I ragazzi della ferrovia

Le prime righe

Two nights after the dawning of Peter's idea he beckoned the girls mysteriously at the twilight hour. “Come hither with me,” he said, “and bring the Roman Chariot.” The Roman Chariot was a very old perambulator that had spent years of retirement in the loft over the coach-house. The children had oiled its works till it glided noiseless as a pneumatic bicycle, and answered to the helm as it had probably done in its best days. “Follow your dauntless leader,” said Peter, and led the way down the hill towards the station. Just above the station many rocks have pushed their heads out through the turf as though they, like the children, were interested in the railway. In a little hollow between three rocks lay a heap of dried brambles and heather. Peter halted, turned over the brushwood with a well-scarred boot, and said:— “Here's the first coal from the St. Peter's Mine. We'll take it home in the chariot. Punctuality and despatch. All orders carefully attended to. Any shaped lump cut to suit regular customers.” The chariot was packed full of coal. And when it was packed it had to be unpacked again because it was so heavy that it couldn't be got up the hill by the three children, not even when Peter harnessed himself to the handle with his braces, and firmly grasping his waistband in one hand pulled while the girls pushed behind. Three journeys had to be made before the coal from Peter's mine was added to the heap of Mother's coal in the cellar. Afterwards Peter went out alone, and came back very black and mysterious. “I've been to my coal-mine,” he said; “to-morrow evening we'll bring home the black diamonds in the chariot.” It was a week later that Mrs. Viney remarked to Mother how well this last lot of coal was holding out. The children hugged themselves and each other in