“How am I ever to get to the Fair in that? There’s no place underneath where I can hang on. I can’t get inside, for they’ll see me first thing, and then I’ll be taken into the barn and securely locked up. That was the treatment I received in the summer when the Circus came to Springfield. I can’t ride anywhere that I can see.”
Once more he circled around the machine.
“If there was only a top to the machine, I might manage to ride on it. To be sure, it might prove rather slippery, but I’d dig in my toes. There would be one disadvantage, though. I’d receive the full benefit of all the bumps on the road, perched up there.”
With a saucy side toss of his magnificent head, he paused suddenly to chuckle:
“Ha, ha! Ho, ho! Just the very place for me! Ha, ha, ha!” and with one light spring he was up beside the hamper.
“Plenty of room with a few of those papers out of the way,” so he proceeded to dispense with them by eating them—not a very appetizing meal, but goats are not the most epicurean of beasts. When they had been disposed of in this manner, he stepped daintily inside the hamper, though it was a very tight fit. Then his eyes popped open and a broad smile lighted up his countenance, and he wiggled his chin whiskers, a trick he had to express extreme pleasure.
“What luck for Billy! Breakfast all laid! And Mrs. Treat’s best cooking, too.”
With a little flirt of his horns, wicked Billy brought the cover down over himself and the lunch basket, and to all outward appearances everything was very snug.
“Good thing this is so large,” ruminated Billy. “Really it is more of a rattan trunk than a hamper. I suppose it is meant to do duty for a trunk on short trips,” and he settled himself comfortably, and only just in time, for Mr. Treat was even then calling in his hearty, jovial way: “All aboard!” and was helping Mrs. Treat into the tonneau.
After an argument as to whom belonged the honor place—the seat beside the driver—Tom was installed there, while the younger boys were tucked in beside their mother, pacified by the promise that on the return trip it would be turn-about.