They had to go through a parlor car to reach the dining car, and Sunny Boy saw for himself that there was no piano, nothing but chairs on either side of the aisle. A colored waiter helped him into his seat at a little table in the dining car, and he thought it great fun to eat chicken broth while looking out of the window at the telegraph poles galloping by. The poles seemed to be moving instead of the train, but Sunny Boy knew the train really moved.
“Will there be another call for lunch?” he asked, remembering what the man had shouted, as he ate his mashed potato and peas.
“Oh yes, but we won’t come,” said Mrs. Horton. “That will be for the people who weren’t hungry when we were.”
A man at the table across from theirs picked up the menu card.
“Now what on earth shall I order for dessert?” he frowned. “If the doctor won’t let me have meat, I suppose I have to eat something.”
“Chocolate ice-cream,” suggested Sunny Boy helpfully, feeling sorry for any one who did not know that it was the finest dessert in the world.
The frown slid away from the man’s face and he grinned cheerfully at the small boy.
“Is that what you are going to have?” he demanded. “All right then, I will, too.”
And when it came, a neat little mountain of it, he and Sunny smiled again at each other before they buried their silver spoons in the beautiful dark iciness of it.
Back in their seat in their car, Sunny was restless. To Mother’s suggestion that he take a nap, he said that he didn’t feel sleepy. He wished he had something to do—he was tired of looking at trees and things.