Bridget and Ann were on hand to say the last good-byes, Mamma gave a few last directions, and entered the carriage, Papa poked the small couple in, topsy-turvy style, got in himself, called out good-bye to the servants, who were wiping their eyes with the corners of their aprons, and—the long-anticipated "start" had taken place.
Polly was radiant. She hugged Papa, squeezed Mamma, threw her arms around Teddy, and kissed him over and over (getting as many kisses from him as she gave, you may be sure), and finally settled down with a long sigh of deep, pure content, and said "she was so happy she felt crowded inside of her, right up to her throat!" And Teddy, not willing to feel different from Polly, said: "So do I!"
I won't be able to tell you very much of the short journey to the city of New York, for I've neither time nor space for it. But you know Polly and Teddy were just like you, my dear little girls and boys, and they enjoyed the few hours of train ride past fields and villages, hills and meadows, and all the various kinds of landscape views, they watched from the windows of their car, just as much as you have enjoyed such little trips; and, moreover, they were just as restless and fidgety—when feeling that they wanted to have a good run about, and couldn't "because they were shut up in a railroad car so long!"—as all little folks (who are real live little folks) are apt to get under such circumstances. But the cars sped on and on, and after a while they rushed pell-mell into a long dark tunnel, which Polly at once recognized as the "beginning of the end" of their journey to New York City.
"Now, jus' as soon as we get into the light again, and under a big high roof, and the cars stop, that will be New York! Oh, Teddy Terry, aren't you glad we're almost there?"
In his excitement Teddy forgot where he was, and, jumping to his feet, he shouted: "Whoop!" as loudly as if he had been standing in his own garden at home. Then, with an immediate sense of his mistake, the little boy dropped again into his seat, and covered his mouth with both hands, while his little crimson face was a pitiful sight to see.
"Oh, I forgot!" said he. "I truly did forget; but I did feel so full of halloo, I—I—it came right out 'fore I guessed it would!" He looked very penitent, but whispered to Polly:
"Don't you wish you could halloo, Polly darling? I should think you would!"
"Teddy Terry, I'm just bursting to halloo as loud as I can, but I s'pose we'll have to keep on wanting to and never doing it while we're European travelers. It'll be hard holding in, Teddy; but we've truly got to, else Mamma and Papa'll be 'shamed of our queerness again, don't you see?"