CHAPTER XV
AN ODD ADVENTURE
Six inches or more of snow had fallen. It was feathery and packed wellunder the snowshoes. The girls sank about two inches into the fleecymass and there the shoes made a complete bed for themselves and theweight of their wearers.
"You know what I'd love to do this winter?" said Helen, as they trudgedon.
"What, my dear?" asked Ruth, who seemed much distraught.
"I'd like to try skiing. The slope of College Hill would be justsplendiferous for _that_! Away from the observatory to the lake--andthen some!"
"We'll start a skiing club among the freshies," Ruth said, warmlyaccepting the idea. "Wonder nobody has thought of it before."
"Ardmore hasn't waked up yet to all its possibilities," said Helen,demurely. "But this umpty-umph class of freshmen will show the college athing or two before we pass from out its scholastic halls."
"Question!" cried Ruth, laughing. Then: "There! you can see that lightagain."
"Goodness! You're never going over to that island?" cried Helen.
"What did we come out for?" asked Ruth. "And scamp our study hour?"
"Goodness!" cried Helen, again, "just for _fun_."
"Well, it may be fun to find out just who built that fire and what for,"said Ruth.
"And then again," objected her chum, "it may be no fun at all, but_serious_."
"I have a serious reason for finding out--if I can," Ruth declared.
"What is it, dear?"
"I'll tell you later," said Ruth. "Follow me now."
"If I do I'll not wear diamonds, and I may get into trouble," objectedHelen.
"You've never got into very serious trouble yet by following myleadership," laughed Ruth. "Come on, Fraid-cat."
"Ain't! But we don't know who is over there. Just to think! A camp inthe snow!"
"Well, we have camped in the snow ourselves," laughed Ruth, harking backto an adventure at Snow Camp that neither of them would ever be likelyto forget.
They scuffed along on the snowshoes, soon reaching the edge of the lake.Nobody was about the boathouse, for the ice would have to be swept andscraped by the horse-drawn machines before the girls could go skatingagain.
The moon was pushing through the scurrying clouds, and the snow hadceased falling.
"Look back!" crowed Helen. "Looks as though two enormous animals hadcome down the hillside, doesn't it?"
"The girls will wake up and view our tracks with wonder in the morning,"said Ruth, with a smile. "Perhaps they'll think that some curiousmonsters have visited Ardmore."
"That would cause more wonderment than the case of Rebecca Frayne. Whatdo you suppose is finally going to happen to that foolish girl?"
"I really cannot guess," Ruth returned, shaking her head sadly. "Poorthing!"
"Why! she can't be _poor_," gasped Helen. "Look at all those trunks shebrought with her to Ardmore. And her dresses are tremendouslyfancy--although we've not seen many of them yet."
Ruth stared at her chum for a moment without replying. It was rightthere and then that she came near to guessing the secret of RebeccaFrayne's trouble. But she forbore to say anything about it at the time,and went on beside her chum toward the white island, much disturbed inher mind.
Now and then they caught sight of the dancing flames of the campfire.But when they were nearer the island, the hill was so steep that theylost sight completely of the light.
"Suppose it's a _man_?" breathed Helen, suddenly, as they began to climbthe shore of Bliss Island.
"He won't eat us," returned Ruth.
"No. They don't often. Only cannibals, and they are not prevalent inthis locality," giggled Helen. "But if it _is_ a man----"
"Then we'll turn around and go back," said Ruth, coolly. "I haven't comeout here to get acquainted with any male person."
"Bluie! Suppose he's a real nice boy?"
"There's no such an animal," laughed Ruth. "That is, not around here atthe present moment."
"Oh yes. I see," Helen rejoined drily. "The nearest _nice_ one is at theSeven Oaks Military Academy."
"So you say," Ruth said demurely. "But if it were Tom?"
"Dear old Tom and some of his chums!" cried Helen. "Wouldn't it begreat? This Adamless Eden is rather palling on me, Chum. The other girlshave visitors, but our friends are too far away."
"Hush!" advised Ruth. "Whoever it is up there will hear you."
Helen was evidently not at all enamored of this adventure. She laggedbehind a little. Yet she would not allow Ruth to go on alone tointerview the mysterious camper.
"I tell you what," the black-eyed girl said, after a moment and in awhisper. "I believe that fire is up near the big boulder we lookedat--you remember? The Stone Face, do they call it?"
"Quite possibly," Ruth rejoined briskly. "Come on if you're coming. I'msure the Stone Face won't hurt us."
"Not unless it falls on us," giggled Helen.
The grove of big trees that covered this part of the hillside was open,and the chums very easily made their way toward the fire, even onsnowshoes. But the shoes naturally made some noise as they scuffed overthe snow, and in a minute Ruth stopped and slipped her feet out of thestraps, motioning Helen to do the same. They wore overshoes so there wasno danger of their getting their feet wet in the snow.
Hand in hand, Ruth and Helen crept forward. They saw the fire flickeringjust before them. There was a single figure between the fire and thevery boulder of which Helen had spoken.
Reaching the edge of the grove the girls gazed without discovery at thecamp in the snow. The boulder stood in a small open space, and it was sohigh and bulky that it sheltered the fire and the camper quitecomfortably. As Ruth had suspected, the latter was the girl she had seenwalking upon the southern shore of Bliss Island. She knew her by herfigure, if not by her face, which was at the moment hidden.
"She's alone," whispered Helen, making the words with her lips more thanwith her voice.
"What _can_ she be doing out here?" was the black-eyed girl's nextdemand.
Her chum put out a hand in a gesture of warning and at once walked outof the shelter of the trees and approached the fire. Helen lingeredbehind. After all, it was so strange a situation that she did not feelvery courageous.
The moon had quite broken through the clouds now and as Ruth drew nearerto the fire and the girl, her shadow was projected before her upon thesnow. The girl who looked like Maggie suddenly espied this shadow,raised her head, and leaped up with a cry.
"Don't be frightened, Maggie," said Ruth. "It's only us two girls."
"My--my name is--isn't Maggie," stammered the strange girl.
And sure enough, having once seen her closely, Ruth Fielding saw thatshe was quite wrong in her identification. This was not the girl who haddrifted down the Lumano River to the Red Mill and taken refuge with AuntAlvirah.
This was a much more assertive person than Maggie--a girl with plenty ofhealth, both of body and mind. Maggie impressed one as being mentally ornervously deficient. Not so this girl who was camping here in the snowon Bliss Island. Yet there was a resemblance to Maggie in the figure ofthe stranger, and Ruth noted a resemblance in her features, too.
"My goodness me!" she said, laughing pleasantly. "If you're not ourMaggie you look near enough like her to be her sister."
"Well, I haven't any sister in that college," said the strange girl,shortly. "You're from Ardmore, aren't you?"
"Yes," Ruth said, Helen now having joined them. "And we saw yourlight----"
"My _what_?" demanded the camping girl, who was warmly, though plainlydressed.
"Your campfire. You see," explained Ruth, finding it rather difficultafter all to talk to this very self-possessed girl, "we skated aroundthe island to-day----"
"I saw you," said the stranger gruffly. "There were three of you."
"Yes. And I thought you looked like Maggie, then."
"Isn't this Maggie one of you?" sharply demanded the stranger.
"She's a girl whom--whom I know,
" Ruth said quickly. "A really nicegirl. And you do look like her. Doesn't she, Helen?"
"Why--yes--something like," drawled Helen.
"And did you have to come out here to see if I were your friend?" askedthe other girl.
"When I saw the campfire--yes," Ruth admitted. "It seemed so strange,you know."
"What seemed strange?" demanded the girl, very tartly. It was plain thatshe considered their visit an intrusion.
"Why, think of it yourself," Ruth cried, while Helen sniffed audibly. "Agirl camping alone on this island--and in a snowstorm."
"It isn't snowing now," said the girl, smiling grimly.
"But it was when we saw the fire at first," Ruth hastened to say. "Youknow yourself you would be interested."
"Not enough to come clear out here--must be over a mile!--to see aboutit," was the rejoinder. "I usually mind my own business."
"So do we, you may be sure!" spoke up Helen, quick to take offence."Come away, Ruth."
But the girl of the Red Mill was not at all satisfied. She said,frankly:
"I do wish that you would tell us why you are here? Surely, you won'tremain all night in this lonely place? There is nobody else on theisland, is there?"
"I should hope not!" exclaimed the girl. "Only you two busybodies."
"But, really, we came because we were interested in what went on here.It seems so strange for a girl, alone----"
"You've said that before," was the dry reply. "I am a girl alone. I amhere on my own business. And _that_ isn't yours."
"Oh!" ejaculated Helen, angrily.
"Well, if you don't like being spoken to plainly, you needn't stay," thestrange girl flung at her.
"I see that very well," returned Helen, tossing her head. "_Do_ comeaway, Ruth."
"Ha!" exclaimed the strange girl, suddenly looking at Ruth moreintently. "Are you called Ruth?"
"Yes. Ruth Fielding is my name."
"Oh!" and the girl's face changed in its expression and a little flushcame into her cheeks. "I've--I've heard of you."
"Indeed! How?" cried Ruth, eagerly. She felt that this girl must reallyhave some connection with Maggie at the mill, she looked so much likethe waif.
"Oh," said the other girl slowly, looking away, "I heard you wrotepicture plays. I saw one of them. That's all."
Ruth was silent for a moment. Helen kept tugging at her arm and urgingher to go.
"We--we can do nothing for you?" queried the girl of the Red Mill atlast.
"You can get off the island--that's as much as I care," said the strangegirl, with a harsh laugh. "You're only intruding where you're notwanted."
"Well, I do declare!" burst out Helen again. "She is the most impolitething. _Do_ come away, Ruthie."
"We really came with the best intentions," Ruth added, as she turnedaway with her chum. "It--it doesn't look right for a girl to be alone ata campfire on this island--and at night, too."
"I sha'n't stay here all night," the girl said shortly. "You needn'tfret. If you want to know, I just built the fire to get warm by before Istarted back."
"Back where?" Ruth could not help asking.
"_That_ you don't know--and you won't know," returned the strange girl,and turned her back upon them.