He had combined the two offices of train-boy and conductor. We heard him
alternately demanding "Tickets!" and urging "Peanuts, cakes, and
candies!" If the intention had been to lure us back to witness a
Sullivan triumph, it failed. We shut our lips tightly and moved around
to the front porch.
The foiled Sullivans presently followed us here. They made a group at
the base of a maple on the lawn and, affecting not to notice us, talked
in a large, loud way so that we must overhear and be made envious,--even
awe-struck; for they had all secured jobs on the real railroad, it
appeared. They would have to begin to-morrow, probably. They didn't know
for sure, but they thought it would be to-morrow. It would be fine,
riding off on the big train. Probably they would never come back to this
town, but sleep on their big engine every night; and every day, from the
toothsome dainties of the train-boy Sullivan's basket, they would "eat
all they could hold." The elder Sullivan, aged eight, he of the
artistic temperament, here soared dizzily into the farthest ether of
romance. He had his uniform at home, at that very moment, and a cap with
"gold reading" on it--it read "Conductor" on one side, and "Candy" on
the other.
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