CHAPTER XV
THE BATTLE IN THE SNOW
It was a fact that Ruth was tempted to run back to the house, justas fast as she could go, and from there send Reno out to find hisyoung master. Whether the dog could have traced Tom on the ice,however, is a question, for Ruth did not yield to this cowardlysuggestion. She had come out with the gun to find the boys, and herhesitation at the edge of the pond was only momentary.
She started down the pond toward the stream, seeing the scratches ofthe boys' skates leading in that direction. There could be no doubtas to where they had gone. Ruth only wished that she had brought herskates when she ran so hastily from Snow Camp.
Not a sound reached her ears, save the sharp twitter of a sparrownow and then, the patter of Reno's feet on the ice, and the rattle ofthe loaded rifle against the buttons of her sweater-coat. The forestthat surrounded the pond seemed uninhabited. The axes of the woodsmendid not echo here, and the boys must indeed be a great way off, forshe could distinguish no sound whatever from them.
Yet she had no doubt that she was following their trail--not evenwhen she came down to the outlet of the pond. The strokes of theskates upon the ice were still visible. The three boys had certainlygone down the frozen stream.
"Come on, Reno!" she exclaimed aloud, encouraging herself in herduty. "We'll find them yet. They certainly could not have gone clearto Rolling River--that's ten miles away!"
The stream was not ten yards across--nothing more than a creek. Thewoods and underbrush shut it in closely. There was not a mark in thesnow on either hand of footsteps--not that Ruth could see. And howheavy the afternoon silence was!
Ruth had recovered in a measure from the first fear she had felt ofthe marauding panther. The beast, had he traveled toward Snow Camp,was likely miles away from the spot. She had determined to go on andfind Tom and the others, more that they might be warned of peril onapproaching Snow Camp, than for any other reason.
And she did wish, now, that Tom and the other boys would appear. Shewas more than a mile--quite two miles, indeed--from the lodge.
"I guess Mr. Cameron will call me reckless again. He suggested thatI was that when I followed Fred Hatfield--or whatever his name was--from the cars at Emoryville. He'll surely scold me for this," thoughtRuth.
She kept on down the stream, however, and at last began to shout forher boy friends. Her clear voice rang from wall to wall of theforest; but it could not have been heard far into the snowy depths oneither hand. Suddenly Reno growled a little, sniffed, and the hairupon his neck began to rise.
"Now, there's no use your doing that, boy," Ruth declared, clutchingthe mastiff tight by the collar with her left hand, while shebalanced the rifle in her right. "If you hear them, bark! Tom willknow it's you, then, and your bark will carry farther than my voice,I do believe."
Reno whined, and looked from side to side, sniffing the keen, stillair. It seemed as though he scented danger, but did not know for surefrom which direction it was coming.
"You're scaring me, acting so, Reno!" exclaimed Ruth. "I wish youwouldn't. I can't help feeling that the panther is right behind mesomewhere. Oh!"
The end of her soliloquy was a shriek. Something flashed through thebrush clump on her left hand. Reno broke into a savage barking andsprang toward the bank. But Ruth did not lose her grip on his collar,and her hand restrained him.
"Oh, Tom! Tom!" the girl cried.
There was another movement in the bushes. It was between Ruth andthe way to the camp, had she been so foolish as to try to reach thehouse directly through the woods. But she did face up stream again,and had Reno been willing to accompany her she would have run as hardas ever she could in that direction.
"Come, Reno! Come, good dog!" she gasped, tugging at his collar."Let it alone--we must go back----"
Reno uttered another savage growl and sprang upon the bank. The hardpacked snow crunched under him. There sounded a scream from the brush--a sound that Ruth knew well. The catamount was really at hand--therecould be no mistaking that awful cry, once having heard it.
The dog burst through the bushes with such a savage clamor that Ruthwas indeed terrified. She sprang after him, however, hoping to draghim back from any affray with the panther. What would Tom Cameron sayif anything happened to his brave and beautiful Reno?
It was past the girl's power, however, to stay the mastiff. Withangry barks he broke through the barrier and entered a small gladenot a stone's throw from the bank of the stream. Before Ruth reachedthis cleared place she saw the tracks of the beast which had sostartled her. There could be no mistaking the round impressions ofthe great, padded paws. Unlike the print of the bear, or the dog,that of the cat shows no marks of claws unless it be springing at itsprey.
And now, when Reno burst into the open, the panther uttered anotherfierce and blood-chilling scream. Ruth noted the flash of the great,lithe body as the beast sprang into the air. Startled for the momentby the on-rush and savage baying of the dog, the panther had leapedinto a low-branching cedar. The tree shook to its very tip, and tothe ends of its great limbs. There the panther crouched upon a limb,its eyes balefully glaring down upon the leaping, growling mastiff.
As Ruth remembered the creature from the time of her dreadful rideon the timber cart with the so-called Fred Hatfield, it displayed atemper and ferocity that was not to be mistaken. Reno's suddenonslaught was all that had driven it to leap into the tree. But thereit crouched, squalling and tearing the hard wood into splinters withits unsheathed claws. In a moment it would leap down upon the dog,and Ruth was horror-stricken.
"Oh, Reno! Good dog!" she moaned. "Come back! come back!"
The mastiff would not obey and in a moment the huge cat sprang outof the tree directly upon Tom Cameron's faithful companion. Reno wastoo sharp to be easily caught, however; he leaped aside and the sabre-likeclaws of the panther missed him. Nor was the dog unwise enoughto meet the panther face to face.
He sprang in and bit the cat shrewdly, and then got away before thebeast wheeled, yelling, to strike him. Round and round in the snowthey went, so fast that it was impossible for Ruth to see which wasdog and which was cat, their paws throwing up a cloud of snow-dustthat almost hid the combatants.
"Ah!" cried Ruth, aloud. "I've missed my chance, I should have triedto shoot the creature while it was in the tree."
And that seemed true enough. For had she been the best of shots withthe rifle, it looked now as though she was as likely to shoot Reno asthe panther whilst they battled in the snow.