Ruth was not so sure of that. They came to a break in the flooring. Once there had been steps here leading down into the cellar of the mill, but the steps had rotted away.
"Amy!" called Ruth again. She knelt and held the lantern as far down the well as she could reach. The sound of sobbing had ceased.
"Amy, _dear_!" cried Ruth. "It"s Ruth and Ann, And Curly is with us. Do answer if you hear me!"
There was a murmur from below. Ann cried out in alarm, but Curly exclaimed: "I believe that"s Amy, Ruth! She must be hurt--the silly thing.
She"s tumbled down this old well."
"How will we get to her?" cried Ruth. "Amy! how did you get down there?
Are you hurt, Amy?"
"Go away!" said a faint voice from below.
"Old Scratch! Isn"t that just like her?" groaned Curly. "She was hiding from us."
"Here," said Ruth, drawing up the lantern and setting it on the floor. "It can"t be very deep. I"m going to drop down there, Curly, and then you pa.s.s down the lantern to me."
"You"ll break your neck, Ruth!" cried Ann.
"No. I"m not going to risk my neck at all," Ruth calmly affirmed.
She set the lantern on the broken floor and swung herself down into the black hole. She hung by her hands and her feet did not touch the bottom.
Suddenly she felt a qualm of terror. Perhaps the cellar was a good deal deeper than she had supposed!
She could not raise herself up again, and she almost feared to drop. "Let down the light, Curly!" she whispered.
CHAPTER XXII
DISASTER THREATENS
Before Curly could comply with Ruth"s whispered request, her fingers slipped on the edge of the flooring. "Oh!" she cried out, and--dropped as much as three inches!
"Goodness me, Ruth!" gasped Ann Hicks. "Are you killed?"
"No--o. But I might as well have been as to be scared to death," declared the girl of the Red Mill. "I never thought the cellar was so shallow."
There was a rustling near by. Ruth thought of rats and almost screamed aloud. "Give me the lantern--quick!" she called up to Curly Smith.
"Here you are," said that youth. "And if Amy is down there she ought to be ashamed of herself--making us so much trouble."
Amy was there, as Ruth saw almost immediately when she could throw the radiance of the lantern about her. But Ruth did not feel like scolding the younger girl.
Amy had crept away into a corner. Her movements made the rustling Ruth had heard. She hid her face against her arm and sobbed with abandonment.
Her dress was torn and muddy, her shoes showed that she had waded in mire.
She had lost her hat and her flaxen hair was a tangle of briers and green burrs.
"My _dear_!" cried Ruth, kneeling down beside her. "What does it mean? Why did you come here? Oh, you"re sick!"
A single glance at the flushed face and neck of the smaller girl, and a tentative touch upon her wrist, a.s.sured Ruth of that last fact. Amy seemed burning up with fever. Ruth had never seen a case of scarlet fever, but she feared that might be Amy"s trouble.
"How long have you been here?" she asked Amy.
"Si--since--since it got dark," choked the girl.
"Is your throat sore?" asked Ruth, anxiously.
"Yes, it is; aw--awful sore."
"And you"re feverish," said Ruth.
"I--I"m aw--all shivery, too," wept Amy Gregg, quite given up to misery now.
Ruth was confident that the smaller girl had developed the fever that she feared. Chill, fever, sore throat, and all, made the diagnosis seem quite reasonable.
"How did you get into this cellar?" she asked Amy.
"There"s a hole in the underpinning over yonder," said the culprit.
"Come on, then; we"ll get out that way. Can you walk?"
"Oh--oh--yes," choked Amy.
She proved this by immediately starting out of the cellar. Ruth lit the way with the lantern.
"Hi!" shouted Curly Smith, "where are you going with that light?"
"Come back to the door," commanded Ruth"s m.u.f.fled voice in the cellar.
"You can find your way all right."
"What do you know about that?" demanded Ann. "Leaves us in the lurch for that miserable child, who ought to be walloped."
"Oh, Ann, don"t say that!" cried Ruth, as she and the sick girl appeared at the mill door. "No! don"t come near us. I"ll carry the lantern myself and lead Amy. She"s not feeling well, but she can walk. We must get her to Mrs. Smith"s just as soon as possible and call a doctor."
"What"s the matter with her?" demanded Curly, curiously.
"She feels bad. That"s enough," said Ruth, shortly. "Come on, Amy."
For once Amy Gregg was glad to accept Ruth Fielding"s help. She had no idea what Ruth thought was the matter with her, and she stumbled on beside the older girl, sleepy and ill, given up to utter misery. Curly and Ann began to be suspicious when Ruth forbade them to approach Amy and herself.
"Old Scratch!" whispered the boy to the Western girl. "I bet Amy"s got small-pox or something. Ruth Fielding will catch it, too."
"Hush!" exclaimed Ann, fiercely. "It"s not as bad as that."
It was a long walk to Mrs. Sadoc Smith"s. At the last, Ruth almost carried Amy, who was not a particularly small girl. Curly grabbed the lantern and insisted upon walking close to them.