New England -- Description and travel -- Juvenile fiction
The next morning the Merrills took their ocean dip early, as they had
decided to get to Boston in the afternoon instead of evening. The water
was "freezing" cold, but the sun was good and warm and the dip was most
refreshing as well as lots of fun.
It wasn’t easy to leave Rye Beach. There was so much to do that would
be fun, and so many nice people to meet and such good things to eat,
that Mary Jane had to think hard about her father off home alone to make
herself willing to leave so soon. But once away, she was quite happy,
especially when she found that they could have their luncheon in a
diner—Mary Jane would go anywhere—almost—to eat on a train!
Uncle Hal met them at the station in Boston and his smiling face assured
them a surprise was in store.
"Too tired riding to do a little more?" he asked, as they walked out of
the great station.
"Well," asked Mary Jane determined not to be tricked into anything, "is
it a nice thing we would do, if we weren’t too tired to do it?"
"_Very_ nice, I’d say, my young lady," replied Uncle Hal.
"Then I’m not a bit tired," Mary Jane assured him.
It was a good thing that was her answer, for the surprise was ready and
waiting at the station door.
"This is my sister and her two daughters, Miss Burn," said Hal as he
stepped up to a waiting car, "and they say they will enjoy the ride you
so kindly planned for them." Miss Burn was a charming young lady with
whom Mary Jane and Alice promptly made friends, and her car was a
beautiful big touring car in which the Merrills were whisked away before
they quite realized what had happened to them.
Through the parks of Boston they went, out the boulevards along the
north shore where the roadway borders the ocean for miles and miles.
Beautiful homes flashed passed them, parks, suburbs, playgrounds,
amusement places—all like a wonderful living moving picture show. Mary
Jane was interested in the great shoe factories they passed in Lynn and
she tried to peek into the windows and see which factory made shoes for
little girls her age. Rows and rows of red brick buildings—all shoe
factories Uncle Hal told her—seemed enough to make shoes for everybody
in the whole country!
On they went till they could see the houses on Marblehead and the famous
Marblehead lighthouse that can be seen from such a distance at night,
then, back they went, mostly over a different route, toward Boston.
"Couldn’t you stop at our house for a cup of tea?" invited Miss Burn,
"mother would love to meet you but she didn’t feel up to a ride to-day."
Mrs. Merrill said they had nothing to hurry them, so Miss Burn drove
them to her pretty home on one of the tree-covered streets in
Winchester.
"We’ll go through the house," said Miss Burn as they left the car, "but
I want you two girls to go to the garden. You’ll like to see my pet
goldfishes."
"Pet goldfishes!" exclaimed Mary Jane, "do you keep ’em in a bowl?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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