Wakulla | Page 5

ten
years is up."
"But won't it cost a great deal to get there, uncle?" asked Mrs. Elmer,
whose face had lighted up as this new hope entered her heart.
"Sakes alive! no; cost nothin'! Why, it's actually what you might call
providential the way things turns out. You can go down, slick as a log

through a chute, in the Nancy Bell, of Bangor, which is fitting out in
that port this blessed minit. She's bound to Pensacola in ballast, or with
just a few notions of hardware sent out as a venture, for a load of pine
lumber to fill out a contract I've taken in New York. She can run into
the St. Mark's and drop you jest as well as not. But you'll have to pick
up and raft your fixin's down to Bangor in a terrible hurry, for she's
going to sail next week, Wednesday, and it's Tuesday now."
So it was settled that they should go, and the following week was one
of tremendous excitement to the children, who had never been from
home in their lives, and were now to become such famous travellers.
Mark Elmer, Jr., as he wrote his name, was as merry, harum-scarum,
mischief-loving a boy as ever lived. He was fifteen years old, the leader
of the Norton boys in all their games, and the originator of most of their
schemes for mischief. But Mark's mischief was never of a kind to
injure anybody, and he was as honest as the day is long, as well as
loving and loyal to his parents and sister Ruth.
Although a year younger than Mark, Ruth studied the same books that
he did, and was a better scholar. In spite of this she looked up to him in
everything, and regarded him with the greatest admiration. Although
quiet and studious, she had crinkly brown hair, and a merry twinkle in
her eyes that indicated a ready humor and a thorough appreciation of
fun.
It was Monday when Mark and Ruth walked home from the post-office
together, reading the paper, for which they had gone every Monday
evening since they could remember, and they were to leave home and
begin their journey on the following morning.
During the past week Mr. Elmer had resigned his position in the bank,
sold the dear little house which had been a home to him and his wife
ever since they were married, and in which their children had been born,
and with a heavy heart made the preparations for departure.
With the willing aid of kind neighbors Mrs. Elmer had packed what
furniture they were to take with them, and it had been sent to Bangor.

Mark and Ruth had not left school until Friday, and had been made
young lions of all the week by the other children. To all of her girl
friends Ruth had promised to write every single thing that happened,
and Mark had promised so many alligator teeth, and other trophies of
the chase, that, if he kept all his promises, there would be a decided
advance in the value of Florida curiosities that winter.
As the little house was stripped of all its furniture, except some few
things that had been sold with it, they were all to go to Dr. Wing's to
sleep that night, and Mrs. Wing had almost felt hurt that they would not
take tea with her; but both Mr. and Mrs. Elmer wanted to take this last
meal in their own home, and persuaded her to let them have their way.
The good woman must have sent over most of the supper she had
intended them to eat with her, and this, together with the good things
sent in by other neighbors, so loaded the table that Mark declared it
looked like a regular surprise-party supper.
A surprise-party it proved to be, sure enough, for early in the evening
neighbors and friends began to drop in to say good-bye, until the lower
rooms of the little house were filled. As the chairs were all gone, they
sat on trunks, boxes, and on the kitchen table, or stood up.
Mark and Ruth had their own party, too, right in among the grown
people; for most of the boys and girls of the village had come with their
parents to say good-bye, and many of them had brought little gifts that
they urged the young Elmers to take with them as keepsakes. Of all
these none pleased Ruth so much as the album, filled with the pictures
of her school-girl friends, that Edna May brought her.
Edna was the adopted daughter of Captain Bill May, who had brought
her home from one of his voyages when she was a little baby, and
placed her in his wife's arms, saying