The clerk nodded and then boarded a Broadway car. Oliver stood on the pavement in wonder.
“Might take the train for St. Louis to-day!” he murmured; “and I thought all the while that he intended to stay in New York for some time at least! If he has gone he will have a full day’s start of me, to say nothing of the difference in the trip overland and the one by the way of the isthmus. I wish I was going by train instead.”
After a moment’s reflection, he resolved to go at once to the Gilliford House and see if the colonel had yet departed. If he had, then there was nothing to do but wait for the steamer on Wednesday.
On the corner was a policeman, and the officer quickly directed the boy to the proper elevated road by which he could reach the hotel mentioned. Oliver climbed the steps, procured his ticket, dropped it into the box, and a moment later was aboard the train.
Though he had been to New York a number of times, the ride in the air as it were was somewhat of a novelty to him. He sat in one of the little cross seats in the middle of the car, and thoroughly enjoyed the panorama that swept by—a panorama that was so close to him that he could note every detail.
At length Thirty-third Street was reached. Here Oliver left the train, went down the long stairs, and inquired his way to the Gilliford House.
It was not a long distance off, and in five minutes more he had entered the office.
“Is Colonel Mendix stopping here?” he asked of the clerk at the desk.
The young man looked at the register.