“There is only one drawback to our going and that is leaving behind Billy Junior, my son, and his wife and darling twin grandchildren. I hate so to say good-by that whenever I go I feel like sneaking off and not letting anyone know I am leaving. It does no good to say good-by and only makes me feel sad. But Nannie thinks differently. Wild horses could not pull her away if she did not get a chance to say farewell. There she goes now to say good-by to the chickens that have been shut in that coop to fatten for market, but they don’t know that and they just stuff themselves with the food that is given them and quarrel over it, entirely oblivious of the fact that every mouthful they take puts on more fat and brings them that much nearer the day of their death.”
Five hours after this conversation when all good-bys had been said, had you looked you would have seen two splotches of white weaving along in the high grass of the meadow, followed by a yellow splotch and a black splotch. For the long journey to California had begun.
They soon crossed the meadow and came out on the railroad track that led to Chicago by way of Milwaukee, Racine and Sheboygan. They followed this track as it was good walking between the rails and they were in no danger of being seen by farmers. Consequently they made good time and stopped to rest just before daylight on the outskirts of a small town. It was just light enough to see the smoke from the chimneys of the houses when the four friends awoke and sat up on their haunches and held a consultation as to whether they should go through the town or around it.
“I need a shave,” said Billy. “Let’s go through it.”
“You don’t mean to tell me,” said Nannie, “that you would be willing to go through the experience you once had when you were tied in a barber’s chair and the barber shaved off your beard, would you?”
“Oh! I had forgotten about that. But you fail to mention how I stood around the place and waited for him to go to dinner, and how I butted him over a grocer’s wagon that was standing in front of his shop, and when he landed, it was in the middle of a mud puddle,” and at the memory of it Billy laughed until his sides shook.
“I too say we go through the town,” said Stubby, “for I haven’t had a piece of butcher’s meat for ages and I should like to feel the blood trickling down my throat when my teeth sink into it and listen to the sound of my teeth grinding the bones. Yes, I say we go through.”
“That juicy meat sounds pretty good to me,” said Button. “I would not mind a steak myself even should it happen to be a tough one.”
“Well, Nannie, what have you to say to our plans? Should we be unlucky enough to be shut up, we are to baa, bark, and meow three times in quick succession and repeat three minutes apart. This is to be a guide to Nannie should she come back looking for us. If you hear a goat baaing, you are to listen and see if he baas naturally or baas as the signal says, three times every three minutes. The same way if you hear a dog or cat, you are to make sure whether it is Stubby or Button or some strange dog or cat.”
“That is all right for us, but what are we to do if we come to our trysting-place and find no Nannie?” said Stubby.