A MAGIC TRIP
“Maybe it was just Helen you heard, Chess,” chuckled Ruth, and Helen
gazed at her chum reproachfully.
“Do you mean to say that I am wild, Ruthie? How can you? Why, there
never was a meeker, more down-trodden——”
“Write it on the ice!” suggested Chess in atrocious slang that Helen
did not even deign to notice.
To prevent one of the good-natured squabbles that so often took
place between these two, Ruth immediately began to talk about their
prospects.
“It seems a long enough journey to Seattle,” she said. “But really
that’s only about the first stage of the journey.”
“Four days and three nights, isn’t it?” asked Helen.
“The flyer makes it in a little better time,” said Tom. “But it’s
approximately that.”
“Then we meet the others of the company,” said Ruth, “and take the
steamer for St. Michael. That’s the chief distributing center, you
know. There we’ll have to take a smaller steamer for the rest of the
way.”
“That’s the part I’ll love,” cried Helen enthusiastically. “It’s
always so much more fun to travel by ship than overland.”
The rest of the trip to New York, though enlivened by high spirits
and merry chatter, was uneventful. The train arrived not only on
time, but a little ahead of it. Which, for that particular line, was
rather unusual.
They had decided to postpone luncheon until they were safely
established on the western bound train. Now, as they gathered up
wraps and other belongings in a flurry of excitement, Helen confessed
to an extreme and gnawing hunger.
“I don’t think I can ever wait till we get on board the train,
Ruthie,” she complained plaintively. “I am really ravenous. If
we should pass a sandwich stand anywhere along the way, don’t be
surprised if I make a wild dash for a frankfurter and rolls, or some
other such delicacy.”
It was necessary for Chess to make a last-minute rush to the ticket
office, since he had made no reservation. He was lucky enough to
secure an upper berth in the same car with Tom, so that the party
would be pretty close together.
“Lucky you could grab off anything, Chess, old boy,” said Tom, as
the latter came up to them panting.
“That’ll be all right,” said Chess. “I’d made up my mind to come if I
had to sleep on the roof.”
“By comparison the upper ought to be quite comfortable,” chuckled
Helen, and Chess was heard to murmur something about “having
suspected before that that girl had no heart and now was quite sure
of it.”
Gayly they allowed an obsequious porter—he was obsequious because
Tom had tipped him generously in advance and commissioned him to let
the young ladies in the compartment lack for no comfort during the
journey—to lead them to their particular private little cubbyhole
which was to be such a luxury to them on the long trip.
Suitcases disposed of, the girls looked about them with all the pride
of possession.
“Oh, isn’t this perfectly scrumptious, Ruthie Fielding?” cried Helen.
“I’ll tell you we are traveling de luxe this time.”
Ruth closed the door of the compartment against curious eyes and sank
down on one of the cushioned seats which at night could be converted
into fairly comfortable beds.
“It’s all perfectly wonderful,” she agreed with Helen. “One usually
doesn’t expect much privacy on a train. But, oh, Tom,” with an
appealing glance at the latter, “how about something to eat?”
“And that time you hit the nail right on the head, Ruthie,” agreed
Tom cheerfully. “I shall order lunch at once, and unless you young
ladies object to our society——”
“We _should_,” murmured Helen.
“We will dine right here in comfort——”
“To say nothing of style!” finished Ruth, with a delighted laugh.
“Oh, Tom, please do!”
Tom rang the bell that would summon the porter and struck an attitude.
“Waiter! The tray!” he declared, and a second later as though the
words and not the bell had summoned the black genii of the train,
there came a knock upon the door.
Tom sent for a menu card and when it came ordered what sounded to
them all like a sumptuous feast.
“The boy is good,” said Chess, when the party was once more alone.
“He ordered enough for another half dozen of us.”
“And I thought this was to be lunch!” sighed Helen.
However, when the order arrived there proved to be no more of it than
the ravenous young people could take care of. It was the merriest
meal they had ever had, and that was saying a good deal, since they
had partaken of many merry meals together.
There was something that appealed to their imagination in the privacy
of the compartment, in the fact that, aboard that crowded train, they
four could be as much alone as though they were in the dining-room of
the house at the Red Mill.
Even the train itself seemed enveloped in the same glamorous mist—a
sort of dream train, speeding them on toward romance and adventure.
The illusion continued during all of that long journey across the
continent. Never once did their spirits flag or that utter boredom
that is so often the accompaniment of a long trip descend upon them.
Chess and Tom declared that they were perfectly comfortable in the
Pullman coach, and as for the girls, they slept as soundly as though
they were back in their own familiar beds at home.
The delight of dining alone in a stateroom never palled, and
they whiled away the long daylight hours of the journey reading
or chatting or discussing with Ruth the filming of Mr. Hammond’s
picture, “The Girl of Gold.” Ruth herself spent many hours in
studying both the novel and the scenario.
As the scenery became more rugged and beautiful they spent more and
more time on the observation platform, sometimes only leaving it
when hunger drove them inside to appease their appetite.
Occasionally the train stopped long enough at way stations to permit
of their stretching cramped legs and lazy muscles in a short walk.
They never failed to take advantage of these occasional breaks and
always came back to the train with an increased eagerness to be on
their way.
It was only at Chicago that an incident occurred that sufficed to
shatter Ruth’s enjoyment of the trip for a time.
In the city of the lakes it was necessary for them to change trains
for points still farther West. Tom had secured a compartment for the
girls on the second train, as well, so that the change was actually
only a matter of shifting their baggage and themselves from one train
to another.
But when they were on the platform and just about to board the
Seattle train, Helen suddenly hissed a sentence in Ruth’s ears that
made the latter stand still as though she had been shot.
“That’s our old friend Charlie Reid, Ruthie! Look quickly! Directly
back of you!”