He knew the conductor of the freight train with whom he had entrusted the strange girl. The next day he went over to the tank at the right hour and met the conductor again.
“Sure, I got her on to Campton—poor kid,” said the man. “She’s a smart one, too. When the boys wanted to know who she was, I said she was my niece, and she nodded and agreed to it. We had a big feed back here in the hack while she was aboard, and she had her share.”
“But where was she going?” asked Tom.
“Didn’t get much out of her,” admitted the conductor. “But she’d lived in Harburg, and I reckon she had folks in or near Campton. But I’m not sure at all.”
This was rather unsatisfactory; but whatever point the strange girl was journeying to, she had arrived safely at Campton. This Tom told Ruth and the latter had to be content with this information.
The incident of the runaway girl was two or three days old when Ruth received a letter from Madge Steele urging them all to come on soon—that Sunrise Farm was ready for them, and that she was writing all the girls to start on Monday.
The train would take them to Darrowtown. There a conveyance would meet and transport the visitors fifteen miles through the country to Mr. Steele’s big estate.
Mercy Curtis joined the Camerons and Ruth at the Cheslow Station, and on the train they boarded were Heavy Stone and The Fox. The girls greeted each other as though they had been separated for a year.
“Never was such a clatter of tongues,” declared the plump girl, “since the workmen struck on the tower of Babel. Here we are—off for the sunrise—and traveling due west. How do you make that out?”
“That’s easy—anybody could see it with half an eye,” said The Fox.