On a beautiful morning about a week later, the three children, beaming with happiness, alighted at Seaport station, to find Sam and Billy on the platform looking eagerly for them. Yet when they met, the natural shyness that children feel at meeting those whom they seldom see, overcame the three new-comers, and they found no words to express the pleasure and gratitude that was in their hearts, although their happy faces spoke for them. Sam, always business-like, was the first to speak and conduct them to the wagonette which was to take them to their boarding-place. When they were seated in the wagonette, facing one another, Maysie at last found voice,—
“Hallo, Billy!” she said, her face wreathed in smiles.
They were all a little shy of Sam at first, but they soon felt at their ease, for he pointed out the objects of interest as they drove along, and told them about the colt, the puppies, the kittens, and the wonderful things they would find on the beach.
“Is it hot in the city?” asked Sam.
“Just!” replied Johnny, briefly.
“I saw a horse that was killed entirely by the hot sun,” said Maysie.
“He wasn’t dead, Maysie,” said Johnny; “it is just overcome he was. They took him off in a big cart to the hospital.”
Soon the engine-house was passed, and there sat Jack, who knew them as soon as they came in sight. Sam insisted on taking him in, and Jack, who seldom had the pleasure of a drive, was very glad of the opportunity.
“He looks like the dog I saw to the fire that day I told you of,” said Maysie.