CHAPTER XIII
THE NIGHT OF THE BIG WIND
"Ruthie! there's another man wants to sell you a boat."
"Ruthie! there's another man wants to sell an elephant--and it's _so_cute!"
"For the land's sake!" gasped Ruth, throwing down a sputtering pen,where she was writing on the chest of drawers in the tent. "_How_ cana body write? And an elephant, no less!"
She rushed out to see Dot's elephant, as that seemed more importantthan Tess' announcement that a man had merely a boat for sale. Dot'sman was a gangling young fellow with a covered basket from which hewas selling sugar cakes made into fancy shapes. So Dot had herelephant for the Alice-doll (almost everything that appealed to Dotwas bought for that pampered child of hers!) and was appeased.
But the man with the boat was a different matter. He proved to be aboat owner and he wanted to hire one of his craft to the Corner Housegirls by the week. Agnes was just crazy (so she said) to add rowing toher accomplishments, and Ruth thought it would be a good thingherself.
The boat was a safe, cedar craft, with two pairs of light oars and aportable kerosene engine and propeller to use if the girls got tiredof rowing. Ruth made the bargain after thoroughly looking over theboat, which had had only one season's use.
There was a chain and padlock for mooring it to a post at the edge ofthe water just below the tent.
The older girls had already learned to swim in the school gymnasium atMilton. Milton was pretty well up to date in its school arrangements.
Tess had been taught to "strike out" and could be left safely topaddle by herself in shallow water while Ruth and Agnes taught littleDot.
The latter refused to own to any fear of the water. Up here in theriver the waves were seldom of any consequence, and of course onstormy days the girls would not go bathing at all.
Others of the Willowbend campers had rowboats for the season; and someeven owned their own motorboats. The girls were well advised regardingfishing-tackle and the like. Crabbing was a favorite sport just then,for several small creeks emptied into the river nearby and soft-shellcrabs and shedders were plentiful.
"I'd be afraid of these crabs if their teeth were hard," Dot declared,for she insisted that the "pincers" of the crustaceans were teeth.
"They are dreadfully _squirmy_, anyway," sighed Tess. "Just likespiders. And yet, we eat them!"
"But--but I always shut my eyes when I eat them; just as I do when Iswallow raw oysters," confessed Dot. "They taste so much better thanthey look!"
Having the boat, the Corner House girls rowed to the village for theirsupplies and to visit their friends. They did not go to the OverlookHouse; but Pearl Harrod and her party were at the burned bungalowalmost all day. They always bathed there, and the Corner House girlswent down to bathe with them. The beach was better there than at thecamp.
It was Monday when Ruth Kenway and her sisters were established intheir tent. On Thursday of that week they rowed over to Spoondriftbungalow in the morning. Pearl greeted them before they got ashorewith:
"Oh, Ruth! The funniest thing has happened. You'd never guess."
"Trix Severn has the mumps!" exclaimed Agnes. "I knew she was allswelled up."
"Not as good as _that_," laughed Pearl. "But worse may happen to thatgirl than mumps. However, it's nothing to do with Trix."
"What is it?" asked Ruth, calmly. "I'm not a good guesser, Pearl."
"You remember those Gypsies?"
"That are camped up in the woods!"
"Yes."
"If they _are_ Gypsies," said Ruth, doubtfully.
"Of course they are!" cried Pearl. "Well, they've been around herelooking for you."
"For goodness' sake!" gasped Agnes. "What for?"
Ruth herself looked startled. But Pearl began to laugh again.
"At least, that queer old woman has been asking for you," sheexplained.
"Zaliska!" exclaimed Ruth, although she was very sure that was not theperson's name. Of course the name was part of the strange girl'smasquerade.
"It was this morning," Pearl went on to say. "We didn't see many ofthe women of the tribe when we came past that camp last week. But anumber of them came down into the village this morning--sellingbaskets and telling fortunes from door to door. We saw them over bythe hotel--didn't we, girls?"
"Yes. I bought a basket from one of them," admitted Carrie Poole.
"But when we came up here to the bungalow," pursued Pearl, "one of themen working here asked me if I'd seen 'my friend, the Gypsy queen'?So, I said 'No,' of course.
"Then he told me that that Zaliska had asked him where the girl waswho was called Ruth Kenway. He told her that after the bungalow gotafire, all the girls went to the hotel."
"Then she'll never find you there, Ruth," interposed Agnes, withsatisfaction.
Ruth was not sure that she did not wish the supposed Gypsy queen tofind her. She knew that "Zaliska" was really the very pretty,dark-skinned girl whom she had been so much interested in on the traincoming down from Milton.
And that strange girl was interested in Rosa Wildwood. Of that Ruthwas as sure as she could be.
"Maybe she'll follow you up to the camp," said Lucy Poole. "I'd beafraid to live all alone in that tent if I were you girls."
"Pooh!" exclaimed Agnes. "What's going to hurt us!"
"The crabs might come up the beach at night and pinch your toes,"laughed Maud Everts.
"I don't know," Pearl said, seriously. "I wouldn't want those Gypsinterested in _me_."
"Now you are trying to frighten us," laughed Ruth. "We have plenty ofneighbors. Don't you come up there and try to play tricks on us in thetent. You might get hurt."
"Bet she has a gatling gun," chuckled Carrie Poole.
"I'm going to have something better than that," declared Ruth,smiling. But she refused to tell them _what_.
Ruth remembered that the little old woman who lived in a shoe hadspoken of being afraid, too; so the oldest Corner House girl made herplans accordingly, but kept them to herself.
After their bath the sisters dressed in the Harrod tent that had beenpitched on the lawn behind the bungalow, and then went on to thevillage. Ruth and Agnes rowed very nicely, for the former, at least,had had some practise at this sport before coming to Pleasant Cove.
They tied the painter of their boat to a ring in one of the wharfstringers, and went "up town" to the stores. The village of PleasantCove was never a bustling business center. There were but few peopleon the main street, and most of those were visitors.
"There are two of those Gypsy women, Ruth!" hissed Agnes in hersister's ear, as they came out of a store.
Ruth looked up to see the woman who had been in the train, andanother. They were both humbly dressed, but in gay colors. Ruth lookedup and down the street for the disguised figure of the young girl, but_she_ was not in sight.
"My goodness, Ruth!" said Agnes, "what do you suppose that old hag ofa Gypsy wants you for?"
"She isn't----" began Ruth. Then she thought better of taking Agnesinto her confidence just then and did not finish her impulsively begunspeech, but said:
"We won't bother about it. She probably won't find us up at WillowbendCamp."
"I should hope _not_!" cried Agnes. "I don't want to get any betteracquainted with those Gyps."
The matter, however, caused Ruth to think more particularly of RosaWildwood. She had not yet found a boarding place for the Southerngirl, and Rosa was to come down to Pleasant Cove the next Monday.
Ruth wanted to see Mrs. Bobster, and she did so that very afternoon.On their way back to the camp they tied the boat up at the foot of thewrecked pleasure park and walked up the broken boardwalk to theshoe-house.
"Here's your bread, girls--warm from the oven," said the brisk littlewoman. "And if you want a pan of seed cookies----"
"Oh! don't we, just!" sighed Agnes.
The girls sat down to eat some of the delicacies right then and there,and Mrs. Bobster brought a pitcher of cool milk from the well-curb.Ruth at once
opened the subject of getting board for Rosa with thelittle old woman who lived in a shoe.
"Wal, I re'lly don't know what ter say to ye," declared Mrs. Bobster."I ain't never kalkerlated ter run a boardin' house----
"But one young lady! I dunno. They wanted me to take old Mr. Kendrickster board last winter; the town selectmen did. But I told 'em 'No.' Iwarn't runnin' a boardin' house--nor yet the poorfarm."
"Poorfarm?" questioned Ruth, puzzled by the reference.
"Yep. Ye see, there ain't been no town poor here in Pleasant Cove fora number o' years. Last winter old Mr. Kendricks see fit to let thetown board him. He's spry enough to go clammin' in the summer; an' hekin steer a boat when his rheumatics ain't so bad. But winters isgittin' hard on him.
"It didn't seem good jedgment," Mrs. Bobster said, reflectively, "toopen the poorfarm jest for _him_. B'sides, they'd got the old farm letto good advantage for another year to Silas Holcomb. So they come tome.
"Now, Mr. Kendricks is as nice an old man as ever you'd wish ter see,"pursued Mrs. Bobster. "He comes of good folks--jest as good as my poorEddie's folks.
"The town selectmen had consid'rable trouble gettin' Mr. Kendrickstook, 'count o' his being so pertic'lar. Yeast bread seemed ter be hischief objection. He couldn't make up his mind to it on account ofhavin' had sour milk biscuit all his life; but finally, after I'd said'No,' they got Mis' Ann 'Liza Cobbles to agree to give him hot breadthree times a day like he was used to.
"But, lawsy me! She ain't a com-_plete_ cook--no, indeed! Mr.Kendricks said her cookin' warn't up to the mark, an' if he has to goon the town this comin' winter he shouldn't go to Mis' Cobbles.
"The selectmen may be driv' to open the poorfarm ag'in, an' to gittin'somebody ter do for Mr. Kendricks proper.
"Maybe it's a sort of lesson to the folks of Pleasant Cove," sighedMrs. Bobster, "for bein' sort o' proud-like through reason of nothavin' no town poor for endurin' of ten years. I view it that waymyself.
"Mr. Kendricks says he feels as if he was meant ter be a notice to'em; ter be ready an' waitin' ter help people in a proper way; not tobe boardin' of 'em 'round where they might git dyspepsia fastened on'em through eatin' of unproper food."
Agnes was giggling; but Ruth managed to get the talkative old ladyback into the track she wanted her in. The Corner House girlexpatiated upon how little trouble Rosa would be, and what a nice girlshe was.
"Well!" said Mrs. Bobster, "I might try her. You offer awful temptin'money, Miss. And poor Eddie allus said I'd do anything for money!"
It had been fortunate for the deceased Mr. Bobster, as Ruth hadlearned, that his wife _had_ been willing to earn money in any honestway; for Mr. Bobster himself seldom had done a day's work after hismarriage to the brisk little woman.
So the matter of Rosa Wildwood's board and lodging was arranged, andthe Kenways went back to their boat. Evening was approaching, and withit dark clouds had rolled up from the horizon, threatening a badnight.
Ruth and Agnes found a head wind to contend with when they pushed offthe cedar boat. Ruth had learned to run the little motor propeller,and she started it at once. Otherwise they would have a hard timepulling up to Willowbend Camp.
During the week there were few men at the tent colonies. On Saturdaysand Sundays the husbands and fathers were present in force; but nowthere was not a handful of adult males in either the Enterprise orWillowbend encampments.
The Corner House girls were helped ashore, however, and they hauledtheir boat clear up to the front of their tent. There was quite aswell on, and the waves ran far up the beach, hissing and spatteringspray into the air. The wind swept this spray against the tents ingusts, like rain.
But there was no rain--only wind. The black clouds threatened, butthere was no downpour. There was no such thing as having a coal fire,however; the wind blew right down the stack and filled the tent withchoking smoke.
They lit a lantern and ate a cold supper. The flaps of the tent werelaced down, for they had been warned against letting the wind getunder. Now and then, however, a chill draught blew over them and thepartition creaked.
"It's just like a storm at sea," said Agnes, rather fearfully, yetenjoying the novel sensation. "We might as well be on a sailing ship."
"Not much!" exclaimed Ruth. "At least, we're on an even keel."
They agreed to go to bed early. Lying in the cots, well covered withthe blankets, seemed the safest place on such a night. There was noshouting back and forth from tent to tent, and no visiting.
Lights went out early. The wind shrieked in the treetops back from theshore, and in the lulls the girls could hear the breakers booming onthe rocks outside the cove.
Tess and Dot went to sleep--tired with the day's activities. Not sothe older girls. They lay and listened, and shivered as the boomingvoice of the wind grew in volume, and the water seemed to drivefarther and farther up the beaches.
Forever after, this night was known at Pleasant Cove as "the night ofthe big wind." But as yet it had only begun and the Corner House girlshad no idea of what was in store for them.