Unfortunately for Tony, the realities of life had no charm for him. He was constantly building air-castles, and looking for something that never came. He lived in a little world of his own creation, and he was not happy unless he was wandering about that world, and mingling with the impossible beings with which his lively imagination had peopled it.
Having decided to "make a break," Tony went further, and made up his mind that he would do it without any unnecessary delay. He could not go on the river without his father's consent, for almost all the steamboat men who ran out of St. Louis were acquainted with him, and some of them would be sure to tell Mr. Richardson that they had seen him. If he went anywhere, he must go to sea. But just here a difficulty arose: How was he going to make his way to New Orleans, which was the nearest port at which he could ship on an ocean-going vessel? There were three ways open to him. He could ask some steamboat captain to pass him, or he could ship as deck hand, or he could pay his fare in the cabin. There were objections to every one of these plans. If he asked for a pass, he would be sure to get it, but he would have to answer a thousand and one questions. Did his father say he might go to New Orleans? and, if so, why didn't Tony take passage on one of his boats?
"That would never do," soliloquised the boy, who had thought all these things over more than once. "When I leave here I want to disappear as completely as though I had ceased to exist. If father should find out that I had left for New Orleans, it would be just like him to telegraph there and stop me. I can't work my way as deck hand, for I couldn't eat and sleep with such a lot of men as they are. Besides I am not strong enough to handle heavy freight, and some of those sharp-eyed mates would certainly penetrate any disguise I might assume. If I pay my fare in the cabin, I shall run the same risks I would run in asking for a pass. 'Tony,' some inquisitive clerk would say, 'what are you doing this for? Why don't you go down on one of your father's boats, and then you could go for nothing?' I wish I was not so well known. If I only had money enough I would go by rail; but I have only enough to pay for my ticket, and I ought to have a little left to buy an outfit when I reach New Orleans. Dear me! I am always bothered about something."
But, after all, getting to New Orleans was not so great a task as Tony thought it was. Unluckily for him events took a turn which made it very easy for him to accomplish his object, and that, too, without his father's knowledge.
The next day was Saturday, and consequently there was no school; but Tony went to the city as usual—we have said that he spent all his leisure hours on the levee—and taking leave of his father at the depot made his way toward one of the wharf-boats. There he encountered a well-known coal-dealer, Mr. Vandegriff by name, whose countenance lighted up at the sight of him.
"Looking for a job?" said he, as he shook hands with Tony.
"Not to-day, I guess," was the laughing reply.
"But I am in earnest," said Mr. Vandegriff, as he and Tony walked over the gang-plank to the wharf-boat. "Here's the Armada loading for New Orleans, and she is in such a hurry to get off that she can't stop to coal up; so I have had a barge made fast alongside of her, and she is going to take it down the river with her and coal up while she is under way. When she gets all she wants she will turn the barge adrift, and when one of my tugs comes in, I'll send down after it."
"Well?" said Tony, who knew that there was nothing unusual in all this.
"Well, I want somebody to go with her and check the coal and take the money," said Mr. Vandegriff.