Ruth Fielding in Alaska

“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!”