They were off the moment Ruth stepped into the tonneau. But she stood up and waved her hand to the little figure of Aunt Alvirah in the cottage doorway as long as she could be seen on the Cheslow road. And she had a fancy that Uncle Jabez himself was lurking in the dark opening to the grist-floor of the mill, and watching the retreating motor car.
There was a quick, alert-looking girl hobbling on two canes up and down the platform at Cheslow Station. This was Mercy Curtis, the station agent"s crippled daughter.
"Here you are at last!" she cried, shrilly. "And the train already hooting for the station. Five minutes more and you would have been too late. Did you think I could go to Briarwood without you?"
Ruth ran up and kissed her heartily. She knew that Mercy"s "bark was worse than her bite."
"You come and see Jane Ann--and be nice to her. She doesn"t look it, but she"s just as scared as she can be."
"Of course you"d have some poor, unfortunate pup, or kitten, to mother, Ruth Fielding," snapped the lame girl.
She was very nice, however, to the girl from Silver Ranch, sat beside her in the chair car, and soon had Jane Ann laughing. For Mercy Curtis, with her sarcastic tongue, could be good fun if she wished to be.
Here and there, along the route to Osago Lake, other Briarwood girls joined them. At one point appeared Madge Steele and her brother, Bob, a slow, smiling young giant, called "Bobbins" by the other boys, who was always being "looked after" in a most distressing fashion by his sister.
"Come, Bobby, boy, don"t fall up the steps and get your nice new clothes dirty," adjured Madge, as her brother made a false step in getting aboard the train. "Will you look out for him, Mr. Cameron, if I leave him in your care?"
"Sure!" said Tom, laughing. "I"ll see that he doesn"t spoil his pinafore or mess up his curls."
"Say! I"d shake a sister like that if I had one," grunted "Busy Izzy"
Phelps, disgustedly.
"Aw, what"s the odds?" drawled good-natured Bobbins.
The hilarious crowd boarded the _Lanawaxa_ at the landing, and after crossing the lake they again took a train, disembarking at Seven Oaks, where the boys" school was situated.
From here the girls were to journey by stage to Briarwood. There was dust-coated, grinning, bewhiskered "Old Noah Dolliver" and his "Ark,"
waiting for them.
There was a horde of uniformed academy boys about to greet Tom and his chums, and to eye the girls who had come thus far in their company. But Ruth and her friends were not so bashful as they had been the year before.
They formed in line, two by two, and slowly paraded the length of the platform, chanting in unison the favorite "welcome to the infants" used at the beginning of each half at Briarwood:
"Uncle Noah, he drove an Ark-- One wide river to cross!
He"s aiming to land at Briarwood Park-- One wide river to cross!
One wide river!
One wide river of Jordan!
One wide river!
One wide river to cross!"
The boys cheered them enthusiastically. The girls piled into the coach with much laughter. Even Mercy had taken part in this fun, for the procession had marched at an easy pace for her benefit.
Old Dolliver cracked his whip. Tom ran along in the dust on one side and Bobbins on the other, each to bid a last good-bye to his sister.
Then the coach rolled into the shadow of the cool wood road, and Ruth and her friends were really upon the last lap of their journey to the Hall.
CHAPTER V
A LONG LOOK AHEAD
"Hurrah! first glimpse of the old place!"
Helen cried this, with her head out of the Ark. The dust rolled up in a cloud behind them as they topped the hill. Here Mary c.o.x had met Ruth and Helen that first day, a year ago, when they approached the Hall.
There was no infant in the coach now save Jane Ann. And the chums were determined to save the western girl from that strange and lonely feeling they had themselves experienced.
There was n.o.body in view on the pastured hill. Down the slope the Ark coasted and bye and bye Cedar Walk came into view.
"Shall we get out here, girls?" called Madge Steele, with a glance at Mercy.
"Of course we shall," cried that sprightly person, shaking her fist at the big senior. "Don"t you dare try to spare _me_, Miss! I am getting so strong and healthy I am ashamed of myself. Don"t you dare!"
Madge kissed her warmly, as Ruth had. _That_ was the best way to treat Mercy Curtis whenever she "exploded."
Suddenly Helen leaned out of the open half of the door on her side and began to call a welcome to four girls who were walking briskly down the winding pathway. Instantly they began to run, shouting joyfully in return.
"Here we be, young ladies," croaked Old Dolliver, bringing his tired horses to a halt.
They struggled forth, Jane Ann coming last to help the lame girl--just a mite. Then the two parties of school friends came together like the mingling of waters.
One was a very plump girl with a smiling, rosy face; one was red-haired and very sharp-looking, and the other two balanced each other evenly, both being more than a little pretty, very well dressed, and one dark while the other was light.
The light girl was Belle Tingley, and the dark one Lluella Fairfax; of course, the red-haired one was Mary c.o.x, "The Fox," while the stout girl could be no other than "Heavy" Jennie Stone.
The Fox came forward quickly and seized both of Ruth"s hands. "Dear Ruth,"
she whispered. "I arrived just this morning myself. You know that my brother is all right again?" and she kissed the girl of the Red Mill warmly.
Belle and Lluella looked a bit surprised at Mary c.o.x"s manifestation of friendship for Ruth; but they did not yet know all the particulars of their schoolmates" adventures at Silver Ranch.
Heavy was hurrying about, kissing everybody indiscriminately, and of course performing this rite with Ruth at least twice.
"I"m so tickled to see you all, I can"t tell!" she laughed. "And you"re all looking fine, too. But it does seem a month, instead of a week, since I saw you."
"My! but you are looking bad yourself, Heavy," gibed Helen Cameron, shaking her head and staring at the other girl. "You"re just fading away to a shadow."
"Pretty near," admitted Heavy. "But the doctor says I shall get my appet.i.te back after a time. I was allowed to drink the water two eggs were boiled in for lunch, and to-night I can eat the holes out of a dozen doughnuts. Oh! I"m convalescing nicely, thank you."
The girls who had reached the school first welcomed Jane Ann quite as warmly as they did the others. There was an air about them all that seemed protecting to the strange girl.
Other girls were walking up and down the Cedar Walk, and sometimes they cast more than glances at the eight juniors who were already such friends. Madge had immediately been swallowed up by a crowd of seniors.
"Say, Foxy! got an infant there?" demanded one girl.
"I suppose Fielding has made her a Sweetbriar already--eh?" suggested another.