Of course that set the Squire exploding. What right had clerks to pretend to issue tickets unless they knew their business? The clerk in question coolly ran his finger down the railway list he had turned to, and then gave us the tickets.
“It is a station not much frequented, you see,” he civilly observed. “Travellers mostly go on to Saltwater.”
But for the train being due, and our having to make a rush for the platform, the Squire would have waited to give the young man a piece of his mind. “Saltwater, indeed!” said he. “I wonder the fellow does not issue his edict as to where people shall go and where they shan’t go.”
We arrived in due time at our destination. It was written up as large as life on a white board, “Montpellier-by-Sea.” A small roadside station, open to the country around; no signs of sea or of houses to be seen; a broad rural district, apparently given over entirely to agriculture. On went the whistling train, leaving the group of us standing by our luggage on the platform. The Squire was staring about him doubtfully.
“Can you tell me where Seaboard Terrace is?”
“Seaboard Terrace?” repeated the station-master. “No, sir, I don’t know it. There’s no terrace of that name hereabouts. For that matter there are no terraces at all—no houses in fact.”
The Squire’s face was a picture. He saw that (save a solitary farm homestead or two) the country was bare of dwelling-places.
“This is Montpellier-by-Sea?” he questioned at last.
“Sure enough it is, sir. Munpler, it’s called down here.”
“Then Seaboard Terrace must be somewhere in it—somewhere about. What a strange thing!”