Chapter 3

OFF FOR NEW YORK

"Sunny Boy and I will go ahead and get the trunk checked," said Mr. Horton, picking up the two suitcases that stood in the hall. "Where's your hat? You haven't lost it again, have you?"

Sunny Boy dashed under the table and picked up his new hat.

"It's all right," he assured his father anxiously. "It just fell off when I wasn't looking. Mother bought it yesterday. Does it do for New York, Daddy?"

"I don't see why not," replied Mr. Horton, smiling. "All through, Olive? Sure you and Harriet can lock up all right?"

Mrs. Horton came into the hall, pencil and pad in hand. It was the day for leaving--Sunny Boy had been afraid that it would never come--and they were almost on the way to New York. The train would leave Centronia Union Station in an hour.

"I'm finishing the list of things I want Harriet to remember," explained Mrs. Horton. "Sunny, dear, did you say good-bye to her? All right then, run along with Daddy. And I'll meet you at the south entrance not later than a quarter of ten."

Sunny Boy and Daddy took the street car, and Sunny was so blissfully happy to be beginning the journey at last that a white-haired gentleman next to him asked him if he was thinking about Christmas.

Sunny Boy shook his head. He hadn't begun to think of Christmas. That was months and months away.

"I'm going to New York," he informed the white-haired gentleman proudly. "Daddy and Mother and me. And I can ride on top of the busses, Daddy said so."

"Dear me," said the gentleman, "that is a long trip for a chap of your age. I have a little grandson who lives in New York. He's counting the days now till he can come to see me."

This was a new idea to Sunny Boy.

"Do you s'pose folks who live in New York like to come to see Centronia?" he asked doubtfully.

"Just as much as you count on going to New York," said the white-haired gentleman promptly. "It's new to them, you see. Here's my corner now. Good-bye. I hope you will have all the good times you are looking forward to."

"Isn't it funny, Daddy?" said Sunny Boy, watching the gentleman go out the door. "Most everybody has relations living in New York. Harold Wallace's cousin lives there. Have we any 'lations to go to see?"

"Not in New York," answered Mr. Horton, pressing the button to tell the motor-man to let them off. "You and Mother will have to amuse each other, because you may find it lonesome at first with no friends to talk to."

They were opposite the station now, and the car stopped. Sunny Boy hopped off blithely, but his thoughts were busy with what Daddy had said. How could one be lonely in New York?

"'Member the time the baggage man thought the alarm clock was a 'fernal machine?" asked Sunny Boy, as he followed his father into the station and over to the baggage room.

"Indeed I do," Mr. Horton laughed.

You see, when Sunny Boy and his mother had been going to see Grandpa Horton, Sunny, as his part in the packing, tucked in the family alarm clock so that he would be sure to get up early in the country. And he forgot the clock might be set, as it was. The station people had held the trunk and it took a great deal of explaining, and the Hortons nearly missed their train before they were allowed to check the trunk.

The baggage man remembered Sunny Boy.

"How's the alarm clock?" he grinned cheerfully. "Any more infernal machines in your baggage this time?"

Sunny Boy smiled shyly.

"We didn't have a finger in packing this trunk," Daddy answered for him. "All right, Son, we're fixed. Now we'll see if we can get some parlor car seats."

But, it seemed, the parlor car seats were all sold.

"All the way through. Convention going to-day on your train," announced the man behind the brass-barred window. "Sorry, but you'll have to go in the day coach."

"You and I don't mind, Sunny," said Mr. Horton, as they walked over to the south entrance to wait for Mrs. Horton. "It is rather hard on Mother, but perhaps she won't mind. It isn't so warm to-day."

"And we can put the window up," suggested Sunny Boy helpfully. "Oh, there's Mother!"

He ran to meet her and brought her over triumphantly to the seat saved for her.

"Am I in time?" she asked a little anxiously. "Ten minutes yet? That's fine. There was a block on the cars."

"Get your breath, and then I think we'd better go through the gate," counseled Mr. Horton. "Couldn't get parlor car seats, so the earlier we get on, the better chance we have of getting a good seat. I'll take the grips, Sunny, you take care of Mother."

Sunny Boy felt that he was an experienced traveler when he handed the tickets to the man at the gate, Daddy's hands being occupied with the suitcases. The long gray train shed was filled with shining dark cars and snorting, puffing engines, but Daddy seemed to know where to go, and he led the way.

"This is all right," he decided, coming to a stop before a coach.

He put down the heavy suitcases and took the tickets from Sunny.

"They'll be safer in my wallet," he explained. "But you may give them to the conductor if you wish. Up you go--there!"

Sunny Boy found himself on the platform beside Mother, who had gone first. He followed her into the nearly dark car, and they found two nice seats near the center and on what Daddy said would be the shady side as soon as they pulled out of the shed.

"If a crowd comes in we must give up one of these seats," Mr. Horton said, turning back one so that it faced the other. "But until then let's be as comfortable as we can."

He put the suitcases in the racks overhead, put Mother's light dust coat up with them, and raised both windows. Sunny Boy and his mother sat facing Daddy.

"Now we're off," announced Mr. Horton, smiling at Sunny Boy, who was watching everything.

A few more people came into the car, but not many, and after what seemed a long wait to Sunny, they heard the conductor's long-drawn-out "All a-bo-ard!"

The train groaned and started slowly.

"And now we're going!" declared Sunny Boy, with satisfaction.

"Now we're going," echoed Mother. "Don't put your head out, Sunny. If the wind blows too strongly we'll have to put the window down."

Sunny Boy hoped it wouldn't blow too much. He loved to feel it rumpling his hair and cutting gently across his cheek.

"There's Haver's grocery," he cried, as they passed the red-brick store on a street corner. "And the market! There's where we punctured a tire, Daddy. And, look! There's where Harriet took her shoes to be mended!"

"Not so loud," cautioned Mr. Horton. Indeed, Sunny had unconsciously raised his voice, and several people were smiling at him.

So Sunny Boy made up a little song to amuse himself as the train went slowly through the city streets, streets he knew fairly well because he had ridden through them with his father in the automobile.

"Bicycle shop, gasoline station, fresh egg store," sang Sunny softly. "Mr. French's ice-cream--wonder if he'll know I've gone to New York."

Soon the train began to go faster, and Sunny Boy did not know the little towns they were passing through. Almost before he knew it, the waiter came through announcing lunch, and the Hortons went into the dining-car. This was the third time Sunny Boy had eaten on the train, and he was, as he said, "'Most used to it."

When they came back into their own coach, and had settled down, Mr. Horton to read his paper and Mrs. Horton with a book to read aloud to Sunny, a tall, thin, rather odd looking man who had sat huddled up in a corner seat suddenly clapped his hand to his eye and began to act strangely.

"Ow!" he cried. "Ow! I told you not to have that window opened. Oh! Oh, my! What shall I do?"

"He must be in a fit," said the woman in the seat behind the Hortons.

"Appendicitis, probably," declared the man across the aisle.

"Nonsense," said Mr. Horton briskly. "He has a cinder in his eye. I wonder if he would let me take it out for him?"

There was a crowd about the man now, and as Mr. Horton went down the aisle to help him, Sunny Boy slipped out of his seat, too, and tagged along after.

"I know something about first-aid," he heard his father say. "Let me look at your eye. Stand back, neighbors, we need a little room."

Watching, Sunny Boy managed to see his father take out a clean white handkerchief and a lead pencil. He seemed only to look at the man's eye, and then the cinder was out and the excitement over.

"If that boy hadn't opened his window, this never would have happened," declared the man, who was grateful to Mr. Horton for relieving his pain, but determined to lay his misfortune to some one. "I'm going into the smoker. Perhaps a man can have a little less fresh air and a bit more common sense in there."

He tramped angrily away. Sunny Boy looked for the first time at the boy in the seat ahead, who had been leaning over the back apologetically, fearful that his open window really had caused the trouble.

"Why, Joe Brown!" said Sunny Boy.

Joe turned a dull red. He was a boy whom Sunny did not know very well, and he was a number of years older, twelve or thirteen years old at least. His mother often did sewing for Mrs. Horton, and Sunny sometimes saw Joe at Sunday school and at the grocery store where he sometimes worked after school.

"Hullo, Sunny," said Joe Brown awkwardly. "Where you goin'?"

"To New York," announced Sunny Boy importantly. "Where you going?"

"To New York," was the answer.

"How do you do, Joe?" asked Mr. Horton kindly, coming up to him. "Taking a trip, too, are you?"

"Yes, sir," mumbled Joe. "Going to see my Aunt Annabell in New York."

"Where does she live?" said Mr. Horton with interest. "Perhaps we can drop you there on our way from the station. Do you plan to stay long?"

Joe Brown fumbled with his cap.

"I don't know just how long I'll stay," he blurted out. "Maybe all winter. I've got Auntie's address somewhere in my satchel. I know how to get there all right."

Mr. Horton went back to his seat, but Sunny Boy lingered.

"You're another with 'lations in New York," he observed. "Harold Wallace has a cousin, and the gentleman on the street car had a grandson. I wish my Aunt Bessie lived in New York. Have you been there before?"

"No, I haven't," admitted Joe Brown. "But I guess one city's pretty much like another. I went to Chicago when I was six. I'm going to see all the big places when I'm grown up."

"There's Mother motioning to me," said Sunny Boy. "Come on and see her."

But Joe Brown wouldn't.

"I have to write a letter," he protested hastily.

Sunny Boy went back to his parents. He had an odd feeling that Joe Brown was not looking forward to seeing New York as much as he, Sunny Boy, was.

"Is he sick, do you think, Daddy?" he urged, his troubled eyes resting on Joe, now huddled moodily in his seat and making no pretense of letter-writing.

"No, he's all right," said Mr. Horton easily. "Come, laddie, we're almost at the end of our trip. Sit down by Mother and see your first glimpse of one of the largest cities in the world."

Sunny Boy scrambled into his place again, but Joe Brown was still in his thoughts. Presently he heard his father speaking in a low voice to his mother.

"Olive, I believe that young scamp, the Brown boy, is running away from home. He has it written all over him. I wish we could keep an eye on him."

"But Mrs. Brown has a sister who lives in New York," said Sunny Boy's mother. "He may really be going to visit her."

"Perhaps," admitted Mr. Horton doubtfully.

There was no time to say more just then for the train rushed down from daylight into what was next to darkness.

"Oh!" cried Sunny Boy, "where are we going, Mother? Are we in a cellar?"

"We are going down under the Hudson River into New York," explained Mrs. Horton. "That will save us the trouble of going over on a ferryboat."

Sunny Boy was very much interested in the ride under the river and asked many questions.

"I should think the river would leak in on us," he remarked. "And we haven't any umbrellas along."

"We are perfectly safe," his father assured him.

Then in a few minutes the bustle of getting ready to leave the train began.

"We'll take a taxi," announced Mr. Horton, holding his wife's coat for her. "Take Mother's hand, Sunny. Careful, now."

Down the steps on to the platform, where Mr. Horton gave the suitcases to a porter, and they joined a steady stream of people all going in one direction.