Dave Porter and His Double: or, The Disapperarance of the Basswood Fortune

To us it’s just like home!
Then give three cheers, and let them ring
Throughout this world so wide,
To let the people know that we
Elect to here abide!”

“Say, that takes me back to the old days at Oak Hall,” remarked Roger, when the singing had come to an end. “My, but those were the great days!”

“I don’t believe we’ll ever see any better, Roger,” answered Dave.

The sleighing party had still three miles to go when suddenly Laura uttered a cry.

“It’s snowing!”

“So it is!” burst out Belle. “What a shame!”

“Maybe it won’t amount to much,” said Ben. “It often snows just a little, you know.”

The first flakes to fall were large, and dropped down lazily from the sky. But soon it grew darker, and in a short time the snow was coming down so thickly that it almost blotted out the landscape on all sides.

“Some fall this!” exclaimed Phil. “Looks now as if it were going to be a regular storm.”

“O dear! and I wanted it to be moonlight to-night!” wailed Laura.

Dave was peering around and looking anxiously at the heavy, leaden sky.

“If this is going to be a heavy storm, maybe it might be as well for us to turn back,” he announced.

“Turn back?” came from several of the others.

“Yes.”

“What for, Dave?” questioned Phil. “I don’t think a little snow is going to hurt us. Maybe it will help to keep us warm,” he added with a grin.

“We don’t want to get snowed in, Phil.”

“Oh, let’s go on!” interposed Roger. “Even if it does keep on snowing it won’t get very heavy in the next couple of hours. We can hurry up with our dinner at Lamont and be home again before it gets very deep.”

“All right, I’m willing if the rest are,” returned Dave, who did not wish to throw “cold water” on their sport. “Lamont it is! Go ahead, Wash, we want to get there just as soon as possible.”

On they plunged, the snow coming down thicker and thicker every minute. Then, just as the outskirts of the town were gained, they heard a curious humming sound.

“Oh, Dave! What is that?” queried Jessie.

“It’s the wind coming up,” he answered. “Listen!”

All did so and noted that the humming sound was increasing. Then the wind came tearing through the woods and down the highway with great force, sending the snow in driving sheets into their faces.

“My gracious, this looks as if it were going to be a blizzard!” gasped Phil, who had started up to see what the sound meant. “We had better get under some kind of cover just as soon as possible.”

“We’ll be up to dat hotel in anudder minute,” bawled Washington Bones, to make himself heard above the sudden fury of the elements. “Say! dis suah is some snowsto’m!” he added.

Again he cracked his whip, and once more the four horses ploughed along as well as they were able. They had to face both the wind and the snow, and these combined made progress slow. By the time the party came into sight of the hotel with the restaurant attached, the wind was blowing almost a gale, and the snow seemed to be coming down in driving chunks.

“Drive us around to the side porch,” ordered Dave. “It will be a little more sheltered there.”

“Yassir,” came from the colored driver; and soon they had come to a halt at the spot mentioned. From under the snow and robes crawled the boys and the girls and lost no time in running into the hotel. Then the colored man drove the turnout down to the stables.

“My! did you ever see such a storm!” was Roger’s comment. “And how quickly it came up!”

“If it isn’t a blizzard, it is next door to it,” returned Dave. And then he added quickly: “It looks to me as if we were going to be snowbound!”

CHAPTER XI

HELD BY THE BLIZZARD

“Snowbound!” The cry came from several of the party.

“Yes, snowbound, if this heavy fall continues,” answered Dave. “Just see how the chunks of snow are coming down, and how the wind is driving them along.”

It was certainly an interesting sight, and all the young people watched it for some time before they took off their wraps and prepared to sit down to the meal, which had been ordered over the telephone before leaving Crumville.

“My, just listen to the wind!” was Phil’s comment. “You’d think it was a regular nor’-wester.”

“If it keeps on it certainly will be a blizzard,” put in Roger. “In one way we can be glad we are under shelter, even though we are a good many miles from home.”

“Yes. And snow or no snow, I move that we sit down to dinner,” continued Phil. “We can’t go back while it is snowing and blowing like this, so we might as well make the best of our stay here.”

After having ordered a meal for the colored man, which was served in another part of the hotel, Dave joined his friends in the restaurant. A special table had been placed in a cozy corner, and that was decorated with a large bouquet of hothouse flowers, with a smaller bouquet at each plate.

“Oh, how lovely!” burst out Jessie, when she saw the flowers.

“You folks in the East certainly know how to spread yourselves,” was Cora Dartmore’s comment. “Just look at those beautiful flowers and then at the fierce snowstorm outside.”

“Oh, let us forget the storm!” cried Laura. “It will be time enough to think about that when we have to start for home.”

“That’s the truth!” answered her brother, gaily. “Everybody fall to and do as much damage to the bill-of-fare as possible;” and this remark caused a general smile.

Then the first course was served and soon all of the party were eating and chatting with the greatest of satisfaction.

In the meanwhile, the blizzard–for such it really was–continued to increase in violence. The wind tore along through the woods and down the streets of the town, bringing with it first the heavy chunks of snow and then some hard particles not unlike salt in appearance. The fine snow seemed to creep in everywhere, and, driven by the wind, formed drifts which kept increasing in size steadily.

After the first course of raw oysters, came some cream of celery soup with relishes, and then some roast turkey with cranberry sauce and vegetables. After that the young folks had various kinds of dessert with hot chocolate, and then nuts with raisins.

“What a grand dinner!” remarked Belle, when they were finishing. “Dave, you certainly know how to order the good things.”

“Oh, I had Roger and Phil to help me on that,” returned our hero. “Trust them to order up the good things to eat.”

“And trust Dave to help us get away with them,” sang out the senator’s son, gaily.