 
“We’ll soon have you out, little man,” said one of the lumbermen. “Don’t be afraid. We can easily split this log,” he added to his companion.
 
“That’s right,” agreed the other. “See,” he said to Janet, “this log has a big crack all the way along it. We’ll just put in some wedges and they will make the crack wider. Then the hole in the log will get bigger and we can pull your brother out.”
 
“Oh, I hope you can!” sighed Janet.
 
“Sure we can!” declared one of the lumbermen. “Stay quiet now, little man,” he added.
 
And Teddy kept very still and quiet inside the log while on the outside the lumbermen[155] cut and drove in with their axes some wedges of wood.
 
A wedge, you know, is shaped like the letter V. The narrow part was put in the crack, and then ............