He said, "Well, there are going to be big doings to-morrow—races, balloon ascension, murders and everything like that. But I'm afraid you boys are going to be disappointed. There's a train comes through here about four or five in the morning, going east. I think that'll be the one to pick you up."
We went back to our car feeling pretty glum about it. Jiminies, you couldn't blame us. What was the good of being left at a carnival in the middle of the night and taken away again before daylight? That's one thing I don't like about railroads; they do just as they please. They push you and pull you around and take you away again before you want to go.
"Why can't they let us spend Columbus Day here?" Westy wanted to know.
"When did the brakeman say it would come?" Connie asked.
"Hanged if I remember," I said; "but I knew how it would be when I heard that the train would be Number Twenty-three. I'll never trust that number."
"And races and everything, too," Wig said.
"Sure, and a balloon ascension," Connie began grouching.
"Maybe he's mistaken," I said; "we've had pretty good fun, anyway."
"You call it fun, starting away just when the fun is going to begin?" Pee-wee piped up.
I guess we didn't know what to think or what to expect. Anyway, I knew that the train that had left us there would telegraph to some place or other about us, that was all I knew. When another train stopped for us, we'd just have to go.