Star answered back, “Hurry up or you will be left behind; they are going to switch our car on to the Santa Fe train.”
Billy knew he would not have time to go around the way he had come, so he crawled through a place in the fence where a couple of boards were off, and gained his car just as it began to back out of the yard.
“Well, old fellow, where have you been? You look all wet, and you have nearly given me nervous prostration by your absence. I have neighed and neighed for you until my throat is sore.”
“I never heard you,” said Billy Jr., “for I was inside the laundry seeing to a little washing,” and Billy Jr. commenced to laugh.
“What are you laughing at?” asked Star.
“At the funny frightened faces those pig-tailed Chinamen made at me when they saw me coming for them. I wonder if the Chinaman I frightened up the street has stopped running yet,” said Billy Jr.
“Tell me so I can laugh, too,” said Star, “for I know you have been in mischief.”
While Billy was telling of his adventure the train started on its way, westward ho.
The trip from Chicago to Kansas City was made without any excitement; and after they had left Kansas City behind and were well on their way across the state, Billy, who was looking out of his peephole, said:
“Well, I am glad I took your advice and did not try to walk or steal rides to the West. I would have been a tired, foot-sore goat by this time, if I had ever gotten as far as here, which I doubt. The map of the United States I chewed up never gave me any idea of the distance between the eastern states and the western. Look quickly, Star, at that woman with a baby in her arm, coming out of that hole in the ground. What on earth is she doing there? They don’t bury people alive out here, do they?”