Madge Steele was crying frankly. Bobbins came rushing upon the scene, and there was a general riot of exclamation and explanation.
“Say! you goin’ to let me see my brothers now?” demanded the runaway, who had a practical mind, if nothing more.
“Bob,” said his father, quickly, “you have the pony put in the cart and drive down there to Caslon’s and bring those babies up here.”
“Aw, Father! what’ll I tell Caslon?” demanded the big fellow, hesitatingly.
“Tell him—tell him——” For a moment, it was true, that Mr. Steele was rather put to it for a reply. He found Ruth beside him, plucking his sleeve.
“Let me go with Bobbins, sir,” whispered the girl of the Red Mill. “I’ll know what to say to Mr. and Mrs. Caslon.”
“I guess you will, Ruth. That’s right. You bring the twins up here to see their sister.” Then he turned and smiled down at Sadie, and there were tears behind his eyeglasses. “If I have my way, young lady, your coming here to Sunrise Farm will be the best thing—for you and the twins—that ever happened in your young lives!”
Perhaps Sadie Raby would have been just as well pleased had Mr. Steele allowed her to go to the Caslons’ to see her brothers, instead of having them brought up the hill to Sunrise Farm. The gentleman, however, did not do this because he disliked Caslon; Sadie had saved Bennie from what might have been certain death, and the wealthy Mr. Steele was quite as grateful as he was obstinate.
He was determined to show his gratitude to the friendless girl in a practical manner. And the object of his gratitude would include her two little brothers, as well. Oh, yes! Mr. Steele proposed to make Sadie Raby glad that she had saved Bennie from the runaway horse.
The other girls and boys, beside the members of the Steele family, were anxious now to show their approval of Sadie’s brave deed. The wanderer was quite bewildered at first by all the attention she received.
She was such a different looking girl, too, as has been already pointed out, from the miserablelittle creature who had been found by Mr. Steele in the shrubbery, that it was not hard to develop an interest in Sadie Raby.
Encircled by the family and their young visitors on the veranda, Sadie again related the particulars of her life and experience—and it was a particularly sympathetic audience that listened to her. Mr. Steele drew out a new detail that had escaped Ruth, even, in her confidences with the strange child.
Although the “terrible twins” were unable to remember either father or mother—orphan asylums are not calculated to encourage such remembrances in infant minds—Sadie, as she had once said to Ruth, could clearly remember both her parents.
And although they had died in distant Harburg, where the children had been put into the orphanage, Sadie remembered that the family had removed to that city, soon after the twins were born, from no less a place than Darrowtown!
“Me, I got it in my head that mebbe somebody would remember pa and mom in Darrowtown, and would give me a chance. That’s another reason I come hiking clear over here,” said Sadie.
“We’ll hunt your friends up—if there are any,” Mr. Steele assured her.
Sadie looked at him shrewdly. “Say!” saidshe, “you treat me a whole lot nicer than you did a while ago. Do folks have to do somethin’ for your family before you forget to be cross with them?”
It certainly was a facer! Mr. Steele flushed a little and scarcely knew what to say in reply to this frank criticism. But at that moment the two-wheel cart came into sight with the pony on the trot, and Ruth and the twins waving their hands and shouting.
The meeting of the little chaps with their runaway sister was touching. The three Raby orphans were very popular indeed at Sunrise Farm just then.
Mr. Steele frankly admitted that this might be a case where custom could be over-ridden, and the orphanage authorities ignored.
“Whether those Perkins people she was farmed out to, were as harsh as she says——” he began, when Ruth interrupted eagerly:
“Oh, sir! I can vouch forthat. The man was an awful brute. He struckmewith his whip, and I don’t believe Sadie told a story when she says he beat her.”
“I wish I’d been there,” ejaculated Tom Cameron, in a low voice, “when the scoundrel struck you, Ruth. I would have done something to him!”
“However,” pursued Mr. Steele, “the girl ishere now and near to Darrowtown, which she says is her old home. We may find somebody there who knew the Rabys. At any rate, they shall be cared for—I promise you.”
“I know!” cried Ruth, suddenly. “If anybody will remember them, it’s Miss Pettis.”
“Another of your queer friends, Ruth?” asked Madge, laughing.
“Why—Miss True Pettis isn’t queer. But she knows about everybody who lives in Darrowtown, or who ever did live there—and their histories from away back!”
“A human encyclopedia,” exclaimed Heavy.
“She’s a lovely lady,” said Ruth, quietly, “and she’ll do anything to help these unfortunate Rabys—be sure of that.”
The late dinner was announced, and by that time the twins, as well as Sadie, had become a little more used to their surroundings. Willie and Dickie had been put into “spandy clean” overalls and shirts before Mrs. Caslon would let them out of her hands. They were really pretty children, in a delicate way, like their sister.
With so many about the long dining table, the meals at the Steele home at this time were like a continuous picnic. There was so much talking and laughter that Mr. and Mrs. Steele had to communicate with signs, for the most part, from their stations at either end of the table, or elsethey must send messages back and forth by one of the waitresses.
The twins and Sadie were down at Mrs. Steele’s end of the table on this occasion, with the girls all about them. Ruth and the others took a lot more interest in keeping the orphans supplied with good things than they did in their own plates.
That is, all but Heavy; of courseshewasted no time in heaping her own plate. The twins were a little bashful at first; but it was plain that Willie and Dickie had been taught some of the refinements of life at the orphanage, as both had very good table manners.
They had to be tempted to eat, however, and finally Heavy offered to run a race with them, declaring that she could eat as much as both of the boys put together.
Dickie was just as silent in his sister’s presence as usual, his communications being generally in the form of monosyllables. But he was faithful in echoing Willie’s sentiments on any and every occasion—noticeably at chicken time. The little fellows ate the fricassee with appetite, but they refused the nice, rich gravy, in which the cook had put macaroni. Mrs. Steele urged them to take gravy once or twice, and finally Sadie considered that she should come to the rescue.
“What’s the matter with you kids?” she demanded, hoarsely,in an attempt to communicate with them aside. “Ye was glad ’nough to git chicken gravy on Thanksgivin’ at the orphanage—warn’t ye?”
“Yes, I know, Sadie,” returned Willie, wistfully. “But they never left the windpipes in it—did they, Dickie?”
“Nope,” responded Dickie, feelingly, likewise gazing at the macaroni askance.
It set the table in a roar and finally Willie and Dickie were encouraged to try some of the gravy, “windpipes” and all!
“They’re all right,” laughed Busy Izzy, greatly delighted. “They’re one—or two—of the seven wonders of the world——”
“Pooh!” interrupted Heavy, witheringly, “You don’t even know what the seven wonders of the world are.”
“I can tell you one thing they’renot,” grinned Busy Izzy. “They’re not a baseball team, for there’s not enough of them. Now will you be good?”
Madge turned her head suddenly and ran right into Belle Tingley’s elbow, as Belle was reaching up to settle her hair-ribbon.
“Oh, oh! My eye! I believe you poked it out, Belle. You havesuchsharp elbows,” wailed Madge.
“You’ll have to see Doc. Blodgett at Lumberton,”advised Heavy, “and get your eye tended to. He’s a great old doctor——”
“Why, I didn’t know he was an eye doctor,” exclaimed Madge. “I thought he was a chiropodist.”
“He used to be,” Heavy returned, with perfect seriousness. “He began at the foot and worked up, you see.”
Amid all the fun and hilarity, Mr. Steele called them to order. This was at the dessert stage, and there were tall cones of parti-colored ice cream before them, with great, heaping plates of cake.
“Can you give me a moment’s attention, girls and boys?” asked their host. “I want to speak about to-morrow.”
“The ‘great and glorious,’” murmured Heavy.
“We’ve all promised to be good, sir,” said Tom. “No pistols, or explosives, on the place.”
“Only the cannon,” interposed Bobbins. “You’re going to let us salute withthat; eh, Pa?”
“I’m not sure that I shall,” returned his father, “if you do not give me your attention, and keep silent. We are determined to have a safe and sane Fourth on Sunrise Farm. But at night we will set off a splendid lot of fireworks that I bought last week——”
“Oh, fine, Pa! I do love fireworks,” cried Madge.
“The girls are as bad as the boys, Mother,” said Mr. Steele, shaking his head. “What I wanted to say,” he added, raising his voice, “was that we ought to invite these little chaps—these brothers of Sadie Raby—to come up at night to see our show.”
“Oh, let’s have all the fresh airs, Pa!” cried Madge, eagerly. “Whata good time they’d have.”
“I—don’t—know,” said her father, soberly, looking at his wife. “I am afraid that will be too much for your mother.”
“Mr. Caslon has some fireworks for the children,” broke in Ruth, timidly. “I happen to know that. And Tom was going down to buy ten dollar’s worth more to put with what Mr. Caslon has.”
“Humph!” said Mr. Steele.
“You see, some of us thought we’d give the little folk a good time down there, and it wouldn’t bother you and Mrs. Steele, sir,” Ruth hastened to explain.
“Well, well!” exclaimed the gentleman, not very sharply after all, “if those Caslons can stand the racket, I guess mother and I can—eh, mother?”
“We need not have them in the house,” saidMrs. Steele. “We can put tables on the veranda, and give them ice cream and cake after the fireworks. Get the men to hang Chinese lanterns, and so forth.”
“Bully!” cried the younger Steeles, in chorus, and the visitors to Sunrise Farm were quite delighted, too, with this suggestion.
Of course, somebody had to go to the Caslons and explain all this, and that duty devolved upon Ruth. Naturally, permission had to be sought of the farmer and his wife before the “fresh air kids” could be carried off bodily to Sunrise Farm.
It was decided that the ten dollars, of which Tom had taken charge, should be spent for extra bunting and lanterns to decorate with, and to buy little gifts for each of the fresh airs to find next his or her plate on the evening of the Fourth.
Therefore, Tom started again for Darrowtown right after breakfast, and Ruth rode with him in the high, two-wheeled cart.
Ruth had two important errands. One was in Darrowtown. But the first stop, at Mr. Caslon’s, troubled her a little.
How would the farmer and his wife take the idea of the Steeles suddenly patronizing the fresh air children? Were the Caslons anything like Mr. Steele himself, in temperament, Ruth’s errand would not be a pleasant one, she knew.
The orphans ran out shrieking a welcome when Tom drove into the yard of the house under the hill. Where were the “terrible twins”? Had their sister really come to see them? Were Willie and Dickie coming back to the orphanage at all?
These and a dozen other questions were hurled at Ruth. Some of the bigger girls remembered Sadie Raby and asked a multitude of questions about her. So the girl of the Red Mill contented herself at first with trying to reply to all these queries.
Then Mrs. Caslon appeared from the kitchen, wiping her hands of dish-water, and the old farmer himself came from the stables. Their friendly greeting and smiling faces opened the way for Ruth’s task. She threw herself, figuratively speaking, into their arms.
“I know you are both just as kind as you can be,” said Ruth, eagerly, “and you won’t mind if I ask you to change your program a little to-day for the youngsters? They want to give them all a good time up at Sunrise Farm.”
“Good land!” exclaimed Mrs. Caslon. “Notallof them?”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Ruth, and she sketched briefly the idea of the celebration on the hill-top, including the presents she and Tom were to buy in Darrowtown for the kiddies.
“My soul and body!” exclaimed the farmer’swife. “That lady, Mis’ Steele, don’t know what she’s runnin’ into, does she, Father?”
“I reckon not,” chuckled Mr. Caslon, wagging his head.
“But you won’t mind? You’ll let us have the children?” asked Ruth, anxiously.
“Why——” Mrs. Caslon looked at the old gentleman. But he was shaking all over with inward mirth.
“Do ’em good, Mother—do ’em good,” he chuckled—and he did not mean the fresh air children, either. Ruth could see that.
“It’ll be a mortal shame,” began Mrs. Caslon, again, but once more her husband interrupted:
“Don’t you fuss about other folks, Mother,” he said, gravely. “It’ll do ’em good—mebbe—as I say. Nothin’ like tryin’ a game once by the way. And I bet twelve little tykes like these ’uns will keep that Steele man hoppin’ for a while.”
“But his poor wife——”
“Don’t you worry, Mrs. Caslon,” Ruth urged, but wishing to laugh, too. “We girls will take care of the kiddies, and Mrs. Steele sha’n’t be bothered too much.”
“Besides,” drawled Mr. Caslon, “the woman’s got a good sized family of her own—there’s six or seven of ’em, ain’t there?” he demanded of Ruth.
“Eight, sir.”
“But that don’t make a speck of difference,” the farmer’s wife interposed. “She’s always had plenty of maids and the like to look out for them. She don’t know——”
“Let her learn a little, then,” said Mr. Caslon, good naturedly enough. “It’ll do both him and her good. And it’ll give you a rest for a few hours, Mother.
“Besides,” added Mr. Caslon, with another deep chuckle, “I hear Steele has been rantin’ around about takin’ the kids to board just for the sake of spitin’ the neighbors. Now, if he thinks boardin’ a dozen young’uns like these is all fun——”
“Don’t be harsh, John,” urged Mrs. Caslon.
“I ain’t! I ain’t!” cried the farmer, laughing again. “But they’re bitin’ off a big chaw, and it tickles me to see ’em do it.”
It was arranged, therefore, that the orphans should be ready to go up to Sunrise Farm that afternoon. Then Ruth and Tom drove to Darrowtown. They had a fast horse, and got over the rough road at a very good pace.
Tom drove first around into the side street where Miss True Pettis’s little cottage was situated.
“You dear child!” was the little spinster’s greeting. “Are you having a nice time with your rich friends at Sunrise Farm? Tell me all aboutthem—and the farm. Everybody in Darrowtown is that curious!”
Tom had driven away to attend to the errands he could do alone, so Ruth could afford the time to visit a bit with her old friend. The felon was better, and that fact being assured, Ruth considered it better to satisfy Miss Pettis regarding the Sunrise Farm folk before getting to the Raby orphans.
And that was the way to get to them, too. For the story of the tempest the day before, and the appearance of Sadie Raby, the runaway, and her reunion with the twins, naturally came into the tale Ruth had to tell—a tale that was eagerly listened to and as greatly enjoyed by the Darrowtown seamstress, as one can well imagine.
“Just like a book—or a movie,” sighed Miss Pettis, shaking her head. “It’s really wonderful, Ruthie Fielding, what’s happened to you since you left us here in Darrowtown. But, I always said, this town is dead and nothing really happenshere!”
“But it’s lovely in Darrowtown,” declared Ruth. “And just to think! Those Raby children lived here once.”
“No?”
“Yes they did. Sadie was six or seven years old, I guess, when they left here. Tom Raby was her father. He was a mason’s helper——”
“Don’t you tell me another thing about ’em!” cried Miss Pettis, starting up suddenly. “Now you remind me. I remember them well. Mis’ Raby was as nice a woman as ever stepped—but weakly. And Tom Raby——
“Why, how could I forget it? And after that man from Canady came to trace ’em, too, only three years ago. Didn’t you ever hear of it, Ruth?”
“What man?” asked Ruth, quite bewildered now. “Are—are you sure it was the same family? Andwhowould want to trace them?”
“Lemme see. Listen!” commanded Miss Pettis. “You answer me about these poor children.”
And under the seamstress’s skillful questioning Ruth related every detail she knew about the Raby orphans—and Mr. Steele, in her presence, had cross-questioned Sadie exhaustively the evening before. The story lost nothing in Ruth’s telling, for she had a retentive memory.
“My goodness me, Ruthie!” ejaculated the spinster, excitedly. “It’s the same folks—sure. Why, do you know, they came from Quebec, and there’s some property they’ve fell heir to—property from their mother’s side—Oh, let me tell you! Funny you never heard us talkin’ about that Canady lawyer while you was livin’ here with me. My!”
Miss True Pettis thrilled with the joy of telling the romance. The little seamstress had been all her life entertaining people with the dry details of unimportant neighborhood happenings. It was only once in a long while that a story like that of the Rabys’ came within her ken.
“Why, do you believe me!” she said to Ruth, “that Mis’ Raby came of quite a nice family in Quebec. Not to say Tom Raby wasn’t a fine man, for he was, but he warn’t educated much and his trade didn’t bring ’em more’n a livin’. But her folks had school teachers, and doctors, and even ministers in their family—yes, indeed!
“And it seems like, so the Canady lawyer said, that a minister in the family what was an uncle of Mis’ Raby’s, left her and her children some property. It was in what he called ‘the fun’s’—that’s like stocks an’ bonds, I reckon. But them Canadians talk different from us.
“Well, I can remember that man—tall, lean man he was, with a yaller mustache. He had traced the Rabys to Darrowtown, and he sawthe minister, and Deacon Giles, and Amoskeag Lanfell, askin’ did they know where the Rabys went when they moved away from here.
“I was workin’ for Amoskeag’s wife that day, so I heard all the talk,” pursued Miss Pettis. “He said—this Canady lawyer did—that the property amounted to several thousand dollars. It was left by the minister (who had no family of his own) to his niece, Mis’ Raby, or to her children if she was dead.
“Course they asked me ifIknowed what became of the family,” said the spinster, with some pride. “It bein’ well known here in Darrowtown that I’m most as good as a parish register—and why wouldn’t I be? Everybody expects me to know all the news. But if I everdidknow where them Rabys went, I’d forgot, and I told the lawyer man so.
“But he give me his card and axed me to write to him if I ever heard anything further from ’em, or about ’em. And I certain sure would have done so,” declared Miss Pettis, “if it had ever come to my mind.”
“Have you the gentleman’s card now, Miss True?” asked Ruth, eagerly.
“I s’pect so.”
“Will you find it? I know Mr. Steele is interested in the Rabys, and he can communicate with this Canadian lawyer——”
“Now! ain’t you a bright girl?” cried the spinster. “Of course!”
She at once began to hustle about, turning things out of her bureau drawers, searching the cubby holes of an old maple “secretary” that had set in the corner of the kitchen since her father’s time, discovering things which she had mislaid for years—and forgotten—but not coming upon the card in question right away.
“Of course I’ve got it,” she declared. “I never lose anything—I never throw a scrap of anything away that might come of use——”
And still she rummaged. Tom came back with the cart and Ruth had to go shopping. “But do look, Miss Pettis,” she begged, “and we’ll stop again before we go back to the farm.”
Tom and she were some time selecting a dozen timely, funny, and attractive nicknacks for the fresh airs. But they succeeded at last, and Ruth was sure the girls would be pleased with their selections.
“So much better than spending the money for noise and a powder smell,” added Ruth.
“Humph! the kids would like the noise all right,” sniffed Tom. “I heard those little chaps begging Mr. Caslon for punk and firecrackers. That old farmer was a boy himself once, and I bet he got something for them that will smell of powder, beside the little tad of fireworks he showed me.”
“Oh! I hope they won’t any of them get burned.”
“Kind of put a damper on the ‘safe and sane Fourth’ Mr. Steele spoke about, eh?” chuckled Tom.
Miss Pettis was looking out of the window and smiling at them when they arrived back at the cottage. She held in her hand a yellowed bit of pasteboard, which she passed to the eager Ruth.
“Where do you suppose I found it, Ruthie?” she demanded.
“I couldn’t guess.”
“Why, stuck right into the corner of my lookin’-glass in my bedroom. I s’pose I have handled it every day I’ve dusted that glass for three year, an’ then couldn’t remember where it was. Ain’t that the beatenes’?”
Ruth and Tom drove off in high excitement. She had already told Master Tom all about the Raby romance—such details as he did not already know—and now they both looked at the yellowed business card before Ruth put it safely away in her pocket:
Mr. Angus MacDoroughSolicitor13, King Crescent, Quebec
Mr. Angus MacDorough
Solicitor
13, King Crescent, Quebec
“Mr. Steele will go right ahead with this, I know,” said Tom, nodding. “He’s taken a fancy to those kids——”
“Well! he ought to, to Sadie!” cried Ruth.
“Sure. And he’s a generous man, after all. Too bad he’s taken such a dislike to old Caslon.”
“Oh, dear, Tom! we ought to fix that,” sighed Ruth.
“Crickey! you’d tackle any job in the world, I believe, Ruthie, if you thought you could help folks.”
“Nonsense! But both of them—both Mr. Steele and Mr. Caslon—are such awfully nice people——”
“Well! there’s not much hope, I guess. Mr. Steele’s lawyer is trying to find a flaw in Caslon’s title. It seems that, way back, a long time ago, some of the Caslons got poor, or careless, and the farm was sold for taxes. It was never properly straightened out—on the county records, anyway—and the lawyer is trying to see if he can’t buy up the interest of whoever bought the farm in at that time—or their heirs—and so have some kind of a basis for a suit against old Caslon.”
“Goodness! that’s not very clear,” said Ruth, staring.
“No. It’s pretty muddy. But you know how some lawyers are. And Mr. Steele is willing tohire the shyster to do it. He thinks it’s all right. It’s business.”
“Yourfather wouldn’t do such a thing, Tom!” cried Ruth.
“No. I hope he wouldn’t, anyway,” said Master Tom, wagging his head. “But I couldn’t say that to Bobbins when he told me about it, could I?”
“No call to. But, oh, dear! I hope Mr. Steele won’t be successful. I do hope he won’t be.”
“Same here,” grunted Tom. “Just the same, he’s a nice man, and I like him.”
“Yes—so do I,” admitted Ruth. “But I’d like him so much more, if he wouldn’t try to get the best of an old man like Mr. Caslon.”
The Raby matter, however, was a more pleasant topic of conversation for the two friends. The big bay horse got over the ground rapidly—Tom said the creature did not know a hill when he saw one!—and it still lacked half an hour of noon when they came in sight of Caslon’s house.
The orphans were all in force in the front yard. Mr. Caslon appeared, too.
That yard was untidy for the first time since Ruth had seen it. And most of the untidiness was caused by telltale bits of red, yellow, and green paper. Even before the cart came to the gate, Ruth smelled the tang of powder smoke.
“Oh, Tom! theyhavegot firecrackers,” she exclaimed.
“So have I—a whole box full—under the front seat,” chuckled Tom. “What’s the Fourth without a weeny bit of noise? Bobbins and I are going to let them off in a big hogshead he’s found behind the stable.”
“You boys are rascals!” breathed Ruth. “Why! there are the twins!”
Sadie’s young brothers ran out to the cart. Mr. Caslon appeared with a good-sized box in his arms, too.
“Just take this—and the youngsters—aboard, will you, young fellow?” said the farmer. “Might as well have all the rockets and such up there on the hill. They’ll show off better. And the twins was down for the clean clo’es mother promised them.”
It was a two-seated cart and there was plenty of room for the two boys on the back seat. Mr. Caslon carefully placed the open box in the bottom of the cart, between the seats. The fireworks he had purchased had been taken out of their wrappings and were placed loosely in the box.
“There ye are,” said the farmer, jovially. “Hop up here, youngsters!”
He seized Willie and hoisted him into the seat. But Dickie had run around to the other side ofthe cart and clambered up like a monkey, to join his brother.
“All right, sir,” said Tom, wheeling the eager bay horse. It was nearing time for the latter’s oats, and he smelled them! “Out of the way, kids. They’ll send a wagon down for you, all right, after luncheon, I reckon.”
Just then Ruth happened to notice something smoking in Dickie’s hand.
“What have you there, child?” she demanded. “Not a nasty cigarette?”
He held out, solemnly, and as usual wordlessly, a smoking bit of punk.
“Where did you get that? Oh! drop it!” cried Ruth, fearing for the fireworks and the explosives under the front seat. She meant for Dickie to throw it out of the wagon, but the youngster took the command literally.
He dropped it. He dropped it right into the box of fireworks. Then things began to happen!
“Oh, Tom!” shrieked Ruth, and seized the boy’s arm. The bay horse was just plunging ahead, eager to be off for the stable and his manger. The high cart was whirled through the gateway as the first explosion came!
Pop,pop,pop! sputter—BANG!
It seemed as though the horse leaped more than his own length, and yanked all four wheels of the cart off the ground. There was a chorus of screams in the Caslons’ dooryard, but after that first cry, Ruth kept silent.
The rockets shot out of the box amidships with a shower of sparks. The Roman candles sprayed their varied colored balls—dimmed now by daylight—all about the cart.
Tom hung to the lines desperately, but the scared horse had taken the bit in his teeth and was galloping up the road toward Sunrise Farm, quite out of hand.
After that first grab at Tom’s arm, Ruth did not interfere with him. She turned about, knelt on the seat-cushion, and, one after the other,swept the twins across the sputtering, shooting bunch of fireworks, and into the space between her and Tom and the dashboard.
Providentially the shooting rockets headed into the air, and to the rear. As the big horse dashed up the hill, swinging the light vehicle from side to side behind him, there was left behind a trail of smoke and fire that (had it been night-time) would have been a brilliant spectacle.
Mr. Caslon and the orphans started after the amazing thing tearing up the road—but to no purpose. Nothing could be done to stop the explosion now. The sparks flew all about. Although Mr. Caslon had bought a wealth of small rockets, candles, mines, flower-pots, and the like, never had so many pieces been discharged in so short a time!
It was sputter, sputter, bang, bang, the cart vomiting flame and smoke, while the horse became a perfectly frenzied creature, urged on by the noise behind him. Tom could only cling to the reins, Ruth clung to the twins, and all by good providence were saved from an overturn.
All the time—and, of course, the half-mile or more from Caslons’ to the entrance to the Steele estate, was covered in a very few moments—all the time Ruth was praying that the fire-crackers Tom had bought and hidden under the front seat would not be ignited.
The reports of the rockets, and the like, became desultory. Some set pieces and triangles went off with the hissing of snakes. Was the explosion over?
So it seemed, and the maddened horse turned in at the gateway. The cart went in on two wheels, but it did not overturn.
The race had begun to tell on the bay. He was covered with foam and his pace was slackening. Perhaps the peril was over—Ruth drew a long breath for the first time since the horse had made its initial jump.
And then—with startling suddenness—there was a sputter and bang! Off went the firecrackers, package after package. A spark had burned through the paper wrapper and soon there was such a popping under that front seat as shamed the former explosions!
Had the horse been able to run any faster, undoubtedly he would have done so; but as the cart went tearing up the drive toward the front of the big house, the display of fireworks, etc., behind the front seat, and the display of alarm on the part of the four on the seat, advertised to all beholders that the occasion was not, to say the least, a common one.
The cart itself was scorched and was afire in places, the sputtering of the fire-crackers continued while the horse tore up the hill. Tom hadbought a generous supply and it took some time for them all to explode.
Fortunately the front drop of the seat was a solid panel of deal, or Ruth’s skirt might have caught on fire—or perhaps the legs of the twins would have been burned.
As for the two little fellows, they never even squealed! Their eyes shone, they had lost their caps in the back of the cart, their short curls blew out straight in the wind, and their cheeks glowed. When the runaway appeared over the crest of the hill and the crowd at Sunrise Farm beheld them, it was evident that Willie and Dickie were enjoying themselves to the full!
Poor Tom, on whose young shoulders the responsibility of the whole affair rested, was braced back, with his feet against the footboard, the lines wrapped around his wrists, and holding the maddened horse in to the best of his ability.
Bobbins on one side, and Ralph Tingley on the other, ran into the roadway and caught the runaway by the bridle. The bay was, perhaps, quite willing to halt by this time. Mr. Steele ran out, and his first exclamation was:
“My goodness, Tom Cameron! you’ve finished that horse!”
“I hope not, sir,” panted Tom, rather pale. “But I thought he’d finish us before he got through.”
By this time the explosions had ceased. Everything of an explosive nature—saving the twins themselves—in the cart seemed to have gone off. And now Willie ejaculated:
“Gee! I never rode so fast before. Wasn’t it great, Dickie?”
“Yep,” agreed Master Dickie, with rather more emphasis than usual.
Sister Sadie appeared from the rear premises, vastly excited, too, but when she lifted the twins down and found not a scratch upon them, she turned to Ruth with a delighted face.
“You took care of them just like you loved ’em, Miss,” she whispered, as Ruth tumbled out of the cart, too, into her arms. “Oh, dear! don’t you dare get sick—you ain’t hurt, are you?”
“No, no!” exclaimed Ruth, having hard work to crowd back the tears. “But I’m almost scared to death. That—that young one!” and she grabbed at Dickie. “What did you drop that punk into the fireworks for?”
“Huh?” questioned the imperturbable Dickie.
“Why didn’t you throw that lighted punk away?” and Ruth was tempted to shake the little rascal.
But instantly the voluble Willie shouldered his way to the front. “Gee, Miss! he thought you wanted him to drop it right there. You said so. An’—an’—— Well, he didn’t know the thingsin the box would go off of themselves. Did you Dickie?”
“Nope,” responded his twin.
“Do forgive ’em, Miss Ruth,” whispered Sadie Raby. “I wouldn’t want Mr. Steele to get after ’em. You know—he can be sumpin’ fierce!”
“Well,” sighed Ruth Fielding, “they’re the ‘terrible twins’ right enough. Oh, Tom!” she added, as young Cameron came to her to shake hands.
“You’re getting better and better,” said Tom, grinning. “I’d rather be in a wreck with you, Ruthie—of almost any kind—than with anybody else I know. Those kids don’t even know what you saved them from, when you dragged ’em over the back of that seat.”
“Sh!” she begged, softly.
“And it’s a wonder we weren’t all blown to glory!”
“It was a mercy we were not seriously hurt,” agreed Ruth.
But then there was too much bustle and general talk for them to discuss the incident quietly. The horse was led away to the stable and there attended to. Fortunately he was not really injured, but the cart would have to go to the painter’s.
“A fine beginning for this celebration we have on hand,” declared Mr. Steele, looking ruefullyat his wife. “If all that can happen with only two of those fresh air kids, as Bob calls them, on hand, what do you suppose will happen to-night when we have a dozen at Sunrise Farm?”
“Mercy!” gasped the lady. “I am trembling in my shoes—I am, indeed. But we have agreed to do it, Father, and we must carry it through.”
The girls who had come to Sunrise Farm to visit at Madge Steele’s invitation, felt no little responsibility when it came to the entertainment for the fresh air orphans. As The Fox said, with her usual decision:
“Now that we’ve put Madge and her folks into this business, we’ll just have to back up their play, and make sure that the fresh airs don’t tear the place down. And that Sadie will have to keep an eye on the ‘terrible twins.’ Is that right?”
“I’ve spoken to poor Sadie,” said Ruth, with a sigh. “I am afraid that Mrs. Steele is very much worried over what may occur to-night, while the children are here. We’ll have to be on the watch all the time.”
“I should say!” exclaimed Heavy Stone. “Let’s suggest to Mr. Steele that he rope off a place out front where he is going to have the fireworks. Some of those little rascals will want to help celebrate, the way Willie and Dickie did,” and the plump girl giggled ecstatically.
“’Twas no laughing matter, Jennie,” complained Ruth, shaking her head.
“Well, that’s all right,” Lluella broke in. “If Tom hadn’t bought the fire-crackers—and that was right against Mr. Steele’s advice——”
“Oh, here now!” interrupted Helen, loyal to her twin. “Tom wasn’t any more to blame than Bobbins. They were just bought for a joke.”
“It was a joke all right,” Belle said, laughing. “Who’s going to pay for the damage to the cart?”
“Now, let’s not get to bickering,” urged Ruth. “What’s done, is done. We must plan now to make the celebration this afternoon and evening as easy for Mrs. Steele as possible.”
This conversation went on after luncheon, while Bob and Tom had driven down the hill with a big wagon to bring up the ten remaining orphans from Mr. Caslon’s place.
The gaily decorated wagon came in sight just about this time. Fortunately the decorations Tom and Ruth had purchased that forenoon in Darrowtown had not been destroyed when the fireworks went off in the cart.
The girls from Briarwood Hall welcomed the fresh airs cheerfully and took entire charge of the six little girls. The little boys did not wish to play “girls’ games” on the lawn, and thereforeBob and his chums agreed to keep an eye on the youngsters, including the “terrible twins.”
Sadie had been drafted to assist Madge and her mother, and some of the maids, in preparing for the evening collation. Therefore the visitors were divided for the time into two bands.
The girls from the orphanage were quiet enough and well behaved when separated from their boy friends. Indeed, on the lawn and under the big tent Mr. Steele had had erected, the celebration of a “safe and sane” Fourth went on in a most commendable way.
It was a very hot afternoon, and after indulging in a ball game in the field behind the stables, Bobbins, in a thoughtless moment, suggested a swim. Half a mile away there was a pond in a hollow. The boys had been there almost every day for a dip, and Bob’s suggestion was hailed—even by the usually thoughtful Tom Cameron—with satisfaction.
“What about the kids?” demanded Ralph Tingley.
“Let them come along,” said Bobbins.
“Sure,” urged Busy Izzy. “What harm can come to them? We’ll keep our eyes on them.”
The twins and their small chums from the orphanage were eager to go to the pond, too, and so expressed themselves. The half-mile walk through the hot sun did not make them quail.They were proud to be allowed to accompany the bigger boys to the swimming hole.
The little fellows raced along in their bare feet behind the bigger boys and were pleased enough, until they reached the pond and learned that they would only be allowed to go in wading, while the others slipped into their bathing trunks and “went in all over.”
“No! you can’t go in,” declared Bobbins, who put his foot down with decision, having his own small brothers in mind. (They had been left behind, by the way, to be dressed for the evening.)
“Say! the water won’t wet us no more’n it does you—will it, Dickie?” demanded the talkative twin.
“Nope,” agreed his brother.
“Now, you kids keep your clothes on,” said Bob, threateningly. “And don’t wade more than to your knees. If you get your overalls wet, you’ll hear about it. You know Mrs. Caslon fixed you all up for the afternoon and told you to keep clean.”
The smaller chaps were unhappy. That was plain. They paddled their dusty feet in the water for a while, but the sight of the older lads diving and swimming and having such a good time in the pond was a continual temptation. The active minds of the terrible twins were soon at work.Willie began to whisper to Dickie, and the latter nodded his head solemnly.
“Say!” blurted out Willie, finally, as Bob and Tom were racing past them in a boisterous game of “tag.” “We wanter go back. This ain’t no fun—is it, Dickie?”
“Nope,” said his twin.
“Go on back, if you want to. You know the path,” said Bobbins, breathlessly.
“We’re goin’, too,” said one of the other fresh airs.
“We’d rather play with the girls than stay here. Hadn’t we, Dickie?” proposed Willie Raby.
“Yep,” agreed Master Dickie, with due solemnity.
“Go on!” cried Bob. “And see you go straight back to the house. My!” he added to Tom, “but those kids are a nuisance.”
“Think we ought to let them go alone?” queried Tom, with some faint doubt on the subject. “You reckon they’ll be all right, Bobbins?”
“Great Scott! they sure know the way to the house,” said Bob. “It’s a straight path.”
But, as it happened, the twins had no idea of going straight to the house. The pond was fed by a stream that ran in from the east. The little fellows had seen this, and Willie’s idea was to circle around through the woods and find thatstream. There they could go in bathing like the bigger boys, “and nobody would ever know.”
“Our heads will be wet,” objected one of the orphans.
“Gee!” said Willie Raby, “don’t let’s wet our heads. We ain’t got to—have we?”
“Nope,” said his brother, promptly.
There was some doubt, still, in the minds of the other boys.
“What you goin’ to say to those folks up to the big house?” demanded one of the fresh airs.
“Ain’t goin’ to say nothin’,” declared the bold Willie. “Cause why? they ain’t goin’ to know—‘nless you fellers snitch.”
“Aw, who’s goin’ to snitch?” cried the objector, angered at once by the accusation of the worst crime in all the category of boyhood. “We ain’t no tattle-tales—are we, Jim?”
“Naw. We’re as safe to hold our tongues as you an’ yer brother are, Willie Raby—so now!”
“Sure we are!” agreed the other orphans.
“Then come along,” urged the talkative twin. “Nobody’s got to know.”
“Suppose yer sister finds it out?” sneered one.
“Aw—well—she jes’ ain’t go’n’ ter,” cried Willie, exasperated. “An’ what if she does? She runned away herself—didn’t she?”
The spirit of restlessness was strong in the Raby nature, it was evident. Willie was a bornleader. The others trailed after him when he left the pathway that led directly back to Sunrise Farm, and pushed into the thicker wood in the direction he believed the stream lay.
The juvenile leader of the party did not know (how should he?) that just above the pond the stream which fed it made a sharp turn. Its waters came out of a deep gorge, lying in an entirely different direction from that toward which the “terrible twins” and their chums were aiming.
The little fellows plodded on for a long time, and the sun dropped suddenly behind the hills to the westward, and there they were—quite surprisingly to themselves—in a strange and fast-darkening forest.
The girl visitors from Briarwood Hall did all they could to help the mistress of Sunrise Farm and Madge prepare for the evening festivities, and not alone in employing the attention of the six little girls from the orphanage.
There were the decorations to arrange, and the paper lanterns to hang, and the long tables on the porch to prepare for the supper. Twelve extra, hungry little mouths to feed was, of itself, a fact of no small importance.
When the wagon had come up from Caslon’s with the orphans, Mrs. Steele had thought it rather a liberty on the part of the farmer’s wife because she had, with the children, sent a great hamper of cakes, which she (Mrs. Caslon) herself had baked the day before.
But the cakes were so good, and already the children were so hungry, that the worried mistress of the big farm was thankful that these supplies were in her pantry.
“When the boys come back from the pond, I expect they will be ravenous, too,” sighed thegood lady. “Doyou think, Madge, that there will be enough ham and tongue sandwiches for supper? I am sure of the cream and cake—thanks to that good old woman (though I hope your father won’t hear me say it). But that is to be served after the fireworks. They will want something hearty at suppertime—and goodness me, Madge! It is five o’clock now. Those boys should be back from their swim.”
As for Mr. Steele, he was immensely satisfied with the celebration of the day so far. To tell the truth, he had very little to do with the work of getting ready for the orphans’ entertainment. Aside from the explosion of the fireworks in the cart, the occasion had been a perfectly “safe and sane” celebration of a holiday that he usually looked forward to with no little dread.
Before anybody really began to worry over their delay, the boys came into view. They had had a refreshing swim and announced the state of their appetites the moment they joined the girls at the big tent.
“Yes, yes,” said Madge, “we know all about that, Bobbie dear. But his little tootie-wootsums must wait till hims gets his bib put on, an’ let sister see if his hannies is nice and clean. Can’t sit down to eat if hims a dirty boy,” and she rumpled her big brother’s hair, while he looked foolish enough over her “baby talk.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Madge,” said Helen, briskly. “Of course they are hungry—— But where’s the rest of them?”
“The rest of what?” demanded Busy Izzy. “I guess we’re all here.”
“Say! youmustbe hungry,” chuckled Heavy. “Did you eat the kids?”
“What kids?” snapped Tom, in sudden alarm.
“The fresh airs, of course. The ‘terrible twins’ and their mates. My goodness!” cried Ann Hicks, “you didn’t forget and leave them down there at the pond, did you?”
The boys looked at each other for a moment. “What’s the joke?” Bobbins finally drawled.
“It’s no joke,” Ruth said, quickly. “You don’t mean to say that you forgot those little boys?”
“Now, stop that, Ruth Fielding!” cried Isadore Phelps, very red in the face. “A joke’s a joke; but don’t push it too far. You know very well those kids came back up here more’n an hour ago.”
“They didn’t do any such thing,” cried Sadie, having heard the discussion, and now running out to the tent. “They haven’t been near the house since you big boys took them to the pond. Now, say! what d’ye know about it?”
“They’re playing a trick on us,” declared Tom, gloomily.
“Let’s hunt out in the stables, and around,” suggested Ralph Tingley, feebly.
“Maybe they went back to Caslon’s,” Isadore said, hopefully.
“We’ll find out about that pretty quick,” said Madge. “I’ll tell father and he’ll send somebody down to see if they went there.”
“Come on, boys!” exclaimed Tom, starting for the rear of the house. “Those little scamps are fooling us.”
“Suppose theyhavewandered away into the woods?” breathed Ruth to Helen. “Whatever shall we do?”
Sadie could not wait. She was unable to remain idle, when it was possible that the twin brothers she had so lately rejoined, were in danger. She flashed after the boys and hunted the stables, too.
Nobody there had seen the “fresh airs” since they had followed the bigger boys to the pond.
“And ye sure didn’t leave ’em down there?” demanded Sadie Raby of Tom.
“Goodness me! No!” exclaimed Tom. “They couldn’t go in swimming as we did, and so they got mad and wouldn’t stay. But they started right up this way, and we thought they were all right.”
“They might have slanted off and gone across the fields to Caslon’s,” said Bobbins, doubtfully.
“That would have taken them into the back pasture where Caslon keeps his Angoras—wouldn’t it?” demanded the much-worried young man.
“Well, you can go look for ’em with the goats,” snapped Sadie, starting off. “But me for that Caslon place. If they didn’t go there, then they are in the woods somewhere.”
She started down the hill, fleet-footed as a dog. Before Mr. Steele had stopped sputtering over the catastrophe, and bethought him to start somebody for the Caslon premises to make inquiries, Sadie came in view again, with the old, gray-mustached farmer in tow.
The serious look on Mr. Caslon’s face was enough for all those waiting at Sunrise Farm to realize that the absent children were actually lost. Tom and Bobbins had come up from the goat pasture without having seen, or heard, the six little fellows.
“I forgot to tell ye,” said Caslon, seriously, “that ye had to keep one eye at least on them ‘terrible twins’ all the time. We locked ’em into their bedroom at night. No knowin’ when or where they’re likely to break out. But I reckoned this here sister of theirs would keep ’em close to her——”
“Well!” snapped Sadie Raby, eyeing Tom and Bobbins with much disfavor, “I thought thata bunch of big fellers like them could look after half a dozen little mites.”
Mr. Steele had come forward slowly; the fact that the six orphan boys really seemed to be lost, was an occasion to break down evenhisbarrier of dislike for the neighbor. Besides, Mr. Caslon ignored any difference there might be between them in a most generous manner.
“I blame myself, Neighbor Steele—I sure do,” Mr. Caslon said, before the owner of Sunrise Farm could speak. “I’d ought to warned you about them twins. They got bit by the runaway bug bad—that’s right.”
“Humph! a family trait—is it?” demanded Mr. Steele, rather grimly eyeing the sister of the runaways.
“I couldn’t say about that,” chuckled the farmer. “But Willie and Dickie started off twice from our place, trailin’ most of the other kids with ’em. But I caught ’em in time. Now, their sister tells me, they’ve got at least an hour and a half’s start.”
“It is getting dark—or it will soon be,” said Mr. Steele, nervously. “If they are not found before night, I shall be greatly disturbed. I feel as though I were responsible. My oldest boy, here——”
“Now, it ain’t nobody’s fault, like enough,” interrupted Mr. Caslon, cheerfully, and seeingBobbins’s woebegone face. “We’ll start right out and hunt for them.”
“But if it grows dark——”
“Let me have what men you can spare, and all the lanterns around the place,” said Caslon, briskly, taking charge of the matter on the instant. “These bigger boys can help.”
“I—I can go with you, sir,” began Mr. Steele, but the farmer waved him back.
“No. You ain’t used to the woods—nor to trampin’—like I be. And it won’t hurt your boys. You leave it to us—we’ll find ’em.”
Mrs. Steele had retired to the tent on the lawn in tears, and most of the girls were gathered about her. Sadie Raby clung to Farmer Caslon’s side, and nobody tried to call her back.
Since returning from Darrowtown that morning, Ruth Fielding had divulged to Mr. Steele all she had discovered through Miss True Pettis regarding the Raby family, and about the Canadian lawyer who had once searched for Mrs. Raby and her children.
The gentleman had expressed deep interest in the matter, and while the fresh air children were being entertained during the afternoon, Mr. Steele had already set in motion an effort to learn the whereabouts of Mr. Angus MacDorough and to discover just what the property wasthat had been willed to the mother of the Raby orphans.
Sadie had been told nothing about this wonderful discovery as yet. Indeed, there had been no time. Sadie had been busy, with Mrs. Steele and the others, in preparing for that “safe and sane” celebration with which Mr. Steele had desired to entertain the “terrible twins” and their little companions at Sunrise Farm.
Now this sudden catastrophe had occurred. The loss of the six little boys was no small trouble. It threatened to be a tragedy.
Down there beyond the pond the mountainside was heavily timbered, and there were many dangerous ravines and sudden precipices over which a careless foot might stray.
Dusk was coming on. In the wood it would already be dark. And if the frightened children went plunging about, seeking, in terror, to escape, they might at any moment be cast into some pit where the searchers would possibly never find them.
Mr. Steele felt his responsibility gravely. He was, at best, a nervous man, and this happening assumed the very gravest outlines in his anxious mind.
“Never ought to have let them out of my own sight,” he sputtered, having Ruth for a confidant.“I might have known something extraordinary would happen. It was a crazy thing to have all those children up here, anyway.”
“Oh, dear, Mr. Steele!” cried Ruth, much worried, “thatis partly my fault. I was one of those who suggested it.”
“Nonsense! nonsense, child! Nobody blames you,” returned the gentleman. “I should have put my foot down and said ‘No.’ Nobody influenced me at all. Why—why, Iwantedto give the poor little kiddies a nice time. And now—see what has come of it?”
“Oh, it may be that they will be found almost at once,” cried Ruth, hopefully. “I am sure Mr. Caslon will do what he can——”
“Caslon’s an eminently practical man—yes, indeed,” admitted Mr. Steele, and not grudgingly. “If anybody can find them, he will, I have no doubt.”
And this commendation of the neighbor whom he so disliked struck Ruth completely silent for the time being.