Crowded Out o' Crofield Part 23

[Ill.u.s.tration: _His traveler friend was sound asleep_.]

"I wish I had a chair to sleep on, instead of this campstool," thought Jack. "I'll have a look all around the boat and come back."

It took a long while to see the boat, and the first thing he discovered was that a great many people had failed to secure staterooms or berths.

They sat in chairs, and they lounged on sofas, and they were curled up on the floor; for the Columbia had received a flood of tourists who were going home, and a large part of the pa.s.sengers of another boat that had been detained on account of an accident at Albany; so the steamer was decidedly overcrowded.

"There are more people aboard," thought Jack, "than would make two such villages as Crofield, unless you should count in the farms and farmers.

I'm glad I came, if it's only to know what a steamboat is. I haven't spent a cent of my nine dollars yet, either."

Here and there he wandered, until he came out at the stern, and had a look at the foaming wake of the boat, and at the river and the heights behind, and at the grand spectacle of another great steamboat, full of lights, on her way up the river. He had seen any number of smaller boats, and of white-sailed sloops and schooners, and now, along the eastern bank, he heard and saw the whizzing rush of several railway trains.

"I'd rather be here," he thought. "The people there can't see half so much as I can."

Not one of them, moreover, had been traveling all over the world with Mr. Guilderaufenberg, and hearing and about kings and their "police."

Getting back to his old place was easier, now that he began to understand the plan of the Columbia; but, when Jack returned, his camp-stool was gone, and he had to sit down on the bare deck or to stand up. He did both, by turns, and he was beginning to feel very weary of sight-seeing, and to wish that he were sound asleep, or that to-morrow had come.

"It's a warm night," he said to himself, "and it isn't so very dark, even now the moon has gone down. Why--it's getting lighter! Is it morning? Can we be so near the city as that?"

There was a growing rose-tint upon a few clouds in the western sky, as the sun began to look at them from below the range of heights, eastward, but the sun had not yet risen.

Jack was all but breathless. He walked as far forward as he could go, and forgot all about being sleepy or tired.

"There," he said, after a little, "those must be the Palisades."

Out came his guide-book, and he tried to fit names to the places along sh.o.r.e.

"More sailing-vessels," he said, "and there goes another train. We must be almost there."

He was right, and he was all one tingle of excitement as the Columbia swept steadily on down the widening river.

There came a pressure of a hand upon his shoulder.

"Goot-morning, my poy. De city ees coming. How you feels?"

"First-rate," said Jack. "It won't be long, now, will it?"

"You wait a leetle. I sleep some. It vas a goot varm night. De varmest night I efer had vas in Egypt, and de coldest vas in Moscow.

De shtove it went out, and ve vas cold, I dell you, dill dot shtove vas kindle up again! Dere vas dwenty-two peoples in dot room, and dot safe us. Ye keep von another varm. Dot ees de trouble mit Russia. De finest vedder in all the vorlt is een America,--and dere ees more vedder of all kinds."

On, on, and now Jack's blood tingled more sharply, to his very fingers and toes, for they swept beyond Spuyten Duyvil Creek, which his friend pointed out, and the city began to make its appearance.

"It's on both sides," said Jack. "No, that's New Jersey"--and he read the names on that side from his guidebook.

Masts, wharves, buildings, and beyond them spires, and--and Jack grew dizzy trying to think of that endless wilderness of streets and houses.

He heard what Mr. Guilderaufenberg said about the islands in the harbor, the forts, the ferries, and yet he did not hear it plainly, because it was too much to take in all at once.

"Now I brings de ladies," said Mr. Guilderaufenberg, "an' ve eats breakfast, ven ve all gets to de Hotel Dantzic. Come!"

Jack took one long, sweeping look at the city, so grand and so beautiful under the newly risen sun, and followed.

At that same hour a dark-haired girl sat by an open window in the village of Mertonville. She had arisen and dressed herself, early as it was, and she held in her hand a postal-card, which had arrived for her from Albany the night before.

"By this time," she said, "Jack is in the city. Oh, how I wish I were with him!"

She was silent after that, but she had hardly said it before one of two small boys, who had been pounding one another with pillows in a very small bedroom in Crofield, suddenly threw his pillow at the other, and exclaimed:

"I s'pose Jack's there by this time, Jimmy!"

CHAPTER XII.

IN A NEW WORLD.

Jack Ogden stood like a boy in a dream, as the "Columbia" swept gracefully into her dock and was made fast. Her swing about was helped by the outgoing tide, that foamed and swirled around the projecting piers.

A hurrying crowd of people was thronging out of the "Columbia," but Jack's German friend did not join them.

"De ceety vill not roon avay," he said, calmly. "You comes mit me."

They went to the cabin for the ladies, and Jack noticed how much baggage the rest were carrying. He took a satchel from Miss Hildebrand, and then the Polish lady, with a grateful smile, allowed him to take another.

"Dose crowds ees gone," remarked Mr. Guilderaufenberg. "Ve haf our chances now."

Afterward, Jack had a confused memory of walking over a wide gang-plank that led into a babel. Miss Hildebrand held him by his left arm while the two other ladies went with Mr. Guilderaufenberg. They came out into a street, between two files of men who shook their whips, shouted, and pointed at a line of carriages. Miss Hildebrand told Jack that they could reach their hotel sooner by the elevated railway.

"He look pale," she thought, considerately. "He did not sleep all night. He never before travel on a steamboat!"

Jack meanwhile had a new sensation.

"This is the city!" he was saying to himself. "I'm really here. There are no crowds, because it's Sunday,--but then!"

After walking a few minutes they came to a corner, where Mr.

Guilderaufenberg turned and said to Jack:

"Dees ees Proadvay. Dere ees no oder street in de vorlt dat ees so long. Look dees vay und den look dat vay! So! Eh? Dot ees Proadvay.

Dere ees no oder city in de vorlt vere a beeg street keep Soonday!"

It was indeed a wonderful street to the boy from Crofield, and he felt the wonder of it; and he felt the wonder of the Sunday quiet and of the closed places of business.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _On Broadway, at last!_]

"There's a policeman," he remarked to Mr. Guilderaufenberg.

"So!" said the German, smiling; "but he ees a beople's boleeceman. Eef he vas a king's boleeceman, I vas not here. I roon avay, or I vas lock up. Jack, ven you haf dodge some king's boleecemen, like me, you vish you vas American, choost like me now, und vas safe!"