“I—I—don’t know—” Peggy disappointingly murmured. “Does she have curtains painted with red and gold Turkish half-moons and all that? And does she fade off into a—” she shuddered, “a—trance? Because I don’t want to see anything like that, honest, I don’t. Of course, I know the trances are just make-believe, but I don’t like them.”
“No,” Katherine hastened to reassure her, “sometimes I think it would be fun to go to one who did those things, but this one doesn’t make much of a show of it, I’ve heard, and if the folks would only let us go—”
“Perhaps we owe it to Mr. Huntington,” Peggy decided at last, “to find out where his grandson is for him, even by clairvoyant means like that. Perhaps we ought not to let an opportunity or possible chance slip by—”
By this Katherine realized she had won her wish and that her little friend was beginning to be as eager for the adventure as she was and was merely trying to translate it into a favor to somebody else before plunging into it heart and soul.
By this time the girls had finished their delightful dinner and they left a quarter on the waiter’s little tray with all the dignity in the world. My, how independent, how experienced, how completely adult it made them feel to be deciding the amount of tips and then handing them out with such sweet grandeur of manner. The waiter smiled and bowed as he pulled out their chairs, but they themselves were so exactly the type of traveler that any waiter would prefer to wait on, with their grave consultation with him as to the choicest dishes and their evident enjoyment of life in general, that perhaps he would have been nearly as polite had they given him only ten cents—but, of course, it’s impossible to say for sure. Waiters are but waiters, and they have certain expectations and have grown accustomed to seeing them realized.
Back on the perilous journey through snow-coated vestibules the girls took their swaying way, laughing light-heartedly at each swerve of the train and trying to work out some Sherlock Holmes system by which they might be sure of finding their own car.
“I knew a girl once,” said Katherine, “whose car was taken off at Buffalo and hitched to another train while she was promenading on the platform outside, and all the baggage she had in the world went off to school, leaving her behind. It was a horrible experience—”
“Must have been,” sniggered Peggy, “but if you’re trying to scare me into thinking perhaps we won’t find our car at all you’ll have a hard time of it, because we’re in it now!”
And so they were. There were the familiar fur coats over the arms of the Pullman seats at last, there were the copies of the gayly covered magazines that they had left behind them, and, indeed, there it all was—home. Home as only a Pullman car can be home to young people who adore traveling and have plenty of interesting experiences and company to while away the journey.
“Ah,” they cried, sinking back into their seats, “this is nice, isn’t it, after all that walk? How smoothly the train runs when you’re sitting still, but how jogglety it goes when you walk through the cars.”