Buster laughed good-naturedly, for his quizzing was making the Old Lion irritable. He wanted to sleep and Buster strolled away, leaving him to enjoy his nap.
The next day the animals were taken aboard the train. Some of the harmless ones were led there and tied to posts in box cars, and others like Ocelot and Spot were lifted aboard in their stout cages. No chance could be taken with them.
Buster found himself in a small compartment of a baggage car, with Chiquita occupying a seat just forward of him. She trusted him so much that she liked to have him near her. But as he had never been on a railroad journey before he was fastened in the car by a chain.
“You might forget yourself, Buster, or get excited, and try to jump off when the train was moving,” she said to him, when chaining him up. “It isn’t because I don’t trust you. You understand that, don’t you?”
Buster nodded his head, as she patted him, and looked at the chain. It was not a very strong one, and he smiled at the thought of what he could do to it if he wanted to escape. He could snap it in two with one jerk of his powerful body.
The train started finally, and Buster was as interested and excited as a child on her first railroad journey. The jolting and rattling began almost at once. He recalled Old Lion’s words, and wondered if he was groaning in agony. Such rolling and jerking were enough to rattle Old Lion’s teeth loose. And Spot and Ocelot! How did they like the noise and confusion?
The train steamed along slowly at first, and then faster. Through a window in the baggage car Buster could see the houses and trees flashing past as if they were all running in the opposite direction. It was a funny sensation. Instead of being frightened by it, Buster enjoyed it.
“I never ran so fast in my life,” he said to himself. “Even Loup the Lynx couldn’t run as fast as this.”
He stopped and scowled. He never thought of Loup without growing angry. The Lynx had treated him in a cowardly, cruel way, and Buster somehow wanted to punish him for it. But there seemed little prospect of his ever meeting the Lynx again.
“Oh, well,” Buster sighed, “I can’t spoil my temper thinking of something that happened in the past.”