It was the tenth of September. The town looked strangely deserted with nearly all the summer people gone. The railroad wharf was the only place where there was the usual bustle and crowd, and that was because the _Dorothy Bradford_ was gathering up its passengers for the last trip of the season.
Richard was to be one of them, and a most unwilling one. Not that he was sorry to be going back to school. He had missed Binney and the gang, and could hardly wait to begin swapping experiences with them. But he was leaving Captain Kidd behind. Dogs were not allowed in the apartment house to which his father and Aunt Letty intended moving the next week.
There had been a sorry morning in the garage when the news was broken to him. He crept up into the machine and lay down on the back seat, and cried and cried with his arms around Captain Kidd’s neck. The faithful little tongue reached out now and then to lap away his master’s tears, and once he lifted his paw and clawed at the little striped shirt waist as if trying to convey some mute comfort.
“You’re just the same as folks!” sobbed Richard, hugging the shaggy head, laid lovingly on his breast. “And it’s _cruel_ of ’em to make me give you away.” Several days had passed since that unhappy morning, however, and Richard did not feel quite so desolate over the separation now. For one thing it had not been necessary to give up all claim on Captain Kidd to insure him a good home. Georgina had gladly accepted the offer of half of him, and had coaxed even Tippy into according him a reluctant welcome.
The passengers already on deck watched with interest the group near the gang-plank. Richard was putting the clever little terrier through his whole list of tricks.
“It’s the last time, old fellow,” he said implor-ingly when the dog hesitated over one of them. “Go on and do it for me this once. Maybe I’ll never see you again till I’m grown up and you’re too old to remember me.”
“That’s what you said about Dan’s coming home,” remarked Georgina from under the shade of her pink parasol. That parasol and the pink dress and the rose-like glow on the happy little face was attracting even more admiration from the passengers than Captain Kidd’s tricks. Barbara, standing beside her, cool and dainty in a white dress and pale green sweater and green parasol, made almost as much of a picture.
“You talked that way about never expecting to see Danny till you were grown,” continued Georgina, “and it turned out that you not only saw him, but were with him long enough to hear some of his adventures. It would be the same way about your coming back here if you’d just keep hoping hard enough.”
“Come Dicky,” called Mr. Moreland from the upper deck. “They’re about to take in the gang-plank. Don’t get left.”
Maybe it was just as well that there was no time for good-byes. Maybe it was more than the little fellow could have managed manfully. As it was his voice sounded suspiciously near breaking as he called back over his shoulder, almost gruffly: