“Sure thing!” chuckled Andy; “it hurts terribly, too; and the only thing that is able to make me use it is the walk to the dinner—the cake-walk I call it. Leave it all to me, Rob; I’m frozen to this seat.”
Accordingly, the pair passed along the aisle and headed for the dining-car. Again the two men did their best to be civil, even nodding and smiling genially as the two boys passed them.
“Rob, they’re chasing after us!” muttered Hiram, in some little anxiety, just as he and his chum had entered the next car and were passing along the narrow corridor.
“All right, there’s no law to prevent them from getting hungry at the same time we do,” replied Rob over his shoulder.
“But they may choose to sit down with us at the same table, and make themselves chummy,” objected the other.
“I guess not if we know it,” Rob told him.
“How can we help it without making some sort of scene?” asked Hiram.
“That’s easy enough, if we can pick a table that only accommodates two,” explained the scout leader, “and as we’re in the advance, we have our choice.”
Evidently, Hiram was considerably relieved by what his comrade had said. He once more realized that Rob promised to be equal to the occasion. Indeed, the record of past achievements should have told Hiram this long ago; but in the presence of new dangers he was apt to forget what splendid things Rob had accomplished on other occasions when the tide seemed adverse.
Upon entering the dining-car Rob smiled to see that there was just one table seating two that did not have some one at it.
“There’s our chance, Rob, down at the further end of the car!” said Hiram hastily, as though he feared the other might not see the table.
Rob took the chair that placed his back against the partition. This allowed him to survey the rest of the car. Nothing could have suited his plans better, for there was a small mirror that he could use to spy upon the two men who were now sitting facing him, halfway up the car.
As the meal progressed and evening drew on, the electric lights in the diner were turned on. Hiram somehow seemed to lack his voracious appetite.
“Don’t just know what’s the cause, Rob,” he remarked, when the other accused him of not disposing of much of the food he had ordered, “it may be the rocking of the car, which is fierce just now; or else it comes of my riding backward. I’ve been told that some people never can stand for that. But I guess I won’t starve to death between now and morning.”