"Is it a dog?" asked Bobby, almost in a whisper, as for a third time the howl sounded.
"A dog barks, doesn"t it? That doesn"t sound like a dog, Bobby," said Betty. "I heard one out West. I do believe it is one!"
"One what?" cried Bobby, almost shaking her in alarm and impatience.
"A wolf. It sounds just like a wolf. Oh, Bobby! suppose there should be a pack of wolves in these hills and that they should attack this train?"
"Wolves!" shrieked Bobby. "_Wolves_! Then me for in-doors! I am not going to stay here and be eaten up by wolves."
As she turned to dive into the tunnel there was a sharper and more eager yelp, and a s.h.a.ggy animal came to the edge of the bluff to their left and, without stopping an instant, plunged down through the drifts toward the two girls where they stood on the hard-packed snow at the mouth of the tunnel.
"It is a wolf!" wailed Bobby, and immediately disappeared, head first, down the hole in the snow drift.
CHAPTER XIV
THE MOUNTAIN HUT
If Bobby had not gone first and had not stuck half way down the hole with her feet kicking madly just at the mouth of the tunnel, without doubt Betty Gordon would have been driven by her own fears back into the Pullman coach.
That s.h.a.ggy beast diving from the top of the embankment, plunging, yelping and whining, through the softer drifts of snow, frightened Betty just as much as it had Bobby Littell. The latter had got away with a flying start, however, and her writhing body plugged the only means of escape. So Betty really had to face the approaching terror.
"Oh! Oh!" cried Betty, turning from the approaching beast in despair.
"Hurry! Hurry, Bobby Littell! Do you want me to be eaten up?"
But Bobby had somehow cramped herself in the winding pa.s.sage through the snow, and her voice was m.u.f.fled as she too cried for help.
However, Bobby"s demands for a.s.sistance were much more likely to bring it than the cries of the girl outside. The porter heard Bobby first, and when he opened the door of the coach several men who were near heard the girl.
"Help! Help! A wolf is eating her!" shrieked the frightened Bobby.
"Ma soul an" body! He must be a-chawin" her legs off!" cried the darkey and he seized Bobby by the wrists, threw himself backward, and the girl came out of the tunnel like an aggravating cork out of a bottle.
"What"s this?" demanded Mr. Richard Gordon, who happened to be coming back to the end of the train to look for his niece and her chum.
"Oh, Mr. Gordon!" sputtered Bobby, scrambling up, "it"s got her! A wolf!
It"s got Betty!"
"A wolf?" repeated Uncle d.i.c.k. "I didn"t know there were any wolves left in this part of the country."
Major Pater was with him. Mr. Gordon grabbed the latter"s walking stick and went up that tunnel a good deal quicker than Bobby had come down it.
And when he got to the surface he found his niece, laughing and crying at once, and almost smothered by the joyful embraces of a big Newfoundland dog!
"A wolf indeed!" cried Mr. Gordon, but beating off the animal good-naturedly. "He must be a friend of yours, Betty."
"Oh, dear me, he did scare us so!" Betty rejoined, getting up out of the drift, trying to brush off her coat, and petting the exuberant dog at the same time. "But it is a dear--and its master must be somewhere about, don"t you think, Uncle d.i.c.k?"
Its master was, for the next moment he appeared at the top of the bank down which the "wolf" had wallowed. He hailed Uncle d.i.c.k and Betty with a great, jovial shout and plunged down the slope himself. He was a young man on snowshoes, and he proved to be a telegraph operator at that station three miles south.
"Wires are so clogged we can"t get messages through. But we knew that Number Forty was stalled about here. Going to be a job to dig her out.
I"ve got a message for the conductor," he said when he reached the top of the drift that was heaped over the train.
"Wasn"t it a hard task to get here?" Mr. Gordon asked.
"Not so bad. My folks live right over the ridge there, about half a mile away. I just came from the house with the dog. Down, Nero! Behave yourself!"
"We are going to be hungry here pretty soon," suggested Mr. Gordon.
"There will be a pung come up from the station with grub enough before night. Furnished by the company. That is what I have come to see the conductor about."
"I tell you what," said Betty"s uncle, who was nothing if not quick in thinking. "My party were bound for Cliffdale."
"That"s not very far away. But I doubt if the train gets there this week."
"Bad outlook for us. We are going to Mountain Camp--Mr. Canary"s place."
"I know that place," said the telegraph operator. "There is an easy road to it from our farm through the hills. Get there quicker than you can by the way of Cliffdale. I believe my father could drive you up there to-morrow."
"In a sleigh?" cried Betty delightedly. "What fun!"
"In a pung. With four of our horses. They"d break the road all right.
Ought to start right early in the morning, though."
"Do you suppose you could get us over to your house to-night?" asked Mr.
Gordon quickly. "There are a good many of us----"
"How many in the party?" asked the young man. "My name"s Jaroth--Fred Jaroth."
Mr. Gordon handed him his card and said:
"There are four girls, four boys, and myself. Quite a party."
"That is all right, Mr. Gordon," said Fred Jaroth cheerfully. "We often put up thirty people in the summer. We"ve a great ranch of a house. And I can help you up the bank yonder and beat you a path through the woods to the main road. Nothing simpler. Your trunks will get to Cliffdale sometime and you can carry your hand baggage."
"Not many trunks, thank goodness," replied Mr. Gordon. "What do you think, Betty? Does it sound good?"
"Heavenly!" declared his niece.
Just then a brakeman came up through the tunnel to find out if the wolf had eaten both the gentleman and his niece, and the telegraph operator went down, feet first, to find the conductor and deliver his message.
"Then the idea of going on to Mountain Camp by sledge suits you, does it, young lady?" asked Mr. Gordon of Betty.
"They will all be delighted. You know they will, Uncle. What sport!"
The suggestion of the telegraph operator did seem quite inspired. Mr.