“Not a thing the same,” replied Mr. Merrill teasingly; “there’ll be more flowers and more warm weather and more palm trees and more fun for girls and lots more chance to play.”
“Then let’s go and you come as soon as you get through your business, Dadah,” said Mary Jane.
So after an early breakfast and a brisk walk through the interesting markets, Mrs. Merrill, Alice and Mary Jane got aboard the fine “Special” train that went down the east coast.
The very first stop, some two hours later, was their station, and the minute Mary Jane got off she felt a pang of disappointment. All there was to see was a row of funny busses, a narrow parkway of flowers and palms and then fields—just plains, fields or vacant lots and not an interesting thing anywhere. But a ride of a mile in one of the busses made a change. They came to the little town of St. Augustine (“It doesn’t grow near the railroad, this town doesn’t,” Mary Jane afterwards explained to her father, “because railroads are so very now-a-days!”) and that was quaint and pretty enough to delight any little girl.
After they had taken their bags to their big, sunny room, changed their traveling clothes for cool, summer dresses, low shoes and parasols, they went down to inspect their new home. It seemed like moving into fairyland—living in that hotel did—and Mary Jane had to pinch herself three or four times to make sure that she, really truly she was to live in that beautiful place for several days. There were gardens, oh, beautiful gardens full of gay flowers, and brooks and bridges right in the garden—inside the house! And on the bridge in the center of the garden, stood a little girl just about Mary Jane’s age—a little girl who looked all the world as though she would like a playmate.
“May I go and talk to her now?” asked Mary Jane.
“Perhaps we’d better have lunch first,” suggested Mrs. Merrill, glancing at her watch. “Who’d have guessed it was nearly one o’clock!”
“I could have guessed that as easy as pie,” said Alice, “because I’m starved.”
“You won’t be long,” said Mrs. Merrill, laughingly, “because you’ll find lots to eat here.” And they went toward the dining room.
“Now where would you like to sit?” asked the pompous head waiter as he escorted Mary Jane, who happened to be leading her family, to a seat.