"Renestine has changed her mind and will remain at home."
Then the girls broke into a laugh and chided Renestine, saying she was a baby and would never see the ocean or go to America and ride in carriages. The mental picture was doing its work. Not ride in carriages and have pretty clothes and .learn to speak English? That was too much to refuse. Renestine raised her head, wiped the tears out of her eyes, brought the skirt neatly folded to her mother and said: "Mutterchen, finish my trunk. I am going with Yetta, Selma and Polly to America."
The journey began and Renestine made the voyage over in a sailing vessel which took six weeks to make her port at Galveston, Texas, in the early fifties. The girls experienced days of seasickness when they thought it was better to die than to ride in carriages and were weary and homesick. But when, at last, they walked again upon land and were welcomed in Galveston by their relatives, all the melancholy hours were forgotten. The girls had separated into their different families on arriving at Houston, but frequently met just as they had before leaving their home town, and were observing everything with eagerness and getting their first impressions of America.
One balmy Sunday morning they took a walk and marveled much that Houston had so many houses and such large ones. While they walked they chatted and were merry. Finally, they noticed that a great many looked at them curiously, and some smiled. They were at last spoken to by an old lady, who reminded them that it was not customary for girls to walk in the middle of the street. This was a conceit that pleased them, to walk in the middle of the street just to see people walking on either side of them.
The ringing of the Sunday morning church bells was a startling sound and Paula exclaimed, as the three stood still listening: "Oh, listen to the music box!" Solemnly they walked on and wondered that the world was so large and full of beautiful things. Itwas a long time before Renestine realized that they had gone a great distance. "We will return now," she said. But when they turned to retrace their steps they found themselves in a wood of large, dark trees with heavy gray moss dropping from their branches and a solemn stillness over all. It was growing dusk, too, and the trees looked ghostly in the falling gloom.
"Do you know which way to go?" asked Yetta.
"Oh, come with me and I will show you," said Paula.
Trustingly they followed Paula. But the brave girl, after a half hour's vain effort, had to admit that she was puzzled herself and did not know how to get out of the wood. Yetta showed the nearness of tears, but Renestine set to work to extricate themselves. Before she had decided what to do they all three heard horses' hoofs trampling down bush-wood and dry twigs not far away. The riders, or whatever it was, came nearer until the girls saw a young man on horseback, a boy accompanying him. The horsemen reined in their horses and stopped when they saw the girls standing before them. The older man, who was about twenty-eight, asked how they came to be so far in the depth of the trackless woods. When they had told him, he dismounted, throwing the reins over his arm and leading his horse, he walked along by the side of the girls guiding them out of their difficulty; the boy followed on his horse which carried the saddle-bags containing the personal belongings of both of them. As they walked many questions were asked and answered and in a little time the woods were left behind and the. girls were opening the gate of Renestine's sister's home. The young rescuer, after seeing them safely disappear in the doorway, got on his horse again and trotted off to his hotel, the boy following.
CHAPTER II
SEATED at her work table in her sitting room, Mrs. Bilter was putting the last stitches in a white Swiss dress that Renestine was to wear that night to a ball. The puff sleeve close to the shoulder was the last of the dainty dress to be put on. Mrs. Bilter took eager pleasure in dressing her pretty sister in the daintiest of gowns. When she looked up she saw her husband coming through the gate for his noon dinner. She put down her sewing and moved to meet him on the porch.