Uncle warmly thanked the boy but he received this second lesson with a little less complacency than the first. Following the crowd to the outside he presented his tickets to the first hack driver he came to.
"You are pretty well supplied, aren't you dad. You have the right of way to two hotels. Which do you want?"
"Take us to the one I've paid fer."
"Which is that?"
"Well, I guess it must be the down town hotel."
"They are both down hotels. I see your baggage is booked for the Northern and I suppose you want to follow your baggage."
Without more ado all four were placed into the uncomfortably crowded hack and shortly unloaded at the Northern. An obsequious porter ushered them into the office and Uncle was astounded with a demand for twenty dollars down. "But I've paid," Uncle protested. The clerk looked at his card and assured him he was at the wrong hotel. It was now dark and Uncle concluded to pay the money and start out anew the next day. They were shown to their rooms by way of the elevator and more dead than alive, to use Aunt Sarah's expression, they flung themselves into chairs and Johnny yelled, "This is Chicago, what I've heard them talk about." They went to the windows and could not repress a shudder as they saw the street lights so far below. Aunt Sarah did not see how she could sleep so high up, but when their evening meal was done and the events of the day discussed they became as sleepy and they felt as safe as they did with the whippoorwill singing in the orchard and the hogs grunting lazily in the lane.