In a moment the gun spoke--one long tongue of flame, followed by the other, flashed into the night. There was a yowl, a struggle on the gra.s.s outside, and then----
"You"re something of a shot, you be, young feller!" boomed out Jabez Potter"s rough voice. "I was some mistaken in you. Ah! it hurt ye, eh?"
and he proceeded to lift the suffering Jerry back into bed as tenderly as he would have handled Ruth herself.
They did not go out to see the dead panther until daybreak. Then they learned that the pair of lions had already been caught by their owners.
CHAPTER IV
ON THE WAY TO BRIARWOOD
If anything had been needed to interest Ruth Fielding deeply in the young fellow who had been injured at the scene of the railroad wreck, the occurrence that evening at the Red Mill would have provided it.
It was not enough for her to make a veritable hero of him to Helen, and Jane Ann, and Tom, when they came over from Outlook the following morning.
When the girl of the Red Mill was really interested in anything or anybody, she gave her whole-souled attention to it.
She could not be satisfied with Jerry Sheming"s brief account of his life with his half-crazed uncle on some distant place called Cliff Island, and the domestic tragedy that seemed to be the cause of the old man"s final incarceration in a madhouse.
"Tell me all about yourself--do," she pleaded with Jerry, who was to remain in bed for several days (Uncle Jabez insisted on it himself, too!), for the injured leg must be rested. "Didn"t you live anywhere else but in the woods?"
"That"s right, Miss," he said, slowly. "I got a little schooling on the mainland; but it warn"t much. Uncle Pete used to guide around parties of city men who wanted to fish and hunt. At the last I did most of the guidin". He said he could trust me, for I hated liquor as bad as him. _My_ dad was killed by it.
"Uncle Pete was a mite cracked over it, maybe. But he was good enough to me until Rufus Blent came rummagin" round. Somehow he got Uncle Pete to ragin"."
"Who is this Rufus Blent?" asked Ruth, curiously.
"He"s a real estate man. He lives at Logwood. That"s the landin" at the east end o" the lake."
"What lake?"
"Tallahaska. You"ve heard tell on"t?" he asked.
"Yes. But I was never there, of course."
"Well, Miss, Cliff Island is just the purtiest place! And Uncle Pete must have had some t.i.tle to it, for he"s lived there all his life--and he"s old. Fifty-odd year he was there, I know. He was more than a squatter.
"I reckon he was a bit of a miser. He had some money, and he didn"t trust to banks. So he kept it hid on the island, of course.
"Then the landslide come, and he talked as though it had covered his treasure box--and in it was papers he talked about. If he could ha" got those papers he could ha" beat Rufus Blent off.
"That"s the understandin" I got of him. Of course, he talked right ragin"
and foolish; but some things he said was onderstandable. But he couldn"t make the judge see it--nor could I. They let Rufus Blent have his way, and Uncle Pete went to the "sylum.
"Then they ordered me off the island. I believe Blent wanted to s"arch it himself for the treasure box. He"s a sneakin" man--I allus hated him,"
said Jerry, clenching his fist angrily.
"But they could ha" put me in the jug if I"d tried to fight him. So I come away. Don"t "spect I"ll ever see Tallahaska--or Cliff Island--again," and the young fellow"s voice broke and he turned his face away.
When Jane Ann Hicks heard something of this, through Ruth, she was eager to help Jerry to be revenged upon the man whom he thought had cheated his uncle.
"Let me write to Bill Hicks about it," she cried, eagerly. "He"ll come on here and get after this thieving real estate fellow--you bet!"
"I have no doubt that he would," laughed Helen, pinching her. "You"d make him leave his ranch and everything else and come here just to do that.
Don"t be rash, young lady. Jerry certainly did you a favor, but you needn"t take everything he says for the gospel truth."
"I believe myself he"s honest," added Ruth, quietly.
"And I don"t doubt him either," Helen Cameron said. "But we"d better hear both sides of it. And a missing treasure box, and papers to prove that an old hunter is owner of an island in Tallahaska, sounds--well, unusual, to say the least."
Ruth laughed. "Helen has suddenly developed caution," she said. "What do you say, Tom?"
"I"ll get father to write to somebody at Logwood, and find out about it,"
returned the boy, promptly.
That is the way the matter was left for the time being. The next day they were to start for school--the girls for Briarwood and Tom for Seven Oaks.
It was arranged that Jerry should remain at the Red Mill for a time. Uncle Jabez"s second opinion of him was so favorable that the miller might employ him for a time as the harvesting and other fall work came on. And Jane Ann left a goodly sum in the miller"s hands for young Sheming"s use.
"He"s that independent that he wouldn"t take nothing from me but a pair of cuff links," declared Jane Ann, wiping her eyes, for she was a tender-hearted girl under her rough exterior. "Says they will do for him to remember me by. He"s a nice chap."
"Jinny"s getting sentimental," gibed Tom, slily.
"I"m not over you, Mister Tom!" she flared up instantly. "You"re too "advanced" a dresser."
"And you were the girl who once ran away from Silver Ranch and the boys out there, because everything was so "common,"" chuckled Tom.
Ruth shut him off at that. She knew that the western girl could not stand much teasing.
They were all nervous, anyway; at least, the girls were. Ruth and Helen approached their second year at Briarwood with some anxiety. How would they be treated? How would the studies be arranged for the coming months of hard work? How were they going to stand with the teachers?
When the two chums first went to Briarwood they occupied a double room; but later they had taken in Mercy Curtis, a lame girl. Now that "triumvirate" could not continue, for Jane Ann had begged to room with Ruth and Helen.
The western girl, who was afraid of scarcely anything "on four legs or two" in her own environment, was really nervous as she approached boarding school. She had seen enough of these eastern girls to know that they were entirely different from herself. She was "out of their cla.s.s,"
she told herself, and if she had not been with Ruth and Helen these few last days before the opening of the school term, she would have run away.
Ruth was going back to school this term with a delightful sense of having gained Uncle Jabez"s special approval. He admitted that schooling such as she gained at Briarwood was of some use. And he made her a nice present of pocket-money when she started.
The Cameron auto stopped for her at the Red Mill before mid-forenoon, and Ruth bade the miller and Aunt Alvirah and Ben--not forgetting Jerry Sheming, her new friend--good-bye.
"Do--_do_ take care o" yourself, my pretty," crooned Aunt Alvirah over her, at the last. "Jest remember we"re a-honin" for you here at the ol"
mill."
"Take care of Uncle Jabez," whispered Ruth. She dared kiss the grim old man only upon his dusty cheek. Then she shook hands with bashful Ben and ran out to her waiting friends.
"Come on, or we"ll lose the train," cried Helen.