THE FINEST HOTEL.
A SKETCH OF LIFE IN THE MOUNTAINS OF KENTUCKY.
By A. Lytle Peterman.
“Boys, is there a hotel in this place?” the traveler asked of two youngsters lounging near, as he stood, suit-case in hand, on the cinder path by the track, looking inquiringly about him, while the train pulled off down the road.
“What place?” putting answer and inquiry into one. It aroused their interest and surprise to hear Montvale called a “place.”
“This village, or hamlet, or station, or whatever you call it—is there a hotel hereabout?” he replied, a little impatient and determined to make himself understood.
“A hotel? Yes, sir,” answered the larger of the boys.
“Then I’ll thank you and pay you to show me to it,” the stranger said, as he brightened up, throwing off the lost look that had struck his face at the same moment his foot had struck the cinders, when he stepped from the train.
“All right; up this a-way,” the larger boy answered, as he turned into the path, and the smaller fell in behind him. The traveler and his suit-case, side by side, brought up the rear. The boys were agreeable, but not over-polite, neither thinking to say, “I’ll take the baggage.”
When they had gone perhaps a hundred yards, the traveler’s eyes all the while seeking sight of a hotel and finding none, the leader stopped suddenly, raised his arm, pointed his finger back down the railway, and remarked, “The finest hotel is ’way down hyander.”