“Yes. Isn’t it the limit?” said Phil, fanning himself with his hat. “Said she couldn’t find her way back to you, so thought she’d wait with the Applegates at the foot of the gangplank; said she knew you would find her there.”
The girls laughed hysterically, and even Mr. Payton’s stern face relaxed; the action was so truly “Lucilian.”
“Well, I suppose all we can do is to follow,” said Mr. Payton, and Mrs. Payton added, pathetically, “I do wish Lucile would be a trifle less impulsive now and then; it might save us a good deal of trouble.”
Mr. Payton had felt inclined to read his “cyclonic” young daughter a lecture, but the sight of her bright young face completely disarmed him, and he could only breathe a prayer of thankfulness that she was safe.
They said good-by to Mr. and Mrs. Applegate and their very diminutive daughter—whom somebody had fondly nicknamed “Puss”—and turned to follow the crowd. A short time later they set foot for the first time on the soil of the Old World. 110
“Where are we going, Dad, now that we’re here?” asked Phil.
“To London, as fast as we can, by the train that connects with our steamer,” said his father. “Stick together, everybody—here we are,” and he hustled them before him into the long coach—for in England, you must remember, trains are not made up of cars, but of “coaches.”
By this time it was getting late, and after vainly trying to distinguish objects through streaked and misty glass, the girls gave up and leaned back with a sigh of tired but absolute content.
“Well, we’re here, and still going,” said Lucile, happily, feeling for her friend’s hands.
“We jolly well know that, my de-ar,” came in sweet, falsetto tones from Phil. “We ought to have no end of sport, you know; rippin’, what-what!”