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The Outdoor Girls at Wild Rose Lodge

L >> Laura Lee Hope >> The Outdoor Girls at Wild Rose Lodge




"It will be mighty hard on Jimmy and Arnold," muttered Roy, gazing
somberly at the fast-flowing river. "To have their dad go that way!
They'll take it mighty hard--those boys."




Chapter XXIII

A Moonlight Apparition



"Let's look around a little anyway," Betty suggested. "He may possibly
have been swept up on the shore farther down the river."

"If such a thing were possible he would probably be dead anyway," Frank
protested, but the girls paid no attention to him. The mere suggestion
that the professor might still be alive and in need of assistance was
enough for them, and they set about feverishly to scour the woods on both
sides of the river and for a considerable distance down its shores.

After an hour of vain search, however, they were forced to conclude that
the old man was indeed dead, and so reluctantly and with heavy hearts they
turned their steps back toward Wild Rose Lodge.

They talked very little on the way back, for they were too occupied with
their own gloomy thoughts. Only once Betty spoke what was in the minds of
all of them.

"It seems such a terrible waste--such a pity," she said. "Just a mistake
on the part of the Government to have resulted in this tragedy. Arnold and
James Dempsey coming home, safe and well and hopeful to find their father
--dead!"

The boys stayed on for several days at the lodge, and for all the Outdoor
Girls but Betty their stay was unmitigated joy. But in the heart of the
Little Captain, hard as she tried to fight against it, was a little sense
of injury to think that her chums had got their boys back and she had been
denied hers.

To be sure, all the boys made much of her and petted her--for there was
not one of them who had not competed for her favor in the old days before
Allen had shouldered them all out--but no amount of attention from any one
else could make up for one little word from Allen.

At each sunrise she awoke thrilling with the thought that perhaps Allen
would be with her before the sun went down. And as each evening came
without him she sighed and thought, "Perhaps to-morrow."

Since the tragic death of Professor Dempsey they felt that they need no
longer fear the woods, although they never ventured near the river or the
falls without a heartache and the fervent wish that they might have
reached the poor demented man with the glad news of his sons' safety in
time to avert the tragedy.

However, they did enjoy their liberty, and took long tramps with the boys
through the woods and picnicked with them beside little unexpected brooks
and streams, quite in the nature of old days.

Then at last came the day when the boys announced that they would have to
return to town and to the military camp to obtain their formal discharge
from the army.

"We may surprise you by coming back in 'civies' a week or two from now,"
Will laughed, as the girls prepared to spin them to the railroad station
in the cars. "So you had better be prepared for the shock."

"Maybe they won't care for us any more when they see us out of uniform,"
grinned Roy, as he shook hands with Mrs. Irving. "You know the old saying
that a uniform has made many a hero of a bootblack."

"Goodness, I hope you aren't a bootblack," said Mollie from her car, where
she was "doing things" with the engine.

"I'm not," answered Roy, adding with a grin, "Nothing half so honest."

Although the girls knew that they were only saying good-bye to the boys
for a few days, the parting was hard just the same, and half an hour later
they watched the train wind serpent-like down the shining track with a
sinking feeling at their hearts.

"Aren't we a lot of geese?" said Grace impatiently, as they climbed back
into the cars. "We have done without the boys for a couple of years, and
now when they have just gone as far as Deepdale for a couple of weeks, we
are almost crying about it."

"I suppose it is just because we have had so much separation that we can't
bear any more of it--even a little," suggested gentle Amy, feeling as if
she had just awakened from a blissful dream.

"Never mind," said Mollie, putting an arm about Betty's waist and giving
it a little squeeze. "Just think how lovely it will be to see the boys in
regular clothes again, and maybe," with a sly glance at Betty, "by the
time they come back they will have added one to their number."

"Goodness, I hope so!" said Betty, unashamed.

In spite of some regret at not having the boys, the girls managed to enjoy
themselves in the days that followed. They motored and swam and fished and
hiked, and got as becomingly sun-burned and tanned as young Indians. It
was not until two or three days before the boys returned that anything
untoward happened to disturb their peace of mind.

Then one night the moon came out with such dazzling brilliance that Betty
was seized with a strong desire to be out in it.

"Let's go for a moonlight swim," she suggested excitedly, as they all
stood on the porch of the lodge staring up through the trees to where the
moon shone glitteringly down. "We haven't done it since we came, and
surely our vacation wouldn't be complete without one."

"Or more," said Mollie, seconding the plan with enthusiasm. "Come on.
Let's tell Mrs. Irving where we are going. Maybe she will wish to go
along, but I doubt it."

Mollie was right: Mrs. Irving did not wish to go, and the girls rushed
upstairs to don bathing suits in preparation for the lark.

A few minutes later they were racing like slim young ghosts through the
woods, laughing and calling to each other and entirely abandoned to the
joy of the moment.

"Race you to the old swimming hole," Mollie called out, as they neared the
river; and away they all raced in response to the challenge.

Betty won, in spite of the fact that Mollie had had a short head start,
and the girls, wild in their exuberance, would have lifted her to their
shoulders had not Betty herself laughingly fought them off.

"I have another challenge," she cried. "My fresh box of candy to whoever
swims to the other side of the swimming hole first. Are you on?"

"We're on!" yelled Grace enthusiastically, adding: "I'd swim from here to
Jericho for that box of candy, Betty."

As a matter of fact, whether it was really the thought of the candy or
whether it was because the other girls were tired from the last spurt,
Grace really did get to the other side of the swimming pool first, and,
pulling herself up on the other bank, dripping and triumphant, demanded
the prize.

"You surely did win it, and you shall have that box of candy--much as I
hoped to keep it in the family," laughed Betty, shaking the water from her
eyes and drawing herself up beside her chum. "Goodness, isn't that water
delicious to-night?" she added, wriggling her toes luxuriously in the
rippling wavelets. "Just cool enough to be refreshing and not cold enough
to chill you----" She broke off suddenly and sat staring, her eyes
widening and her body tense.

"Girls," she said in a queer voice, for Mollie and Amy had also drawn
themselves up on the bank, "have I gone crazy, or what is the matter with
me? Do you see--what--I see--up there?"

Alarmed, the girls followed the direction of her strained gaze, and
suddenly they seemed to feel themselves congeal with momentary horror.

Far above them on the bank near the falls and on the other side of the
river, stood the crouched-up, animal-like figure of--the "Thing!"




Chapter XXIV

Recovered



The sight was almost too much for the girls. What they felt was sheer
animal panic and they wanted to run away--anywhere--just so they put
distance enough between them and that figure on the bank.

"Sit still," Betty commanded them, recovering her presence of mind. "That
is Professor Dempsey up there, and if we make any sudden sound we are sure
of frightening him away."

"But he was killed--we saw it," moaned Amy. "That must be his g-ghost."

"Don't be ridiculous," snapped Mollie, her thoughts working along with
Betty's. "You know you don't believe in ghosts."

"But how----" Amy was beginning when Betty interrupted sharply.

"Listen," she said. "I came across an old derelict of a rowboat the other
day when we were exploring the upper river, but I didn't say anything to
you girls about it because I thought it was too much of a wreck to bother
with. For all I know it isn't even water tight--"

"Betty," Mollie broke in excitedly, "I see what you mean! We can row
across the upper river to where Professor Dempsey is--Were there oars in
the boat?" she broke off to ask.

"A couple of old sticks that would serve for oars," Betty answered. "Of
course it's taking a big chance--"

"Say no more," cried Mollie, jumping to her feet and wringing out her
bathing suit. "Big chance is our middle name anyway. Lead on, Betty. Where
do we find this craft?"

"I'm not quite sure that I can find it," said Betty, leading the way into
the woods, "but it was down this way somewhere. Don't make any noise,
girls, and let's hurry, or we won't get there before he disappears again."

Grace and Amy were now entering into the spirit of the thing, and they
followed at Betty's heels eagerly, careful not to step on stick or stone
that might betray their presence.

Luckily Betty managed to stumble directly on the old derelict rowboat
where it lay in ancient helplessness in the concealment of a thick grove
of bushes along the upper reach of the stream.

"Goody! This is almost too much luck," cried Betty exultantly. "You get in
the stern, Amy, and Grace in the bow. Mollie and I will do the rowing."

"I only hope the old thing doesn't take in too much water," said Amy, as
she and Grace got gingerly into the rickety old craft and Betty and Mollie
pushed it off from the shore.

"That remains to be seen," answered the Little Captain as she handed one
of the ancient oars to Mollie. "There is one thing we shall have to
remember, Mollie," she said, as they pushed clear of the bank and glided
out into the swift water of the river, "and that is to keep far enough
this side of the falls to guard against being swept over it. Bear hard on
your right hand, Mollie honey. It wouldn't be much fun if we upset here,
you know."

"Oh!" gasped Grace, holding fast to the side of the boat and noting with
dismay how plainly the roar of the falls came to them. "I wish we had
another oar, I'd help----"

"You can help most, Grade," cut in the Little Captain briskly, "by keeping
your nerve and helping us to keep ours. Mollie," she called in a whisper
that carried the length of the boat, "can you see--It--yet?"

"Yes," Mollie telegraphed back in the same tense whisper. "It's got its
back to us, I think."

"Good," said Betty softly, adding as she threw all her weight against her
oar, "now let's keep still and work."

It was queer how they referred to that presence at the head of the falls
as "It." Some way, in the weird moonlight, under the more than unusual
circumstances, it seemed almost impossible to give the thing a name.

"Was it Professor Dempsey?" they kept asking themselves over and over
again. But he had committed suicide. Or at least they had seen him fall
into the river, and they could have vowed that he did not come out again.
They had searched both sides of the river. How could they have missed him?
And yet, if that motionless figure at the head of the falls was really
Professor Dempsey, he must have been washed ashore that day and evaded
them as he had succeeded in evading them so many times before.

And all the time the roar of the falls was growing louder and louder in
their ears and they knew that theirs was a race with life and death.

Could they succeed in reaching the opposite bank before the deadly current
of the river should suck them over the falls, to almost certain
annihilation?

The answer to the question came a moment: later when, without warning, the
prow of the little boat struck on an unexpected projection of the shore
and they came to a standstill.

"Thank heaven!" said Betty under her breath as Mollie jumped out and
pulled the craft further in to shore. "That was nearly the riskiest thing
you ever did, Betty Nelson."

Once on shore again, the girls' confidence returned and they hurried
silently through the woods toward the spot where they had seen the figure.
Then Betty, who had taken the lead, suddenly motioned to them to stop.

She had caught a glimpse through the trees of the man, who resembled more
than ever a scarecrow in his crazy makeshift garments--and at the sight of
him her heart unaccountably skipped a beat.

Her thoughts had not gone beyond this moment. Strangely enough all her
energy had been concentrated upon reaching the man before he disappeared.
But now that they had succeeded so far she was at a loss what to do next.

But at that moment she inadvertently stepped on a dry twig that snapped
sharply under her foot, and at the sound the man had turned fiercely, like
an animal at bay. Then he wheeled about and made as though to flee for the
shelter of the woods.

In this emergency Betty followed impulse. She ran out into the open,
calling to him wildly that his sons were alive. Not to run away, because
his sons were safe and well. They were coming to him----

The pitiful wreck of a man paused in his flight as the import of the words
seemed to sink into his befuddled brain, but he turned upon the Little
Captain a look of ferocious hatred that would have terrified a less
courageous girl than Betty. But her whole heart was in her mission, and
she had utterly forgotten herself.

"Won't you please believe me?" she said, advancing toward him, hands
outstretched pleadingly. "I know what I'm talking about. Your sons, Arnold
and Jimmy----"

As though the names of his boys had released some cord in his brain, the
man cried out hoarsely:

"Jimmy and Arnold--my sons, my little boys!" Then, turning fiercely to
Betty, he cried: "You're not lying to me, are you? Because I'll throw you
into the river! I'll cut you into little pieces!"

As the man advanced menacingly, Grace screamed and Mollie ran forward with
some wild idea of protecting her chum, but Betty waved them back.

"I'm not lying to you," she told the crazy man, looking straight into his
glaring eyes. "Your boys were wounded, but not seriously, and they sailed
a few days ago for this country on a hospital ship. They want to see you
more than anything else in the world," she added, playing on the sudden
softness that had crept into his wild eyes. "And they sent their love to
their dad."

At sound of the old loving name all the fight went out of the old man and
he sank to his knees on the grass, sobbing horribly.

They let him alone for a moment, then Betty motioned to Mollie, and
together they lifted him to his feet. The sight of his tear-stained,
unkempt old face, creased and lined with suffering, but with the wildness
gone out of the eyes, stirred a profound pity in the girls and they wished
more than anything in the world to make him happy again.

"We are going to take you home, Professor Dempsey," Betty told him
soothingly, as with Mollie's help she half led, half carried, him through
the woods toward the spot where they had left the boat, Amy and Grace
following awed and silent behind them. "And as soon as your boys reach
home we will bring them to you. Be careful of this big rock. Ah, here's
the boat." And talking all the time, softly and soothingly as one would to
a child, Betty at last succeeded in seating the derelict old man in the
equally derelict old boat.

The girls tumbled in after him, and with a prayer in her heart Betty
pushed off from shore.

That ride back across the river was as weird and unreal as any nightmare
the girls had ever lived through. Their queer passenger, seeming the most
unreal of all, was quiet for the most part but occasionally he would sit
up and look about him wildly and could only be soothed back to reason by
Betty's sweet voice telling him of his boys--Jimmy and Arnold.

Somehow they reached the opposite shore, and, after pulling the boat up
among the bushes once more, they started back, the old man with them, to
Wild Rose Lodge.




Chapter XXV

The Old Crowd Again



Mrs. Irving, who had been worried by their prolonged absence, met the
girls at the door as they stumbled with the almost exhausted old man up
the steps of the porch.

At sight of the latter she grew deathly pale, and leaned against the door
for support. She felt that all the world was growing black----

"Oh, please, please don't faint!" she heard Betty's young voice calling to
her desperately as it seemed from a long distance. "We've depended upon
you to help us."

With a great effort she fought off the dizziness and drew herself away
from Betty's supporting arm.

"It's all right," she said dazedly. "The shock, I guess. Betty what--who--
is that----"

"Oh, please don't ask any questions now," Betty begged feverishly. "Just
help us, and we will tell you all about it later. This is Professor
Dempsey," she added, turning to the broken old man who stood staring at
them uncomprehendingly. "He can have Mollie's and my room, can't he, Mrs.
Irving? and we will bunk somewhere else."

Mrs. Irving nodded automatically, still too dazed by the suddenness of the
thing even to think, and they helped the old man into Betty's room and
laid him on the bed. The tired, ragged, unkempt old head had hardly
touched the pillow before its owner had sunk into a heavy sleep.

For a moment the girls were startled, for it almost seemed as though he
were dead, but Betty put her hand on the ragged old shirt above the heart
and found that the action was strong and regular.

"Perhaps it is the very best thing that could happen to him," she said
softly, and, laying a light cover over him, tip-toed from the room,
followed quietly by Mrs. Irving and the other girls.

Once in the other room, with the need for action over, the girls felt weak
and spent, and it was only then that they realized that they had been
through a terrible ordeal.

In broken sentences they told Mrs. Irving all that had happened and as she
listened she more and more appalled at the risk they had run and the
danger they had gone through.

"Girls, girls," she cried when they had finished, "I was half wild about
you as it was. But if I had known the truth I think I should have gone
crazy. Just the same," she added and her eyes shone with pride in them,
"it was a glorious thing for you to do--an unselfish, wonderfully
courageous thing. I'm proud of you!"

In spite of the fact that they were tired out, the girls insisted upon
standing watch and watch that night. They felt that some one should be
with Professor Dempsey all the time in case he should wake in the night
with his old madness upon him. It was the longest night any of them had
ever spent, and the morning dawned upon a hollow-eyed, worn-out set of
Outdoor Girls.

"I never," said Betty, looking around at her white-faced chums wearily,
"spent such a terrible night in my life. How is the patient?" she added,
taking up the subject that had not left their minds for a minute. "Who was
in there last?"

"I," said Grace, brushing out her hair, listlessly. "He is still asleep."

That report continued good all morning, and it was almost noon before the
ragged, unbelievably unkempt old man on the bed opened his eyes.

The girls had been looking forward to, yet dreading, this minute. It had
been decided that only one of them should be in the room with him when he
awoke, but the rest were hovering close to the door ready to give
assistance if it should become necessary.

But they need not have worried. The magic of his long sleep, together with
the glad news he had heard the night before, seemed to have transformed
the man overnight to his old gentle self.

To be sure, he was amazed at his strange surroundings, and looked
uncomprehendingly into Betty's face as she bent compassionately over him.
But all he said was:

"I declare, this is all very strange, young lady--very strange. Would you
mind--er--telling me where I am?"

At the tone, even more than the words, the girls felt a wild desire to
shout aloud their relief. For the tone was the same, gentle, polite one
that they remembered hearing that day when the little man had entertained
them in his cabin in the woods.

Then Betty, as gently as she knew how, told him a little of what had
happened to him, and the girls could see by the surprise on his face that
he had no recollection whatever of the matters of which she was speaking.

"I declare it is most strange--most strange," he declared when she had
finished, adding as he looked down and plucked distastefully at his
tattered shirt: "And this is the result of my--er--temporary aberration,
is it? Ah, but I remember," he sat up suddenly, a gleam of fear in his
eyes. "It was when I read of the death of my boys. Something snapped in my
brain, I think. You say"--he turned to Betty, grasping her hand
imploringly--"you say that my sons are well--that they are coming to me?"

"Yes," said Betty soothingly, pressing him back upon the pillow. "They are
well and safe and will be with you soon--in a few days, perhaps."

"Ah," said the little man, submitting to Betty's touch, a happy smile on
his lips, "that is good. That is very--very--good--" and with a sigh like
a tired child's, he fell asleep again!

"Did you hear what he said?" whispered Betty, her eyes shining as she
tip-toed from the room, closed the door softly behind her and faced her
awed and incredulous chums. "He's well, girls. He's completely sane
again."

"It's a miracle," said Mollie breathlessly.

And so it came to pass that some little time later four good-looking young
fellows, recently in the service of the greatest country on the earth, and
one of them still wearing his regimentals, saw a rather unexpected sight
as they swung down the path toward Wild Rose Lodge.

On the porch sat an elderly, contented looking man, clad in garments that
would easily have accommodated two men of his size--garments belonging to
Mollie's Uncle John, and seated about him in attitudes of lazy comfort
were four young girls.

These young girls--who were, at least from the standpoint of the four
young men, exceedingly good to look upon, were engaged in doing some sort
of fancy work. All but one of them, that is; for the fourth, a girl with
wavy brown hair and bright brown eyes, pink cheeks, and a dream of a
mouth, was reading to the elderly man who sat in the chair of state.

"Gee, Allen," whispered one of the tall youths to the one who still wore
the uniform of his country's service, "I feel as though we were crabbing
your act. Can't we fellows do the disappearing act----"

But just at the moment the girl with the brown eyes and the pink cheeks
looked up, gave one little startled cry, and dropped the book to the
porch.

The other girls looked up and then followed a scene that very nearly made
the temporarily forgotten and neglected old man on the porch drop out of
his chair in surprise.

"Allen!" screamed the girls, all except the brown-haired, pink-cheeked
one, who, for some unaccountable reason hung back behind the others. "You
perfect angel!"

"Why didn't you let us know you were coming so that we could have been
prepared?"

"Oh, isn't your uniform lovely!"

"And look at the dressed-up leggings!"

These and various other exclamations like them, coupled to the fact that
all the girls, except the one that he wanted to most, had kissed him,
rather overwhelmed young Lieutenant Washburn and took his breath away.

His three companions, however, finding themselves neglected and out in the
cold, interfered at this point and saved his life.

"Betty, what are you hiding away back there for?" cried Mollie to the
Little Captain, whose cheeks were pinker than ever and whose eyes were
shining very brightly with a sort of mixture of joy and fright. "Don't you
know Allen in his uniform?"

"Aren't you going to kiss him?" chimed in Grace wickedly.

"We all did," added Amy.

But Betty had no intention of kissing Allen, although he begged her to
with his laughing eyes and she continued backing into the doorway, until
Mrs. Irving, coming up behind her, caught her up and pushed her out upon
the porch again.

However, the chaperon monopolized Allen for a few minutes and gave Betty
time to catch her breath. She found Mollie introducing Professor Dempsey
to the astonished boys. These young soldiers wanted to ask a hundred
questions, but, catching a warning look from Betty, decided to wait till
later, when the little man himself was not present.

Frank, who was perhaps more glad than any of them to see the father of his
chums alive and well, settled himself near the man and began to pour into
his starved and eager ears news of his sons and tales of adventures in
which they had figured.

And while Betty was still smiling in sympathy with the look of absolute
happiness on Professor Dempsey's face, Allen dragged himself away from the
group of his admirers and came over to her.

Boldly he pulled her hand through his arm and led her past the laughing
boys and girls, down the steps, and along the path that led into the
woods.

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