CHAPTER XXV--AT THE OLD RED MILL AGAIN
The mist hovered over the river as though loth to uncover the dimplingcurrent; yet the rising sun was insistent--its warm, soft September raysmelting the jealous mist and uncovering, rod by rod, the sleepingstream. Ruth, fresh from her bed and looking out of the little window ofher old room at the Red Mill farmhouse, thought that, after all, thescene was quite as soothing and beautiful as any of the fine landscapesshe had observed during her far-western trip.
For the Briarwood Hall girls were back from their sojourn at SilverRanch. They had arrived the night before. Montana, and the herds ofcattle, and the vast canons and far-stretching plains, would be but amemory to them hereafter. Their vacation on the range was ended, and inanother week Briarwood Hall would open again and lessons must beattended to.
Jane Ann Hicks would follow them East in time to join the school theopening week. Ruth looked back upon that first day at school a year agowhen she and Helen Cameron had become "Infants" at Briarwood. They wouldmake it easier for Jane Ann, remembering so keenly how strange they hadfelt before they attained the higher classes.
The last of the mist rolled away and the warm sun revealed all the riverand the woods and pastures beyond. Ruth kissed her hand to it and then,hearing a door close softly below-stairs, she hurried her dressing andran down to the farmhouse kitchen. The little, stooping figure of an oldwoman was bent above the stove, muttering in a sort of sing-songrefrain:
"Oh, my back! and oh, my bones!"
"Then let somebody else save your back and bones, Aunt Alviry!" criedRuth, putting her arms around the old housekeeper's neck. "There! howgood it is to see you again. Sit right down there. You are to play lady._I_ am going to get the breakfast."
"But your Uncle Jabez wants hot muffins, my pretty," objected AuntAlvirah.
"And don't you suppose anybody can make muffins but you?" queried Ruth,blithely. "I made 'em out to Silver Ranch. Maria, the Mexican cook,taught me. Even Uncle Jabez will like them made by my recipe--now you seeif he doesn't."
And the miller certainly praised the muffins--by eating a full half dozenof them. Of course, he did not say audibly that they were good.
And yet, Uncle Jabez had a much more companionable air about him than hehad ever betrayed before--at least, within the knowledge of RuthFielding. He smiled--and that not grimly--as the girl related some of herexperiences during her wonderful summer vacation.
"It was a great trip--and wonderful," she sighed, finally. "Of course,the last of it was rather spoiled by Mary Cox's brother being so ill.And the doctors found, when they got the better of the fever, that hishead had been hurt some months before, and that is why he had wanderedabout there, without writing East--either to his folks or to you, UncleJabez. But he's all right now, and Mary expects to bring him home fromDenver, where he stopped over, in a few days. She'll be home in time forthe opening of school, at least," and here Ruth's voice halted and herface changed color, while she looked beseechingly at Uncle Jabez.
The miller cleared his throat and looked at her. Aunt Alvirah stoppedeating, too, and she and Ruth gazed anxiously at the flint-like face ofthe old man.
"I got a letter from that lawyer at Bullhide, Montana, two days ago,Niece Ruth," said Uncle Jabez, in his harsh voice. "He has been goingover the Tintacker affairs, and he has proved up on that young Cox'sreport. The young chap is as straight as a string. The money he got fromme is all accounted for. And according to the assayers the new vein Coxdiscovered will mill as high as two hundred dollars to the ton of ore.If we work it as a stock company it will make us money; but young Coxbeing in such bad shape physically, and his finances being as they are,we'll probably decide to sell out to a syndicate of Denver people. Coxwill close the contract with them before he comes East, it may be, andon such terms," added Uncle Jabez with a satisfaction that he could nothide, "that it will be the very best investment I ever made."
"Oh, Uncle!" cried Ruth Fielding.
"Yes," said Uncle Jabez, with complacency. "The mine is going to pay uswell. Fortunately you was insistent on finding and speaking to youngCox. If you had not found him--and if he had not recovered his health--itmight have been many months before I could have recovered even the moneyI had put into the young man's scheme. And--so he says--_you_ saved hislife, Ruthie."
"That's just talk, Uncle," cried the girl. "Don't you believe it.Anybody would have done the same."
"However that may be, and whether it is due to you in any particularthat I can quickly realize on my investment," said the miller, risingsuddenly from the table, "circumstances are such now that there is noreason why you shouldn't have another term or two at school--if you wantto go."
"_Want to go to Briarwood!_ Oh, Uncle!" gasped Ruth.
"Then I take it you _do_ want to go?"
"More than anything else in the world!" declared his niece, reverently.
"Wall, Niece Ruth," he concluded, with his usual manner. "If your AuntAlviry can spare ye----"
"Don't think about me, Jabez, don't think about me," cried the littleold woman. "Just what my pretty wants--that will please her Aunt Alviry."
Ruth ran and seized the hard hand of the miller before he could get outof the kitchen. "Oh, Uncle!" she cried, kissing his hand. "You _are_good to me!"
"Nonsense, child!" he returned, roughly, and went out.
Ruth turned to the little old woman, down whose face the tears werecoursing unreproved.
"And you, too, Auntie! You are too good to me! Everybody is too good tome! Look at the Camerons! and Jennie Stone! and all the rest. And MaryCox just hugged me tight when we came away and said she loved me--that Ihad saved her brother's life. And Mr. Bill Hicks--and Jimsey and theother boys. And Bashful Ike and Sally made me promise that if ever Icould get out West again I should spend a long time at their home----
"Oh, dear, me Aunt Alvirah," finished the girl of the Red Mill, with atearful but happy sigh, "this world is a very beautiful place after all,and the people in it are just lovely!"
There were many more adventures in store for Ruth, and what some of themwere will be related in the next volume of this series, to be entitled:"Ruth Fielding on Cliff Island; Or, The Old Hunter's Treasure Box," inwhich will be related the particulars of a most surprising mystery.
"Only one Ruthie!" mused old Jabez. "Only one, but she's quite agal--yes, quite a gal!"
And we agree with him; don't we, reader?
THE END