"I suppose that you boys have never traveled a great deal, except in the West, have you?" questioned John Berwick.
"That's right, Mr. Berwick," said Jim; "we expect to visit a few other countries, though, before long, if we find this 'Lost Mine' we are looking for. You know you can't travel without money."
"Not in your own yacht," replied Berwick.
"I generally walked, or," seeing a gleam of humor in Jim's eye, "or worked my passage."
"We will stick to our yacht," remarked Jim, "seeing that we have it on our hands."
"Quite right, too," replied the engineer.
"You must have had some rather unusual experiences in your travels," prompted Jo.
"Juarez says that you have been pretty much all over the world."
"That's so," replied the engineer, "but I do not know as I have learned enough to pay me for the exertion."
"Tell the boys about that time you traveled in Russia," said Juarez.
"Don't you know?" asked Juarez, slightly confused, "when you were riding in the railroad carriage?"
"That's only an anecdote," replied the engineer. "But I will tell it if you think it will interest."
"I suppose you boys know what it is to be hungry?"
"I have got a pretty good idea of it after eating one of Tom's dinners," remarked Jim. "You see he don't believe in having anything left over. Thinks it's wasteful, so he just cooks dabs of things as though we had no more appetites than a group of maiden ladies who were taking afternoon tea."
There was a general laugh at this, the exaggeration being so manifest that even Tom joined in, still there was some truth in Jim's jocose remarks, for Tom did have a "close" side to him, which showed even in cooking. It was always evident that Thomas Darlington would become the financier among the Frontier Boys. After the laughter had died down the engineer took up the Russian incident again.
"I venture to say that my hunger on the occasion I am about to speak of was somewhat more real than yours, Skipper. I was traveling first-class from St. Petersburg and heading for the German frontier. Very foolishly I did not provide myself with a hamper of provisions, supposing that I would be able to get food along the way. I never made that particular mistake again.
"I had plenty of money in those days, and was traveling, as I say, first-class. When I got in my compartment at St. Petersburg I supposed at first that I was going to have it all to myself, and I was very well pleased because I could take things easy and sleep undisturbed through the most of what promised to be a very dreary trip.