The Last of the Peterkins Part 10

It seemed safer to go directly to Athens, especially as Mr. Peterkin and Agamemnon were anxious to visit that city.

It was found that a steamer would leave Alexandria next day for Athens, by way of Smyrna and Constantinople. This was a roundabout course; but Mr. Peterkin was impatient to leave, and was glad to gain more acquaintance with the world. Meanwhile they could telegraph their plans to Solomon John, as the English gentleman could give them the address of his hotel.

And Mrs. Peterkin did not now shrink from another voyage. Her experience on the Nile had made her forget her sufferings in crossing the Atlantic, and she no longer dreaded entering another steamboat. Their delight in river navigation, indeed, had been so great that the whole family had listened with interest to the descriptions given by their Russian fellow-traveller of steamboat navigation on the Volga--"the most beautiful river in the world," as he declared. Elizabeth Eliza and Mr.

Peterkin were eager to try it, and Agamemnon remarked that such a trip would give them an opportunity to visit the renowned fair at Nijninovgorod. Even Mrs. Peterkin had consented to this expedition, provided they should meet Solomon John and the other little boys.

She started, therefore, on a fresh voyage without any dread, forgetting that the Mediterranean, if not so wide as the Atlantic, is still a sea, and often as tempestuous and uncomfortably "choppy." Alas! she was soon to be awakened from her forgetfulness: the sea was the same old enemy.

As they pa.s.sed up among the Ionian Isles, and she heard Agamemnon and Elizabeth Eliza and their Russian friend (who was accompanying them to Constantinople) talking of the old G.o.ds of Greece, she fancied that they were living still, and that Neptune and the cla.s.sic waves were wreaking their vengeance on them, and pounding and punis.h.i.+ng them for venturing to rule them with steam. She was fairly terrified. As they entered Smyrna she declared she would never enter any kind of a boat again, and that Mr. Peterkin must find some way by which they could reach home by land.

How delightful it was to draw near the sh.o.r.e, on a calm afternoon,--even to trust herself to the charge of the boatmen in leaving the s.h.i.+p, and to reach land once more and meet the tumult of voices and people! Here were the screaming and shouting usual in the East, and the same bright array of turbans and costumes in the crowd awaiting them. But a well-known voice reached them, and from the crowd rose a well-known face. Even before they reached the land they had recognized its owner.

With his American dress, he looked almost foreign in contrast to the otherwise universal Eastern color. A tall figure on either side seemed, also, each to have a familiar air.

Were there three Solomon Johns?

No; it was Solomon John and the two other little boys--but grown so that they were no longer little boys. Even Mrs. Peterkin was unable to recognize them at first. But the tones of their voices, their ways, were as natural as ever. Each had a banana in his hand, and pockets stuffed with oranges.

Questions and answers interrupted each other in a most confusing manner:--

"Are you the little boys?"

"Where have you been?"

"Did you go to Vesuvius?"

"How did you get away?"

"Why didn't you come sooner?"

"Our India-rubber boots stuck in the hot lava."

"Have you been there all this time?"

"No; we left them there."

"Have you had fresh dates?"

"They are all gone now, but the dried ones are better than those squeezed ones we have at home."

"How you have grown!"

"Why didn't you telegraph?"

"Why did you go to Vesuvius, when Papa said he couldn't?"

"Did you, too, think it was Pnyx?"

"Where have you been all winter?"

"Did you roast eggs in the crater?"

"When did you begin to grow?"

The little boys could not yet thoroughly explain themselves; they always talked together and in foreign languages, interrupting each other, and never agreeing as to dates.

Solomon John accounted for his appearance in Smyrna by explaining that when he received his father's telegram in Athens, he decided to meet them at Smyrna. He was tired of waiting at the Pnyx. He had but just landed, and came near missing his family, and the little boys too, who had reached Athens just as he was leaving it. None of the family wished now to continue their journey to Athens, but they had the advice and a.s.sistance of their Russian friend in planning to leave the steamer at Constantinople; they would, by adopting this plan, be _en route_ for the proposed excursion to the Volga.

Mrs. Peterkin was overwhelmed with joy at having all her family together once more; but with it a wave of homesickness surged over her. They were all together; why not go home?

It was found that there was a sailing-vessel bound absolutely for Maine, in which they might take pa.s.sage. No more separation; no more mistakes; no more tedious study of guide-books; no more weighing of baggage. Every trunk and bag, every Peterkin, could be placed in the boat, and safely landed on the sh.o.r.es of home. It was a temptation, and at one time Mrs.

Peterkin actually pleaded for it.

But there came a throbbing in her head, a swimming in her eyes, a swaying of the very floor of the hotel. Could she bear it, day after day, week after week? Would any of them be alive? And Constantinople not seen, nor steam-navigation on the Volga!

And so new plans arose, and wonderful discoveries were made, and the future of the Peterkin family was changed forever.

In the first place a strange stout gentleman in spectacles had followed the Peterkin family to the hotel, had joined in the family councils, and had rendered valuable service in negotiating with the officers of the steamer for the cancellation of their through tickets to Athens. He dined at the same table, and was consulted by the (formerly) little boys.

Who was he?

They explained that he was their "preceptor." It appeared that after they parted from their father, the little boys had become mixed up with some pupils who were being taken by their preceptor to Vesuvius. For some time he had not noticed that his party (consisting of boys of their own age) had been enlarged; and after finding this out, he had concluded they were the sons of an English family with whom he had been corresponding. He was surprised that no further intelligence came with them, and no extra baggage. They had, however, their hand-bags; and after sending their telegram to the lady from Philadelphia, they a.s.sured him that all would be right. But they were obliged to leave Naples the very day of despatching the telegram, and left no address to which an answer could be sent. The preceptor took them, with his pupils, directly back to his inst.i.tution in Gratz, Austria, from which he had taken them on this little excursion.

It was not till the end of the winter that he discovered that his youthful charges--whom he had been faithfully instructing, and who had found the gymnasium and invigorating atmosphere so favorable to growth--were not the sons of his English correspondent, whom he had supposed, from their explanations, to be travelling in America.

He was, however, intending to take his pupils to Athens in the spring, and by this time the little boys were able to explain themselves better in his native language. They a.s.sured him they should meet their family in the East, and the preceptor felt it safe to take them upon the track proposed.

It was now that Mr. Peterkin prided himself upon the plan he had insisted upon before leaving home. "Was it not well," he exclaimed, "that I provided each of you with a bag of gold, for use in case of emergency, hidden in the lining of your hand-bags?"

This had worked badly for Elizabeth Eliza, to be sure, who had left hers at Brindisi; but the little boys had been able to pay some of their expenses, which encouraged the preceptor to believe he might trust them for the rest. So much pleased were all the family with the preceptor that they decided that all three of the little boys should continue under his instructions, and return with him to Gratz. This decision made more easy the other plans of the family.

Both Agamemnon and Solomon John had decided they would like to be foreign consuls. They did not much care where, and they would accept any appointment; and both, it appeared, had written on the subject to the Department at Was.h.i.+ngton. Agamemnon had put in a plea for a vacancy at Madagascar, and Solomon John hoped for an opening at Rustchuk, Turkey; if not there, at Aintab, Syria. Answers were expected, which were now telegraphed for, to meet them in Constantinople.

Meanwhile Mr. Peterkin had been consulting the preceptor and the Russian Count about a land-journey home. More and more Mrs. Peterkin determined she could not and would not trust herself to another voyage, though she consented to travel by steamer to Constantinople. If they went as far as Nijninovgorod, which was now decided upon, why could they not persevere through "Russia in Asia"?

Their Russian friend at first shook his head at this, but at last agreed that it might be possible to go on from Novgorod comfortably to Tobolsk, perhaps even from there to Yakoutsk, and then to Kamtschatka.

"And cross at Behring's Strait!" exclaimed Mrs. Peterkin. "It looks so narrow on the map."

"And then we are in Alaska," said Mr. Peterkin.

"And at home," exclaimed Mrs. Peterkin, "and no more voyages."

But Elizabeth Eliza doubted about Kamtschatka and Behring's Strait, and thought it would be very cold.

"But we can buy furs on our way," insisted Mrs. Peterkin.

"And if you do not find the journey agreeable," said their Russian friend, "you can turn back from Yakoutsk, even from Tobolsk, and come to visit us."

Yes--_us_! For Elizabeth Eliza was to marry the Russian Count!