Part 3

“I’m not afraid,” Mary Jane managed to say between sobs, “’cause I can float. But if I have to get into the river and float, who’s going to take care of this big banana I’m taking to my Dadah? He likes bananas!”

For a second every one on the boat stared. And then a general laugh relieved the tension, and folks were willing to sit down and trust to getting a-shore. The pump was kept working as hard as its broken condition would let it; men dipped into the river with the only two buckets aboard and tossed water onto the fire and slowly the lights of the city twinkled nearer--and nearer--and nearer.

Other boats came comfortingly near and were passed; docks loomed out of the twilight, and finally with a bump the little, overcrowded boat slipped into its place by the shore.

There wasn’t a panic even then, but folks, some way, got off that boat in a hurry. The firm land never had felt so good!

“Where’s the little girl who wanted to save her banana?” called the Captain as he turned his boat over to the dock firemen. “I want to thank her.”

But the Merrills were already out of hearing hurrying to their belated dinner, their Dadah and jolly plan-making for the morrow.

A BIT OF SUNNY SPAIN

“Early to bed, early to rise, and you can catch the first train in the morning,” said Mr. Merrill as they came in from a little stroll through the gayly lighted park that same evening. “And I really think that you folks better forget about me for a few days and go on with your sightseeing by yourselves. The first train for St. Augustine leaves at nine in the morning and you can have lots more fun there than here where everything is more citified.”

“But, Dadah,” said Mary Jane, “will there be flowers there and warm weather and everything just the same?”

“Not a thing the same,” replied Mr. Merrill teasingly; “there’ll be more flowers and more warm weather and more palm trees and more fun for girls and lots more chance to play.”

“Then let’s go and you come as soon as you get through your business, Dadah,” said Mary Jane.

So after an early breakfast and a brisk walk through the interesting markets, Mrs. Merrill, Alice and Mary Jane got aboard the fine “Special” train that went down the east coast.

The very first stop, some two hours later, was their station, and the minute Mary Jane got off she felt a pang of disappointment. All there was to see was a row of funny busses, a narrow parkway of flowers and palms and then fields--just plains, fields or vacant lots and not an interesting thing anywhere. But a ride of a mile in one of the busses made a change. They came to the little town of St. Augustine (“It doesn’t grow near the railroad, this town doesn’t,” Mary Jane afterwards explained to her father, “because railroads are so very now-a-days!”) and that was quaint and pretty enough to delight any little girl.

After they had taken their bags to their big, sunny room, changed their traveling clothes for cool, summer dresses, low shoes and parasols, they went down to inspect their new home. It seemed like moving into fairyland--living in that hotel did--and Mary Jane had to pinch herself three or four times to make sure that she, really truly _she_ was to live in that beautiful place for several days. There were gardens, oh, beautiful gardens full of gay flowers, and brooks and bridges right in the garden--inside the house! And on the bridge in the center of the garden, stood a little girl just about Mary Jane’s age--a little girl who looked all the world as though she would like a playmate.

“May I go and talk to her now?” asked Mary Jane.

“Perhaps we’d better have lunch first,” suggested Mrs. Merrill, glancing at her watch. “Who’d have guessed it was nearly one o’clock!”

“I could have guessed that as easy as pie,” said Alice, “because I’m starved.”

“You won’t be long,” said Mrs. Merrill, laughingly, “because you’ll find lots to eat here.” And they went toward the dining room.

“Now where would you like to sit?” asked the pompous head waiter as he escorted Mary Jane, who happened to be leading her family, to a seat.

“If you’d just as soon,” replied Mary Jane politely, “I’d like to sit at the table where there’s the most to eat. And Alice would like to sit there too, ’cause she’s always just as hungry as I am. And mother’ll have to sit there if we do ’cause she belongs to us.”

“Then this is the very place for you,” said the head waiter, as with twinkling eyes he pulled out three chairs at a cosy window table. “These little girls,” he added to their waiter, “are to have all they can eat whether it’s early or late.”

“I think we’re going to like this place, Mother,” said Mary Jane happily, as she unfolded her napkin, while the waiter went to get their menu cards, “’cause they seem to like _us_.”

They had a royal luncheon, ending with two kinds of ice cream and a promise from the waiter of another still different sort for evening dinner.

After luncheon they took a little walk through the “square,” enjoying the gay shops and the curious houses and trees.

“Isn’t this the place where the ‘Fountain of Youth’ is?” said Alice as she looked up from a window full of pictures. “That looks like the picture of it in my geography.”

“Oh, I know all about the Fountain of Youth!” exclaimed Mary Jane happily. “Miss Lynn told us about it in kindergarten. Is _this_ it?”

“Not right here,” replied Mrs. Merrill, “but only a mile or two outside the city. Suppose we hail one of those pretty little surreys and ride out there. I know you girls will like that and I love riding in those little fringed surreys--they make me feel so gay.”

A few steps farther on they came across an empty surrey, driven by a man who was plainly of Spanish descent and who seemed very glad to have passengers who would like to hear his stories of the founding of the little town.

Before they drove out to the “Fountain of Youth,” he took them through a few of the little streets of the town and told them stories about the houses and stores they passed. Then they turned northward and drove past the city gates, the forts and the old cemetery toward the spring the girls were so anxious to see.

“But, Mother!” exclaimed Alice, as they drew up in front of a rather dilapidated, low building, “_this_ isn’t it! I know what it looks like from the picture and it’s nothing like this.”

“This is the ‘Fountain of Youth’ all the same,” answered Mrs. Merrill. “Those pictures that are used so much were taken years ago when there was an open pavilion over the spring. In recent years it has been housed in as you see it now. You won’t be disappointed with the inside though--it’s as curious and interesting as ever. Come in and get a drink.”

Mary Jane and Alice followed her down three narrow steps, through a low doorway and into a dim room. At first they couldn’t see anything interesting but as they looked about longer they changed their minds. Bubbling out of the ground, almost at their feet, was a little spring--the very same spring that the Spaniard, Ponce de Leon, had discovered over three hundred years ago.

“But, Mother,” objected Mary Jane, “couldn’t he see that this was just a common, every-day spring and that it was just so ordinary this way?”

“Oh, it didn’t look ordinary to him, you may be sure,” said Mrs. Merrill. “You must remember that he had landed after a long, long sea voyage and fresh water, bubbling from the ground, looked more than usually good. Then all this place where we are standing was a forest of bloom--thousands of flowers he had never before seen were here and it must have looked very lovely and magical to him.”

“Yes, that would make a difference,” admitted Alice.

“Then, too,” continued Mrs. Merrill, “even before he came here, the Indians had a legend that this was a magic well and he who drank thereof would never die. That, I think, is because it is a mineral spring and the water tastes different from most spring water. Try it yourselves and see.” And then as the girls filled their cups she added, “So you can hardly blame the stranger if he thought he had found the spring of youth he had set out to locate, can you?”

The girls made faces over the water--they didn’t like the taste a bit. “I know why he called it the ‘Fountain of Youth,’” laughed Alice as she tried to finish her cupful. “He had to call it something interesting or folks would never drink it!”

“What are those stone paths?” asked Mary Jane as she set her cup down.

“Those aren’t paths, little girls,” said the guide who had stood near by. “Those stones make a cross--but such a big cross you hardly notice it at first. See! There are fifteen stones for one part and thirteen for the other. We are told that Ponce de Leon himself laid those here to mark the year he discovered the spring; that was in fifteen-thirteen.”

As they went out from the dimness of the spring house into the warm sunshine, who should they see coming toward them but the little girl Mary Jane had seen that morning on the bridge in the hotel gardens. Mary Jane hung back a minute to speak to her.

“I’m Mary Jane and you live in my house,” she said by way of introduction.

“No,” replied the little girl half shyly; “you live in mine because I lived here first. I’m Ellen. Are you tired?”

“No-o!” answered Mary Jane positively; “what is there to be tired about?”

“It’s such a long way out here,” said Ellen.

Ellen’s mother came up just then and seeing her little girl speaking to the newcomers she added, “We tried to walk out here and I should have known better because it’s much too far for Ellen. But she’ll have to be a brave girl because there’s no other way to get back.”

“There is if you don’t mind being crowded a bit,” suggested Mrs. Merrill hospitably. “We three can sit on the back seat and you and Ellen can sit in front with the driver. We’re just ready to start back now.”

On the way back the two ladies chatted and found they had many mutual friends, and the little girls planned to play together as soon as they got home. At the suggestion of Ellen’s mother, Mrs. Berry, they stopped at an orange orchard and saw the funny little stoves that are set among the trees to keep the orchard warmer in a cold spell. Mary Jane thought those little stoves the queerest things she’d seen yet.

“You tell me when I leave the door open at home, Mother,” she said, “that I must be trying to warm the whole out of doors and here they really do it!” “So they do,” agreed Mrs. Merrill; “only you see we haven’t an orchard to use the heat up our way!”

The owner of the orchard gave each girl an orange and was so nice to them, showing them around and letting the girls pick fruit and take pictures, that they could hardly bear to leave.

“I think,” said Mary Jane as they climbed into the little surrey, “that when I’m big I’ll have me an orange orchard and let little girls come to see me and give ’em fruit-- I think that’s an awfully nice business, I do.”

It was almost dinner time when they got back to the hotel; no time for play then. But after dinner Mary Jane took down her Marie Georgannamore and Ellen brought her best doll, Fifi, and the two little girls sat out on the terrace in great big comfy chairs and played together till after eight o’clock. Then Mrs. Merrill came out to take Mary Jane upstairs.

“You’ll have to go to sleep as quickly as ever you can,” she said, “because I know an awfully jolly surprise that’s coming to-morrow. Coming if a certain little girl I’m acquainted with gets to sleep.”

“Is it something to play?” guessed Mary Jane.

“No guesses--not even one,” answered Mrs. Merrill, “and I’ll tell you only this much. It’s very jolly; and you’ve often wanted to do it; and you’ve never done it before in all your life.”

“WHOA! PLEASE WHOA!”

“Now do we do it?” asked Mary Jane’s eager little voice; “this is to-day!”

“Sure enough it is,” said Mrs. Merrill, sleepily. She looked over to Mary Jane’s bed and saw that a certain young person was wide awake and was sitting up straight and tall in her bed which stood right in the path of the sunshine.

“Yes it is, Mother,” added Mary Jane, fearful that her mother wasn’t really waked up yet; “see the sun? And you know this is the day when the surprise comes. Do we have it now?”

“Dear me, no,” said Mrs. Merrill, “how could we? See, Alice is sound asleep and none of us are dressed and the surprise is for three folks--three folks who are in this room.”

“Don’t worry about Alice,” said Mary Jane gayly; “I’ll get her up!” And with that threat she jumped out of bed and pulled the light covers off her sister. “Come on, Alice,” she cried; “you can sleep at home! Let’s get up and do the surprise.”

“Will I like it, Mother?” asked Alice and, luckily, she was too interested in the surprise to mind that the covers had been pulled off.

“Will you?” exclaimed Mrs. Merrill. “You just wait and see! You’ve been wanting to do this very thing for years and years and years.”

“Then let’s get dressed quick,” said Alice; “who’s going to tub first, Mary Jane?”

“Not too fast there, my dears,” said Mrs. Merrill; “the surprise doesn’t come till eleven o’clock.”

“MOTHER!” exclaimed both girls as though in one breath. And Mary Jane added, “Do we have to wait _all that time_?”

“Well,” said Mrs. Merrill practically, as she glanced at her watch, “I wouldn’t call that such a hopelessly long time if I were you. It’s after seven now and nobody’s even started to dress. Of course you don’t want any breakfast,” she added teasingly, “but--”

“Of course we _do_, you mean, Mother,” laughed Alice; “I hope the surprise won’t interfere with eating--I wouldn’t like that.”

“Well then,” continued Mrs. Merrill, “if we have to dress and eat and maybe take a little walk to look at the shops and maybe do something else I know we _could_ do--and it’s nice, too--I think it’s a pretty good thing the surprise doesn’t come till eleven.”

When the girls sat down to the breakfast table a half an hour later they were glad they had plenty of leisure to enjoy their meal for such fruit, such fish and such delicious Southern biscuit they never had eaten before.

“I just wish there was two of me, one named Mary and one named Jane,” said Mary Jane, as she eyed the plate of biscuits and the honey regretfully, “’cause then one of me could eat some more. But seeing I’m just one all together, I can’t!”

“I think it’s time for a walk anyway,” said Mrs. Merrill. “You know we didn’t have a chance to look at all those nice little shops yesterday and that’s sure to be fun.”

And it was. The girls and their mother too, enjoyed poking about in the little sidewalk shops that lined the main street and they saw many pretty things they thought of taking home to Grandmother Hodges or some friend.

“Mother!” exclaimed Alice suddenly, “see that clock? It’s only quarter before ten and the surprise doesn’t come till eleven. _How_ are we going to wait all that time?”

“We’re not,” said Mrs. Merrill, as she made a sudden plan; “we’re going swimming.”

“Swimming!” exclaimed Mary Jane; “where’s the lake?”

“Wait and see,” replied Mrs. Merrill and she led the way back to their hotel. Mary Jane supposed they must be going back for bathing suits but not so. They didn’t go to their room; they went down a long hallway and up some stairs and along another hall. And by that time, Mary Jane heard noises that sounded exactly like the sounds folks make when they are in swimming and having a jolly time.

“Why, Mother!” she said in amazement, “do they keep the swim in the house down here?”

“Sounds like it, doesn’t it?” answered Mrs. Merrill and she stopped at a window long enough to buy three tickets, one pink and two blue. “Sounds exactly like it--let’s look.” And she led them through a doorway.

Such a sight as the girls saw then, they never had imagined! In a great room, surrounded with balconies on which folks walked and danced and played, was a large tank of beautifully clear water. And in this tank some fifty or more folks were swimming and playing. At one end the children played and swam and at the other end the big folks who evidently could swim better or walk in deeper water were enjoying themselves.

Mary Jane took a long breath as she looked in amazement about her, then she said, “Come on, Mother! Let’s do it too!”

“Oh, may we?” exclaimed Alice rapturously; “will they let us?”

“That’s what our tickets are for,” explained Mrs. Merrill. “And we dress right down in these nice dressing rooms at this end.”

Five minutes later the two girls, with their mother close behind, were gingerly stepping into the water as it lapped on the marble steps at the end of the pool. Mary Jane anxiously watched the first touch of the water, then a happy expression came over her face and she exclaimed, “It isn’t cold and it isn’t hot, Mother. It’s just like I am.”

Of course Mary Jane didn’t know how to swim but both Alice and Mrs. Merrill could swim a little and they took turns holding Mary Jane’s chin and showing her how it was done. Mary Jane had no trouble getting her feet up--she got them up so far out of the water that her swimming was more splashing than swimming but it was fun for them all just the same. Nobody thought a bit about time till suddenly Alice looked at the great clock that was at one end of the pool.

“Mother!” she cried, “it’s quarter to eleven!”

“Goodness!” exclaimed Mrs. Merrill; “we’ll have to fly for they’ll be out in front promptly at eleven.”

“Who’ll be?” asked Mary Jane.

“Wait and see,” teased Mrs. Merrill as she drippingly made her way up the steps and toward the dressing rooms.

Nobody took long to primp that time and at five minutes to eleven they were leaving the Casino.

“That’s plenty of time,” said Alice comfortably.

“Well, none too much,” said Mrs. Merrill doubtfully, “because I have to go up to the room and change my skirt.”

“Why, Mother,” said Alice, “that’s a nice one you have on.”

“Just so,” laughed Mrs. Merrill, “too nice. Let’s see, have you both your gingham bloomers on this morning--I forgot to notice. Yes, you have. Then you don’t need to change. You may wait for me here.” And she hurried off toward the elevator.

Soon she was back, wearing an old denim skirt that the girls didn’t remember ever seeing. They thought it an awfully queer looking thing but had no time to ask questions because she hurried them right out through the garden.

Through the garden, past the hedges and there--right by the leafy gate--all saddled and bridled and ready to go, stood three of the prettiest little ponies the girls had ever seen!

“Oh! I know! I know! I know!” shouted Alice; “we’re going to take a pony ride.”

“Goody! Goody! Goody! I’m glad I’m me!” cried Mary Jane and she danced up and down and clapped her hands so hard that the man who was holding the ponies laughed and laughed.

“So you really think it will be fun?” asked Mrs. Merrill, happily, as both girls, with never a thought that they were on the street, nearly smothered her with a great bear hug; “well, I think so too. So let’s be off. See, the ponies are pawing to go.”

First they decided which pony Mary Jane should ride. The groom put her on one, but he seemed most too big so she was changed to another. Then Alice was lifted up onto hers.

“Don’t bother about me,” said Mrs. Merrill, “I can manage very well with this stone. Please start off with the girls.” So the groom trotted after the girls whose ponies were walking briskly toward the market place.

When Mrs. Merrill caught up with them, she suggested that they turn south, down the quiet, narrow street at the right, as the main street seemed too crowded for even safe ponies when they were ridden by folks who had never been pony-back before. So they rode a few blocks past quaint old Spanish houses and gardens--which the girls didn’t even glance at!--then east past the old barracks and south to the open country. By the time they had ridden a couple of miles the girls were getting “on to” the knack of sitting straight and of holding their reins and guiding their steeds, so the groom suggested that they go west, around the village and ride around the old fort at the north.

“Can you canter, Miss?” he asked Alice, who was riding very well for a novice.

The pony must have caught the word for he hurried off and Alice answered over her shoulder, “I-I-I did-d-n’t-t know-ow it b-b-but I-I-I c-c-can!”

Mary Jane’s pony, seeing his mate start off so gayly, thought he must be left behind so he started cantering too--much to Mary Jane’s dismay.

“Whoa! Please whoa!” shouted Mary Jane with more politeness than success. The pony paid no attention to her! He cantered along rapidly a half a block and then, spying a bit of choice green in a vacant lot, turned suddenly in and began to eat.

“Hold on, dear!” called Mrs. Merrill reassuringly, as she hurried up behind her little girl; “hold on and you’ll be all right.”

“I’m a-holdin’,” replied Mary Jane breathlessly; “when I go riding I don’t let him leave me, ’deed I don’t!” and she clutched at the lines with all her might. But evidently the pony had had no thought of running away. He liked his eating so much that it took a hard pull on the lines by the groom to make him raise his head and start on again.

For a little while the groom rode close by Mary Jane and held on to the lines and Mrs. Merrill rode ahead with Alice. But the pony behaved so very well that soon Mary Jane held her own reins again and proudly rode all around the fort and back to the hotel.

“Oh, that was fun!” exclaimed Alice with a sigh of pure joy and satisfaction as she was lifted off her pony.

“I think I’d like to ride every day,” said Mary Jane; “I like a pony that runs and eats and takes me riding. Do they have ponies other places?” And then, as Mrs. Merrill paid the groom and led the girls back to the hotel, Mary Jane added, “Now what do we do next?”

LUNCHEON BY THE OLD WELL

But by the time she had had her luncheon, Mary Jane began to realize that a long swim, or trying at swimming, and a pony ride of an hour was almost enough for a little girl to do in one day. And when, as they came from the dining room, she saw Ellen running toward her with her French doll in her arms, Mary Jane was willing to promise to “play dolls” in the courtyard garden all afternoon. Alice wanted to take a few pictures in the gardens and write letters and send postals to her friends at home, and Mrs. Merrill had letters and a bit of mending, so the afternoon spent in the sunshine of the inner garden passed very quickly.

Next morning, as they were coming out from the dining room after breakfast, Mrs. Merrill stopped a few minutes to talk with the steward and the girls knew immediately that something nice was coming.

“What do you think,” she asked as she joined them a minute later, “of having a picnic luncheon to-day? Remember that pretty street we rode south on yesterday? All those old Spanish houses were built years and years ago. The queer one, that has no garden in front, is supposed to be the oldest house in America. When I was here before the kind lady who takes care of the place sometimes let folks eat their luncheon in the garden by the old well. Wouldn’t that be fun?”

Of course it would be jolly and both Alice and Mary Jane were eager to be off.

“Let’s go down that same street we rode on, Mother,” suggested Alice, “because when we were riding we didn’t see a thing but the ponies and the road and I’d like to see everything--every single thing, in this nice old town.”

“Very well,” agreed Mrs. Merrill, “that’s what we’ll do. Our luncheon will be ready in a very little while. Let’s get our mail and tell Ellen that Mary Jane can’t play this morning and I expect by that time it will be waiting for us.”

Sure enough! By the time all necessary errands were finished the steward came to the lobby with the luncheon all neatly packed in a nice box.