CHAPTER XIXA FIGHT
Russ sprang to his feet, knocking aside the pieces of his mill in doing so, and rushed around the bush to see what had happened to Laddie. It was just as the smaller boy had said—he had fallen in the deepest part of the water back of the dam.
But, after all, it was not very deep, for the brook was a small one. The water would not have been over Laddie’s head if he stood upright. But the trouble was that Laddie had slipped as he was about to lift a heavy stone on top of the dam, and had gone down sideways.
“I’m coming! I’m coming!” Russ shouted, as he saw Laddie floundering and struggling in the water.
“I—I guess—blub—blub—glub-ub!” was what Laddie answered.
He started to say that he guessed he could get out by himself, when his foot slipped on some mud at the bottom of the brook and his face went under water.
“Oh, Laddie!” cried Russ in alarm.
But he need not have been worried, for Laddie managed to get up on his feet again, and by this time Russ was beside him, holding out his hands to his small brother to help him to shore.
“Are you hurt?” Russ asked, as Laddie, gasping for breath and with water dripping from every part of him, stood on the bank of the brook.
“No, I—I’m not exactlyhurt,” Laddie answered. Then he smiled and said: “But I’m awfulwet!”
“I should say you were! And muddy, too!” chuckled Russ. “It’s a good thing you had your old clothes on. I guess mother won’t scold much. She expects us to fall in once or twice. I heard her tell Farmer Joel that. How did it happen, Laddie?”
“Oh, I guess that stone was too heavy for me. I almost had it where I wanted it and it began to slip away from me. I made agrab for it and I slipped and I went down—and in!”
“Yes, you went in all right,” laughed Russ. “Well, come on up to the house and get on dry things.”
“No,” objected Laddie.
“Why not?” asked his brother. “Are you afraid mother will scold?”
“No, I guess not. But what’s the use of getting dry clothes on when maybe I’ll get all wet again fixing the dam? As long as I’m wet I might as well finish the dam, and then we can work the water wheel.”
“Well, maybe that is the best way,” agreed Russ. “It won’t take long to fix the dam now, and you might fall in again.”
And Laddie did. Once more, as he was lifting a stone to the top of the dam, he slipped and fell in, but this time he only laughed and kept right on working. And when the dam was finally built higher, so that more water poured over to turn the wheel, Laddie went to the house and put on dry clothes.
His mother, who had come back from the woods, did not scold him when he told her what had happened, but she made him washthe mud from his clothes and hang them out to dry, since she said it was only right that he should do this to save Norah work.
Laddie and Russ had much fun playing at the water wheel and with the new and larger mill. Rose and the other children went to look at the splashing mill wheel and thought it very fine indeed.
“If I see that boy sneaking around here, and if he throws stones at your mill, shall I drive him off?” asked Mun Bun.
“What boy?” Russ wanted to know.
“That peddler boy who took Rose’s strawberry shortcake,” Mun Bun replied.
“Why, have you seen him again?” asked Mrs. Bunker, in surprise.
“Yes, I saw him going along the road yesterday,” Mun Bun said. “But he didn’t come in and try to sell any shoe laces.”
“He’d better not come around here again!” declared Russ, with flashing eyes as he clenched his fists. “If he comes I—I’ll hit him!”
“You mustn’t fight, Russ,” his mother said. “But I hardly believe it is the same boy. Hewouldn’t stay around here after being so bold as to take Rose’s shortcake the way he did. It must have been some other peddler, Mun Bun.”
“No, it was the same one,” insisted the little fellow, and later they found out that he was right.
Two days after this a little girl who lived down the road from Farmer Joel’s house invited Rose, Violet, and Margy to come to a party.
“It’s funny she didn’t invite us,” said Russ.
“She isn’t going to have any boys this time,” Rose explained. “But maybe she will next time, and then you can go.”
“Maybe next time we won’t want to!” answered Russ. “Anyhow, we’re going fishing now. Come on, Laddie!”
“All right,” agreed the other. “Fishing is more fun, anyhow, than parties.”
“Can I come fishing?” asked Mun Bun.
As Russ and Laddie promised to look after him, Mun Bun’s mother allowed the little fellow to go with the other two boys. There was a small stream, larger than the brook, about half a mile away across Farmer Joel’sfields, and toward that place Russ, Laddie, and Mun Bun went in the afternoon.
“Now be careful, Russ, that your brothers don’t fall in and don’t let them get fish hooks in their hands,” warned Mr. Bunker, for, to his delight, Mun Bun was allowed to fish with a real hook and not with a bent pin, with which he never had any luck. This was to be a real fishing party.
“I’ll take care of them,” promised Russ.
Away went the boys over the fields toward the little river, Russ merrily whistling. On a shady, grassy bank, under a big buttonwood tree, the boys sat down and cast their baited hooks into the deep water of an eddy, where, in the quiet pool, there were said to be large fish.
Presently the cork on the line attached to Russ’s pole began to bob up and down. Then it went under water.
“You have a bite, Russ!” excitedly called Laddie.
“I know I have! Keep still or you’ll scare it away!”
Russ waited a moment longer. The cork went away under.
“Now I have him!” cried Russ.
He pulled up his line. On the hook was a good-sized fish which Russ landed back of him on the grass.
“Oh, I wish I could get one!” sighed Laddie enviously.
“Look at my cork! Look!” suddenly cried Mun Bun.
“He’s got a bite, too!” cried Laddie. “Pull in, Mun Bun! Pull in! I’ll help you!”
Laddie pulled out the little fellow’s line, and, surely enough, Mun Bun had caught a fish, not as large as the one Russ had landed, but still Mun Bun was much delighted.
“I wonder if I’ll get one?” sighed Laddie.
He did a little later. Then Russ caught a second one, and after a while Laddie said he would go farther downstream to another “hole” he knew of.
“The fish are biting good to-day,” Russ said, as he baited his hook and threw it in again.
A little later a shadow fell on the grass behind Russ and Mun Bun. Russ turned around and saw—that ugly peddler boy who had taken the shortcake Rose had baked!
“Huh!” sneered the peddler, as he walkedup with a pole in his hands. “What right you fellows got to fish here?”
“This is Farmer Joel’s land, and we’re staying at his house,” said Russ. “Course we have a right to fish here!”
“You have not!” cried the peddler. “And you’d better get away before I make you. I’ll punch you—that’s what I’ll do!”
Russ leaped to his feet and started toward the peddler lad, who was larger than Russ.
“Oh! Oh!” cried Mun Bun.
Then suddenly the peddler drew back his fist and struck Russ, knocking him down.