CHAPTER VIII
FIRST AT SNOW CAMP
Fred Hatfield's fears might have been well-founded had the mules notbeen so winded. They had run at least four miles from the railroadand even with the fear of the snarling panther behind them they couldnot continue much farther at this pace.
But over this rougher and narrower road the timber cart jounced morethan ever. In all its life the panther had probably never receivedsuch a shaking-up. The mules had not gone far on what Fred called theRattlesnake Hill Road when, with an ear-splitting cry, the huge catleaped out from the flying wagon and landed in the bush.
"We're saved!" gasped Ruth. "That dreadful beast is gone."
Fred immediately tried to soothe the mules into a more leisurelypace; but nothing but fatigue would bring them down. Thoroughlyfrightened, they kept starting and running without cause, and therewas no chance in this narrow road to turn them.
The fact that it ascended the side of the hill steeply did moretoward abating the pace of the runaways than aught else. The trackcrept along the edge of several abrupt precipices, too--not more thanthirty or forty feet high, but enough to wreck the wagon and killmules and passengers had they gone over the brink.
These dangerous places in the winding road were what had sofrightened young Hatfield at first. He knew this locality well. Butto Ruth the place was doubly terrifying, for she was lost--completelylost.
"Oh, where are we going? What will become of us?" she murmured,still obliged to cling with both hands to the jumping, rocking reach.
The mules could gallop no longer. Fred yelled at them "Yea-a! Yea-a!"at the top of his voice. They began to pay some attention--orelse were so winded that they would have halted of their ownvolition. And as the cart ceased its thumping and rumbling a lightsuddenly blazed up before them, shining through the dusk, and higherup the hill.
"What is that? A house?" cried Ruth, seizing Fred by the shoulder.
Not more than half an hour ago the girl from the Red Mill hadslipped out of the private car at the Emoryville Crossing, in pursuitof the runaway youth; now they were deep in the wilderness andsurrounded by such dangers as Ruth had never dreamed of before.
The baying of a hound and the angry barking of another dog wasRuth's only answer. She turned to see Fred Hatfield sliding down offthe cart.
"You sha'n't leave me!" cried Ruth, jumping down after him andseizing the runaway desperately. "You sha'n't abandon me in thisforest, away from everybody. You're a cruel, bad boy, Fred Hatfield;but you've just _got_ to be decent to me."
"What did you interfere for, anyway?" he demanded, snarling like across dog. "Lemme go!"
But if Ruth was afraid of what terrors the forest might hold, and ofher general situation, she had seen enough of this boy to know thathe was just a poor, miserable coward--he aroused no fear in her heart.
"I'm going to just stick to you, Freddie," she assured him. She wasquite as strong as he, she knew. "You are going home. At least, youshall go back to Mr. Cameron--"
Just then the flare of light ahead broadened and a gruff voiceshouted:
"Hullo! what's wanted? Down, Tiger! Behave, Rose!"
The dogs instantly stopped their clamor. The light came through theopen door and the glazed window of a little hut perched on a rockoverlooking the road. The mules had halted just below this eminence,and Ruth saw that there was a winding path leading up to the door ofthe hovel. Down this path came the huge figure of a man, with the twodogs gamboling about him in the snow. The occupant of this cabin inthe wilderness carried a rifle in one hand.
"Hullo!" he said again. "That's Sim Rogers's team--I know thosemules. Are you there, Sim? What's happened ye?"
"Who is it?" whispered Ruth, again, still clinging to Fred's jacket.
"It's--it's the Rattlesnake Man," returned the boy, in a shakingvoice.
"Who is he?" asked Ruth, in surprise.
"He lives here alone on the hill. He's a hermit. They say he'scrazy. And I guess he is," added Fred, with a shudder.
"Why do you think he's crazy?"
But before Fred could reply--if he intended to--the hermit reachedthe road. He was an old but very vigorous-looking man, burly andstout, with a great mat of riotous gray hair under his fur cap, and abeard of the same color that reached his breast. He seemed to havevery good eyes indeed, for he immediately muttered:
"Ha! Sim's mules--been running like the very kildee! All of a sweat,I vow. Two young folks--ha! Scared. Runaway--ah! What's that?"
The dogs began to bay again. Far behind the boy and girl--down thehill road--rose the eyrie scream of the disappointed panther.
"That cat-o'-mountain chase ye, boy?" the hermit asked, sharply.
But Fred had no answer. He stood, in Ruth's sharp clutch, and hunghis head without a word. The girl had to reply:
"I never was so scared. The beast jumped right on the cart and wejust shook him off down the hill yonder."
"A girl," said the hermit, talking to himself, but talking aloud, inthe same fashion as before. Without doubt, being so much alone inthese wilds he had contracted the habit of talking to himself--or tohis dogs--or to whatever creature chanced to be his company.
"A girl. Not Sim's gal. Sim ain't got nothing but louts of boys. Letme see. What boy is this?"
"He is Fred Hatfield," said Ruth, simply. Fred jumped and tried topull away from her; but Ruth's hold was not to be so easily broken.The hermit, however, seemed to have never heard the name before. Heonly said, idly:
"Fred Hatfield, eh? You his sister?"
"No, sir. I am Ruth Fielding," she replied.
"Ruth Fielding? Don't know her. She's not belongin' around here. No.Well, how'd you get here? And with Sim's mules?"
Ruth told him briefly, but without bringing Fred Hatfield's troubleinto the story. They had got aboard the timber cart at the crossing,the mules had run away, the panther had taken a ride with them and--here they were!
The hermit merely nodded in acknowledgment of the tale. Hisquestions dealt with her alone:
"Where do you belong?"
"The party I was with are bound for Snow Camp. Do you know wherethat is, sir?" Ruth asked.
"Not ten miles away. Yes."
"They will be worried--"
"I will get you over there before bedtime. Go up to my house andwait. This boy and I will stable the mules in my barn; it's justalong the road here. Sim will follow the beasts and find them; buthe'll be some time in getting along. He lives along this road himself--not far, not far. Ah!"
The old man talked mostly as though he spoke to himself. He seldommore than glanced at her, his eye roving everywhere but at the personto whom he spoke. Ruth started toward the house from which the fireand lamplight shone so cordially. The dogs stood before her--Tiger,the big hound, and Rose, a beautiful Gordon setter.
"Let her alone," said the hermit to his canine companions. "She'sall right."
The dogs seemed to agree with him immediately. The hound sniffedonce at the hem of Ruth's frock; Rose gambolled about her and lickedher hand. Ruth now realized how cold she was, and she ran quickly upto the open door of the cabin.
On the threshold she hesitated a moment. A great lamp with a tinshade, hanging from the rafters, illuminated all the center of theroom. At one end burned a hot log fire on the hearth; but the twofurther corners were in gloom. Ruth had said she had never seen a logcabin, and it was true. This one seemed to her to be a very cozyplace indeed, even if it was the habitation of a hermit.
As she entered, however, she found that there was a rathersuffocating, unpleasant odor in the place. It was light, yetpenetrating enough to be distinguished clearly. In one of the darkercorners was what appeared to be a big green chest, and it had aglazed window frame for a cover. Something rustled there.
The dogs followed her in and she sat down in an old-fashioned, benthickory chair on the hearth--perhaps the hermit himself had justrisen from it, for there was a sheepskin lying before it for a matand a pair of huge carpet slippers on either side of the s
heepskin.The dogs came in and sat down by the slippers, just where Ruth couldrest a hand on either head, and so blinked at the flames while theywaited for the return of the hermit and the runaway boy.
So she sat when they came into the cabin, stamping the snow fromtheir shoes. The hermit led Fred by the arm. He had not overlookedthe care with which Ruth had retained him by her side.
"So you want to go over to Mr. Parrish's Snow Camp?" asked the oldman.
"It belongs to Mr. Cameron, now." said Ruth. "I know that there is atelephone there, and I can get word to Mr. Cameron and Helen and Tomat Scarboro that we are safe."
"I'm not going," said Fred "I'll stay here."
"You'll go along with Young Miss," said the hermit, firmly. "I'llgit ye a pannikin of tea and a bite. Then we'll start. We'll go'cross the woods on snowshoes--'twill be easier."
"Oh, can I do it, do you suppose?" cried Ruth. "I never wore suchthings in my life."
"You'll learn," said the hermit.
He bustled about, making the tea and warming a big pancake ofcornbread which he put into an iron dripping-pan down before theglowing coals at one side. While they waited for the water to bubblefor the tea the old man went to the big chest, and began to talk andfondle something. Ruth heard the rustling again and turned around tolook.
"Want to see my children, Young Miss?" asked the old man, whose eyesseemed as sharp as needles.
Ruth arose in curiosity and approached. Within a yard of the old manand his chest she stopped suddenly with a gasp. The hermit stood upwith two snakes twining about his hands and wrists. The serpents rantheir tongues out like lightning, and their beady eyes glowed asthough living fire dwelt in their heads. Ruth was frightened, but shewould not scream. The hermit handled the snakes as though they wereas harmless as kittens--as probably they were, the poison sackshaving been removed.
"They won't hurt you--harmless, harmless," said the old man,caressingly. "There, there, my pretties! Go to bed again."
He lifted the glass cover of the chest and dropped them into itsinterior. There was a great hissing and rustling. The hermit steppedto the hanging lamp and turned the shade so as to send the radianceof it into that corner. Through the pane Ruth saw a squirming mass ofscaly bodies, mixed up with an old quilt. More than one tail, withrows of "buttons" and rattles on it, was elevated, and one angryserpent "sprung his rattle" sharply.
"Hush, hush, my dears!" said the hermit, soothingly. "Go to sleepagain now. My children," he said, nodding at Ruth. "Pretty dears!"
To tell the truth, the girl from the Red Mill wanted to scream; butshe held herself down, clenching her hands, and saying nothing. Thekettle began to sing and she was glad to go back to the chair by thefire and afterward to sip the tin cup of hot tea that their host gaveher, and eat with good appetite a square of the crisp cornbread.
Meanwhile, the hermit took from the walls three pairs of great,awkward-looking snowshoes and tightened the lacings and fitted thongsto them. The pair he selected for Ruth looked to the girl to be sobig that she never could take a step in them; but he seemed to expecther to try.
They went out of the cabin as the moon was rising. It came up as redand fiery as the sun had gone down. Long shadows of the tall treeswere flung across the snow. The hermit commanded Rose, the setter, toguard the hut, while he allowed the hound to follow at heel. Hecarried his rifle, and Ruth was glad of this.
"Haven't heard a cat-o'-mountain around here this winter," he said,as they started up the hill. "Didn't hear nor see one at all lastwinter. Neighbors will have to get up a hunt for this one thattroubled you, Young Miss, 'fore it does more damage."
At the top of the ascent they stopped and the old man put on Ruth'ssnowshoes for her. Fred, always without a word and looking mightysullen (but evidently afraid of the rattlesnake man) tied his own inplace and the hermit slipped into his and they each gave Ruth a hand.
She stood up and found that her weight made little or no impressionupon the well-packed snow. There was no wind and, although the airwas very keen (the thermometer probably being almost to the zeromark) it was easy for her to move over the drifts. With some littleinstruction from the rattlesnake man, and after several tumbles--which were of little moment because he and Fred held her up--Ruth wasable to put one foot before the other and shuffle over the snow at afairly good pace.
The moonlight made the unbroken track as plain as noonday. To Ruthit seemed almost impossible that the hermit could find his waythrough a forest which showed no mark of any former traveler; but hewent on as though it was a turnpike.
Two hours and a half were they on the way, and Ruth had begun to beboth tired and cold when they crossed a road on which there weretelegraph, or telephone poles and then--a little farther into the BigWoods--they struck a well-defined private track over which sleds hadrecently traveled.
"You say some of your party and the baggage were coming over to-night,"said the hermit to Ruth. "They have been along. This is the road toSnow Camp--and there is the light from the windows!"
Ruth saw several points of light directly ahead. They quicklyreached a good-sized clearing, in the middle of which stood a two-storylog cabin, with a balcony built all around it at the height of thesecond floor. Sleigh bells jingled as the horses stamped in theyard. The heavy sledges with the luggage and the serving people hadjust arrived. Ruth Fielding was the first of the pleasure party toarrive at Snow Camp.
Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp; Or, Lost in the Backwoods Page 8