CHAPTER VII
A RUNAWAY IN GOOD EARNEST
Fred Hatfield, the runaway, was approaching the old, ramblingcountry store at Emoryville Crossroads. It was so cold an eveningthat there were no loungers upon the high, railless porch whichextended clear across the front of the building. Indeed, there wasbut one wagon standing before the store and probably there were veryfew customers, or loungers either, inside. The stopping of the trainhad brought nobody to the door.
As Fred gained the sidewalk in front of the store he glanced back.There was Ruth crossing the tracks behind him.
"You come back! Come back immediately, Fred Hatfield!" she called."Come back or I shall call Mr. Cameron."
The girl had been his Nemesis all day. Fred knew he could have giventhe party the slip at some station, had Ruth not kept such a sharpwatch upon him. And here she was on his very heels, when he mighthave gotten well away.
The next stop would be Scarboro. Fred did not want to appear inScarboro again. And he had a suspicion that Ruth knew his reasons fordesiring to keep away from his home and friends.
He looked wildly about the lonely crossroads. The panting of thelocomotive exhaust was not the only sound he heard. The two muleshitched to the timber wagon--the only wagon standing by the store--jingled their harness as they shook their heads. One bit at theother, and his mate squealed and stamped. They were young mules andfull of "ginger"; yet their driver had carelessly left them standingunhitched in the road.
Fred gave another glance at Ruth and kept on running. The engineersuddenly whistled for the return of the flagman. But none of thetrain-hands--nor did the party in the private car--notice the boy andgirl who had so incautiously left the train.
"Come back!" commanded Ruth, so much interested in following Fredthat she did not notice the lantern of the rear brakeman bobbingalong beside the ties. In a moment he swung himself aboard theprivate car and his lantern described half an arc in the dusk. Theengine answered with a loud cough and the heavy train began to move.
But at that moment Fred Hatfield, grown desperate because of Ruth'spursuit, leaped aboard the timber wagon. He was a backwoods boyhimself; he knew how to handle mules. He gave a shout to which theteam responded instantly. They leaped ahead just as Ruth came to theside of the long reach that connected the small pair of front wheelswith the huge wheels in the rear.
"Get off of that wagon, Fred!" she had just cried, when the mulesstarted. She was directly in front of the large rear wheel. If itstruck her--knocked her down--ran over her! Fred knew that she wouldbe killed and he seized her hands and dragged her up beside him onthe jouncing timber-reach.
"Now see what you've done!" he bawled, as the mules broke into agallop.
But Ruth was too frightened for the moment to speak. Her uncle had apair of mules, and she knew just how hard they were to manage. Andthis pair were evidently looking toward supper. They flew up theroad, directly away from the railroad, and the wagon jounced about sothat she could only hold on with both hands.
"Stop them! Stop them!" she cried.
But that was much easier said than done. The animals had beenwilling enough to start when given the word by a stranger; but nowthey did not recognize their master's voice when the boy yelled:
"Yea-a! Yea-a!"
Instead of stopping, the mules went faster and faster. They hadtheir bits 'twixt their teeth and were running away in good earnest.
Almost immediately, when the bumping and jouncing wagon got awayfrom the store and the two or three neighboring houses, they were inthe deep woods. There were no farms--no clearings--not even an openpatch in the timber. The snow lay deep under the pines and firs. Theroad had been used considerably since the last snow, and the rutswere deep. Therefore the mules kept to the beaten track.
"Oh, stop them! stop them!" moaned Ruth, clinging to the swaying,jouncing cart.
"I can't! I can't!" repeated the terrified boy.
"Oh, you wicked, wicked boy! you'll kill us both!" cried Ruth.
"It's your own fault you're here," returned Fred, sharply. "And Iwouldn't never have got onto the wagon if you hadn't chased me."
"I believe you are the very worst boy who ever lived!" declared thegirl from the Red Mill, in both anger and despair. "And I wish I hadlet you go your own wicked way."
"I wish you had," growled Hatfield, and then tried to soothe therunning mules again.
He was successful in the end. He had driven mules before andunderstood them. The beasts, after traveling at least two miles,began to slow down. The wagon was now passing through a wild piece ofthe forest, and it was growing dark very fast. Only the snow on theground made it possible for the boy and girl to see objects at adistance.
Ruth was wondering what her friends would think when they missedher, and likewise how she would ever get back to the railroad. WouldMr. Cameron send back for her? What would happen to her, here in thedeep woods, even when the mules stopped so that she dared leap downfrom the cart?
And just then--before these questions became very pertinent in hermind--she was startled by a wild scream from the bush patch besidethe road. Fred cried out in new alarm, and the mules stopped dead--for a moment. They were trembling and tossing their heads wildly. Theawful, blood-chilling scream was repeated, and there was the softthudding of cushioned paws in the bushes. Some beast had leaped downfrom a tree-branch to the hard snow.
"A cat-o'-mountain!" yelled Fred Hatfield, and as he shouted, thelithe cat sprang over the brush heap and landed in the road, rightbeside the timber cart.
Once Ruth had been into the menagerie of a traveling circus that hadcome to Darrowtown while her father was still alive. She had seenthere a panther, and the wicked, graceful, writhing body of the beasthad frightened her more than the bulk of the elephant or the roaringof the lion. This great cat, crouching close to the snow, its tailsweeping from side to side, all its muscles knotted for anotherspring, struck Ruth dumb and helpless.
Fortunately her gloved hands were locked about the timber on whichshe lay, for the next instant a third savage scream parted thebewhiskered lips of the catamount and on the heels of the cry themules started at full gallop. The panther sprang into the air like arubber ball. Had the mules not started the beast must have landedfairly upon the boy and the girl clinging to the reach of the timberwagon.
But providentially Ruth Fielding and her companion escaped thisimmediate catastrophe. The savage beast landed upon the wagon,however--far out upon the end of the timber, beyond the rear wheels.Mad with fright, the mules tore on along the wood road. There weremany turns in it, and the deep ruts shook them about terrifically.Ruth and Fred barely retained their positions on the cart--nor wasthe catamount in better situation. It hung on with all its claws,yowling like the great Tom-cat it was.
On and on plunged the poor mules, sweating and fearful. Ruth andFred Hatfield clung like mussels to a rock, while the panther boundedinto the air, screeching and spitting, always catching the tail ofthe cart as it came down--afraid to leap off and likewise afraid tohang on.
The mules came to a hill. They were badly winded by now and theirpace grew slower. The panther scratched along the reach nearer to thetwo human passengers, and Ruth saw its eyes blazing like hugecarbuncles in the dusk. There was a fork of the roads at the foot ofthe hill. Fred Hatfield uttered a shriek of despair as the mules tookthe right hand road and struck into the bush itself--a narrow andtreacherous track where the limbs of the trees threatened to brushall three passengers from the cart at any instant.
"Oh! oh! we're done for now!" yelled Fred. "They've taken the roadto Rattlesnake Hill. We'll be killed as sure as fate!"