“Hartel,” said Mr. Prenwood, “I used to come down here with my little nephew. He was too young to see any of the vulgarity. He just enjoyed the life and stir, the bustle of the place, just as you boys do. He called these wheels—they were little then—the big pin wheels; and those were the ‘slam-bang railroads.’ It was fun to watch him! While I was away in the Mediterranean they buried him.” Mr. Prenwood sat very quietly for a moment. “They tell me that last summer he used to say he wished Uncle Amos would come home, and take him to Coney Island. No one else would take him, it seems. And now no one can take him. Isn’t it a shame, Hartel, that I couldn’t have been here?”
“How old was he?” asked Allan, who could see tears in Mr. Prenwood’s eyes.
“Only six,” said the old gentleman. “What a little man he was! You should have seen us wading on the beach, and how he used to laugh when I rolled up my trousers! And he seemed to know just how funny it was when I sat on a horse beside him in the merry-go-round. But we are missing the view altogether. How gay the sun makes everything look! What a good thing it is the sun never gets sad! If the clouds will only let him shine, he’s always as jolly as ever.”
The sun shone on the big, creaking wheel. Mr. Prenwood waved his hand to Owen and McConnell. A young girl who was sitting beside a young man in the car at the other side of the wheel seemed to think the salute was intended for her, and giggled.
“Why not take the wheel, with the couple at the other end?” laughed Mr. Prenwood.
Allan already was preparing to do this. The spokes and cross-bars made a curious cobweb of lines in the finder, a cobweb that twisted like a kaleidoscope.
When they all had stepped out of the wheel again Mr. Prenwood said: “Now, boys, I’m not going to bother you with my company much longer. You have things that you want to do on your own account. But I would like very much if you would go with me and have lunch. When I was a boy I got frightfully hungry at this time of day, and I haven’t altogether recovered from the habit yet.”
Owen thanked Mr. Prenwood, but said they had some lunch with them.
“Yes, I know,” laughed Mr. Prenwood, “you have some dry lunch. But that isn’t enough. Oh, I know! Come along. We’ll eat that—and something else with it! Some oysters, for instance, or chowder, or sweet corn, or watermelon. And how about buttermilk and pie and ice-cream? Hey?”
And they all laughed together as they followed Mr. Prenwood up the broad walk.