“I was hoping Sammy could come,” murmured Dot, as she hugged her “Alice-doll.”
“And Billy Bumps is fun,” added Tess.
“We have no room here for goats, whether they are funny or not,” declared Agnes. “Take him out in front, on the lower deck, Sammy. Tie him there, and then wash yourself for supper. I should think you would have smothered in that closet.”
“I did, almost,” confessed the boy. “And Billy didn’t like it, either. But we wanted to come.”
“Too bad—young ambition nipped in the bud,” murmured Mr. Howbridge. “Take Billy outside, Sammy.”
The goat was rather frisky, and it required Neale and Sammy to tie him to the forward rail on the lower deck. Then Mrs. MacCall, in the kindness of her Scotch heart, sent the “beastie,” as she called him, some odds and ends of food, including beet tops from the kitchen, and Billy, at least, was happy.
“Low bridge!” suddenly came the call from Hank, up ahead with the two mules.
“What’s he saying?” asked Ruth to Mr. Howbridge.
“He’s giving warning that we are approaching a low bridge, and that if we stay on deck and hold our heads too high we may get bumped. Yes, there’s the bridge just ahead. I wonder if we can pass beneath it. Our houseboat is higher than a canal boat.”
The stream curved then, and gave a view of a white bridge spanning it. Hank had had the first glimpse of it. It was necessary for the occupants of the upper deck either to desert it, or to crouch down below the railing, and they did the former.