Ruth Fielding At Sunrise Farm Part 9

"She will if we don't work pretty hard," admitted the girl of the Red Mill, who was hoping herself to be finally among the first few members of her cla.s.s at the Hall. "But I would rather see Mercy win first place, I believe, than anybody else-unless it is you, Helen."

"Don't you fret," laughed Helen. "You'll never see little me at the head of the cla.s.s-and you know it."

The two friends did not bore the physician by staying too long, but after he bade them good-bye at the door, Helen ran down the path giggling.

"What do you suppose he'll say when he finds that hat on the skeleton?"

she demanded, her eyes dancing.

"He'll say, 'That Helen Cameron was in here-that explains it!' You can't fool Dr. Davison," laughed Ruth.

Ruth had taken Helen into her confidence ere this about the strange runaway, Sadie Raby, and during their call at the doctor's, she had asked that gentleman if he had seen the tramping girl, after the latter had left the Red Mill. But he had not. Oddly enough, however, Ruth found some trace of Sadie at Mercy's house, where the girls in the automobile next went to call.

Mercy's mother had taken the girl in for a night, and fed her. The latter had asked Mr. Curtis about the trains going west, but he had sold Sadie no ticket.

"She was very reticent," Mrs. Curtis told Ruth. "She was so independent and capable-acting, in spite of her tender years, that I did not feel as though it was my place to try to stop her. She seemed to have some destination in view, but she would not tell me what it was."

"I wonder if that wasn't what Aunt Alvirah meant?" queried Ruth, thoughtfully, as she and Helen drove away. "That Sadie is awfully independent. I wish you had seen her."

"Maybe she's going to find her twin brothers that she told you about,"

suggested Helen. "I wish I _had_ seen her."

"And maybe you've guessed it!" cried Ruth. "But that doesn't help us find _her_, for she didn't say where Willie and d.i.c.kie had been taken when they were removed from the orphanage."

"Gracious, Ruthie!" exclaimed her chum, laughing. "You're always worrying over somebody else's troubles."

CHAPTER VII-WHAT TOM CAMERON SAW

Of course, Ruth was not at all sure that she could do anything for Sadie Raby if she found her. Perhaps, as Helen said, she was fond of shouldering other people's burdens.

It did seem to the girl of the Red Mill as though it were a very dreadful thing for Sadie to be wandering about the country all alone, and without means to feed herself, or get anything like proper shelter.

In her secret heart Ruth was thinking that _she_ might have been as wild and neglected if Uncle Jabez, with all his crankiness, had not taken her in and given her a home at the Red Mill.

They stopped and saw Ruth's old school teacher and then, it being past mid-afternoon, Helen turned the headlights of the car toward home again.

As the machine slid so smoothly along the road toward the Lumano and the Red Mill, Ruth suddenly uttered a cry and pointed ahead. A huge dog had leaped out of a side road and stood, barring their way and barking.

"Reno! dear old fellow!" Ruth said, as Helen shut off the power. "He knows us."

"Tom must be near, then. That's the Wilkins Corner road," Helen observed.

As the car came to a halt and the big mastiff tried to jump in and caress the girls with his tongue-poor fellow! he knew no better, though Helen scolded him-Ruth stood up and shouted for her friend's twin brother.

"Tom! Tom! A rescue! a rescue! We're being eaten up by a great four-legged beast-get down, Reno! Oh, don't!"

She fell back in her seat, laughing merrily, and keeping the big dog off with both hands. A cheery whistle came from the wood. Reno started and turned to look. He had had his master back for only a day, but Tom's word was always law to the big mastiff.

"Down, sir!" sang out Tom Cameron, and then he burst into view.

"Oh, Tom! what a sight you are!" gasped Ruth.

"My goodness me!" exclaimed his sister. "Have you been in a fight?"

"Down, Reno!" commanded her brother again. He came striding toward them.

If he had not been so disheveled, anybody could have seen that, dressed in his sister's clothes, and she in his, one could scarcely have told them apart. A boy and a girl never could look more alike than Tom and Helen Cameron.

"What has happened to you?" demanded Ruth, quite as anxious as Tom's own sister.

"Look like I'd been monkeying with the buzz-saw-eh?" he demanded, but a little ruefully. "Say! I've had a time. If it hadn't been for Reno--"

"Why, Reno has hurt himself, too!" exclaimed Ruth, hopping out of the car and for the first time noticing that there was a cake of partially dried blood on the dog's shoulder.

"He isn't hurt much. And neither am I. Only my clothes torn--"

"And your face scratched!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Helen.

"Oh-well-_that's_ nothing. That was an accident. She didn't mean to do it."

"_Who_ didn't mean to do it? What _are_ you talking about?" screamed his sister, at last fully aroused. "You've been in some terrible danger, Tom Cameron."

"No, I haven't," returned Tom, beginning to grin again. "Just been playing the chivalrous knight."

"And got his face scratched!" t.i.ttered Ruth.

"Aw-well-- Now wait! let me tell you," he began.

"Now he's going to make excuses," cried Helen. "You have gotten into trouble, you reckless boy, and want to make light of it."

"Gee! I'd like to see _you_ make light of it," exclaimed Tom, with some vexation. "If you can make head or tail of it-- And that girl!"

"There he goes again," said Ruth. "He has got to tell us. It is about a girl," and she laughed, teasingly.

"Say! I don't know which one of you is the worse," said Tom, ruefully.

"Listen, will you?"

"Go ahead," said Helen, solemnly.

"Well, Reno and I were hiking along the Wilkins Corner road yonder. It was just about where your Uncle Jabe's wagon, Ruth, knocked me down into the gully that time-remember?"

Ruth nodded.

"Well, I heard somebody scream. It was a girl. Reno began to growl and I held him back till I located the trouble. There was a campfire down under that bank and the scream came from that direction.

"'Go to it, old boy!' I says, and let Reno go. I had no reason to believe there was real trouble," Tom said, wagging his head. "But I followed him down the bank just the same, for although Reno wouldn't bite anybody unless he had to, he does look ugly-to strangers.

"Well, what do you think? There were a couple of tramps at the fire, and Reno was holding them off from a girl. He showed his teeth all right, and one of them had his knife out. _He_ was an ugly looking customer."