CHAPTER XIV
THE HUE AND CRY
Ruth and Tom Cameron had no further opportunity of speaking together untilthe punt came very close to the island. Here the current ran more swiftlyand the ice-blocks seemed to have been cleared away.
There was a new stone dock, and up the slight rise from it, about ahundred yards back from the shore, was the heavily-framed lodge. Itconsisted of two stories, the upper one extending over the lower. Bigbeams crossed at the corners of this upper story and the outer walls wereof roughly hewn logs. The great veranda was arranged for screening, in thesummer, but now the west side was enclosed with glass. It was an expensiveand comfortable looking camp.
There were several men on the dock as the punt came in, but Jerry Shemingwas not in sight. Tom had, from time to time, been seen whispering withthe boys. They all now gathered in the bow of the slowly moving punt,ready to leap ashore the moment she bumped into the dock.
"Do be careful, boys," begged Mrs. Tingley. "Don't fall into the water, orget hurt. I certainly shall be glad when Mr. Tingley comes up forChristmas and takes all this responsibility off my hands."
"Don't have any fear for us, Mrs. Tingley, I beg," said Tom. "We're onlygoing to scramble ashore, and the first fellow who reaches the house isthe best man. Now, fellows!"
The punt bumped. Such a scrambling as there was! Ann Hicks showed hersuppleness by being one of the first to land and beating some of the boys;but she did not run with them.
"They might have stayed and helped us girls--and Mrs. Tingley--to land,"complained Helen. "I don't see what Tom was thinking of."
But all of a sudden Ruth had an idea that she understood Tom's lack ofgallantry. Jerry Sheming, not being at the dock to meet the newcomers,must be at the house. The boys, it proved later, had agreed to help "tip"Jerry. The first fellow to see him was to tell him of the approach ofBlent and the constable.
Therefore, when Rufus Blent and Lem Daggett reached the lodge, nobodyseemed to know anything about Jerry. Tom winked knowingly at Ruth.
"I tell ye, Preston, I gotter take that boy back to Logwood with me,"shouted Blent, who seemed greatly excited. "Where are you hidin' therascal?"
"You know very well I came over with you in the boat and walked up herewith you, Blent," growled the foreman, in some anger. "How could I hidehim?"
"But the cook, nor nobody, knows what's become of him. He was here peelin''taters for supper, cookie says, jest b'fore we landed. Now he's sloped."
"He saw you comin', it's likely," rejoined Preston. "He suspected what youwas after."
"Well, I'm goin' to leave Daggett. And, Lem!"
"Yes, sir?" said that slouching person.
"You got to get him. Now mind that. The boy's to 'pear in 'Squire Keller'scourt to-morrow--or something will happen," threatened the real estateman.
"And if he don't appear, what then?" drawled Preston, who was more amusedby the old man than afraid of him.
"You'd better not interfere with the course of the law, Preston," declaredBlent, shaking his head.
"You bet I won't. Especially the brand of law that's handed a feller byyour man, Keller. But I don't know nothing about the boy nor where he'sgone. I don't wanter know, either.
"And none of they rest o' you wanter harbor that thief," snarled Blent,viciously, looking around at the gaping hired men and the boys who hadcome to visit Cliff Island. "The law's got a long arm. 'Member that!"
"Will we be breaking the law if we don't report this poor fellow to theconstable here, if we see him?" asked Tom Cameron, boldly.
"You bet you will. And I'll see that you're punished if ye harbor or helpthe rascal. Don't think because Tingley's a rich man, and your fathershave probably more money than is good for them, that you will escape,"said Blent.
"I don't believe he's so powerful as he makes out to be," grumbled Tom,later, to Ruth. "_I_ was the one who caught Jerry and whispered for him toget out. I didn't have to say much to him. He was wise about Blent."
"Where did he go?" asked the eager Ruth, quickly.
"I don't know. I didn't want to know--and you don't, either."
"But suppose something happens to him?" objected the girl, fearfully.
"Why, he knows all about this island. You said so yourself. I just toldhim we'd get some grub to him to-morrow."
"How?"
"Told him we'd leave it at the foot of that tall pine at the far end ofthe island. Then he slipped out of the kitchen and disappeared."
But Blent was a crafty old party and did not easily give up the pursuit ofthe young fellow he had come to the island to nab. The coat of fresh snowover everything made tracking the fugitive an easy task.
After a few minutes of sputtering anger, the real estate man organized apursuit of Jerry. He made sure that the forest youth had run out of thekitchen at about the time the visitors came up from the dock.
"He ain't got a long start," said Blent to his satellite, the constable."Let's see if he didn't leave tracks."
He had. There was still an hour of daylight, although the winter eveningwas closing in rapidly. Jerry had left by the back door of the lodge andhad gone straight across the yard, through the unbroken snow, to thebunkhouse used by the male help.
There he had stopped for his rifle and shotgun, and ammunition. Indeed, hehad taken everything that belonged to him, and, loaded down with thisloot, had gone right up the hill, keeping in the scrub so as to be hiddenfrom the big house, and had so passed over the rising ground toward themiddle of the island.
"The track is plain enough," Blent said. "Ain't ye got a dog, Preston? Wecould foller him all night."
"Not with our dogs," declared the foreman.
"Why not?"
"Don't think the boss would like it. We don't keep dogs to hunt men with."
"You better take care how you try to block the law," threatened the oldman. "That boy's goin' to be caught."
"Not with these dogs," grunted Preston. "You can put _that_ in your pipeand smoke it."
Blent and the constable went off over the ridge. Ruth was so muchinterested that she stole out to follow them, and Ann Hicks overtook herbefore she had gotten far up the track.
"Ruth Fielding! whatever are you doing?" demanded the girl from theMontana ranch. "Don't you know it will soon be night? Mrs. Tingley saysfor you to come back."
"Do you suppose those horrid men will find Jerry?"
"No, I don't," replied Ann, shortly. "And if they do----"
"Oh! you're not as interested in him as I am," sighed Ruth. "I am sure heis honest and that Mr. Blent is telling lies about him. I--I want to seethat they don't abuse him if they catch him."
"Abuse him! And he a backwoods boy, with two guns?" snorted Ann. "Why, hewouldn't even let them arrest him, I don't suppose. _I_ wouldn't if I wereJerry."
"But that would be dreadful," sighed Ruth. "Let's go a little farther,Ann."
Dusk was falling, however, and when they got down the far side of theridge they came to a swift, open water-course. Blent and the constablewere evidently "stumped." Blent was snarling at their ill-luck.
"He's took to the water--that's all _I_ know," drawled Lem Daggett, theconstable. "Ye see, there ain't a mark in the snow on 'tother side."
"Him wadin' in that ice-cold stream in mid-winter," grunted Blent. "Ain'the a scoundrel?"
"Can't do nothin' more to-night," announced the constable, who didn't likethe job any too well, it was evident. "And dorgs wouldn't do us no good."
"Ha! ye know what ye gotter do," threatened Blent. "I'm goin' back to townwhen the punt goes this evenin'. But you stay here, an' you git the huean' cry out after him to-morrer bright and early.
"I don't want him rummagin' around this island at all. You understand? Notat all! It's up to you to git him, Lem Daggett."
Daggett grunted and followed his master back to the lodge. The girls wenton before and Ruth was delighted that, for a time, at least, Jerry was tohave his freedom.
"If it froze over solid in the night he could ge
t to the mainland from theother end of the island, and then they'd never find him," she confided toTom.
But when morning came the surface of the lake was still a mass of looseand shifting ice. Lem demanded of Mrs. Tingley the help of all the men atthe camp, and they started right away after breakfast to "comb" the islandin a thorough manner.
There wasn't a trace near the running stream to show in which directionthe fugitive had gone. Had Jerry gone up stream he could have reached thevery heart of the rough end of the island without leaving the water-trail.
A party of the boys, with Ruth, Helen, and Ann Hicks, stole out of thelodge after the main searching party, and struck off for the high pointwhere the lone pine tree grew.
"I'd hate to think we'd draw that constable over there and help him tocatch Jerry," said Bobbins.
"We won't," Tom replied. "We are just going to leave the tin box of grubfor him. He probably won't come out of hiding and try to get the fooduntil this foolish constable has given up the chase. And I put the food inthe tin box so that no prowling animal would get it instead of Jerry."
It was hard traveling in the snow, for the party of young folk had notthought to obtain snowshoes. "We'll string some when we go back," Tompromised. "I know there are some frames all ready."
"But no more such tobogganing as we had last winter up at Snow Camp,"declared Busy Izzy, with deep feeling. "Remember the spill I had with Ruthand that Heavy girl? Gee! that was some spill."
"The land here Is too rough for good sliding," said Tom. "But I wish thelake would freeze hard again. Ralph says there are a couple of goodscooters, and we all have our skates."
"And the fishing!" exclaimed Helen, eagerly. "I _do_ so want to fishthrough the ice again."
"Oh! we're bound to have a bully good time," declared Bobbins. "But we'lldo this Jerry Sheming a good turn, too, if we can."