"Then we'd better trot right along," said Ben. "You and I will go ahead, Mrs. Ramsey, and lead the way."
But Jennie wanted to walk with her mother too, and so the other two little girls dropped behind to pursue their way through the crooked streets where odd sights met their eyes; queerly dressed women and children jostled them; at the doors of houses swarthy faces and strange forms appeared. The shop windows held many things the children had never seen before, and once or twice they stopped to see what these very unusual articles could be. [162] "Do look here, Edna," said Dorothy as they were passing one particularly foreign looking place. "I must see what those funny things are," and she turned back, Edna following her.
"We mustn't stop," said Edna, "for we might lose the others."
"Oh, just for a second. They are right ahead and we can't miss them." But they could not decide what the funny things were and so went on.
"Why, where are Ben and Mrs. Ramsey?" said Edna in alarm. "I saw them a minute ago."
"They were right ahead of us when we stopped," said Dorothy, hastening her steps. "They must have turned the corner."
They hurried along as fast as possible, turning the corner and looking around. But there was no sign of their friends, and after they had gone a short distance, "we'd better go back," Dorothy said.
They tried to retrace their steps, but it was a very crooked street with others leading from it, and in their bewilderment they took the wrong turning, so that in a few minutes they were hopelessly beyond any possibility of finding their companions. They looked at one another confronted by a problem.
"What shall we do?" at last said Edna in a weak voice.
With one consent they stood still and looked around as if hoping to see a familiar face, but here [163]was a denser crowd of foreigners and only the dark eyes of Russians and Poles met theirs.