A TERRIBLE SURPRISE
Bessie, though she had to pause more than once in her wild descent of
the rocks, dared not look back to see if the gypsy, Peter, was pursuing
her, or even whether he was looking down after her. She had two reasons.
For one thing, the task was difficult and terrifying enough as it was,
and to know that there was danger from behind, as well as the peril
involved in the descent itself, would, she feared, unnerve her.
And, moreover, even if Peter saw her, he might not, if she paid no
attention to him, suspect that she had anything to do with Dolly, or
that he and his companion had anything to dread from her. Bessie did not
know whether he would recognize her as having been at the gypsy camp
with Dolly, but she felt that it would be as well not to take the
chance. Things were bad enough without running the risk of complicating
them still further.
The descent was a long and hard one, but when she was about half way
down to the comparatively level ground at the foot of the peak, all real
danger of a crippling fall was over, since there a path began. Evidently
some trampers who were fond of climbing had worn it through the rough
surface to a point where a good view was to be had, and had stopped
there, content with the distance they had gone, and not disposed to try
the further ascent. And as soon as Bessie reached that point she was
able to stop and get her breath.
Meanwhile she wondered what had become of Lolla. The gypsy girl, as
Bessie understood thoroughly, was running severe risks. If the two men
knew that she was in league with Dolly's friends they would certainly
take some steps to silence her. But John, Bessie felt sure, did not
believe that Lolla, no matter how jealous she might be, would actually
betray her own people to the hated Americans. He had smiled in a
confident manner while Lolla had made her threats, and Bessie thought he
regarded the girl as a child in a temper, but sure to come to her senses
before she actually put him in danger.
What to do next was a problem. Bessie, when she had followed the rough
path until it led to a trail, was completely lost. She knew, roughly,
and in a general way, the direction of Camp Manasquan, as the camp at
Long Lake was called, but that was about all.
"If I go straight ahead I may be going just as straight as I can away
from anyone who can help Dolly," she reflected. "Or I may get over
toward Loon Pond, and run into that awful gypsy, and then I'd be worse
off than ever! Oh, I do wish I knew where I was, or how I can find
Lolla. She must know these woods, and she'd be able to help me, I'm
sure."
Finally, however, Bessie determined to move slowly along the trail in a
direction that would, she thought, take her around the bottom of Deer
Mountain. She remembered that just a little while before she had come
to the place where she had first seen Lolla, a side path had crossed the
trail on which she had followed Dolly and her captor, and it seemed
likely to her that that path would also cross the trail she was now on.
If it did she could work back to a spot she knew, and so find her
bearings, at least. Then, if there was nothing else to be done, she
would certainly be able to get back to Long Lake. For her to stay in the
woods, lost and hungry, would not help Dolly.
So she set out bravely, walking as fast as she could. The sun was high
in the heavens now, and it was long after breakfast time, so that Bessie
was hungry, but she thought little of that.
As she had hoped, and half expected, she came, presently, and at what
seemed to her the proper place, upon a trail that crossed the one she
was following, and she turned to the left without hesitation. She might,
she felt, be going in the wrong direction altogether, but she could not
very well be more hopelessly lost she was already; and, if she had to
be out in the woods without a clue to the proper way to turn, she felt
it made very, little difference whether she was in one place or in
another.
The new trail was one evidently little used, and when Bessie had been on
it for perhaps ten minutes, and was beginning to think that it was time
she came in sight of the larger trail from Long Lake to Deer Mountain,
she heard someone coming toward her, and, rounding a bend, came into
sight of Lolla.
The gypsy girl seemed overwhelmed with joy at the sight of Bessie.
"Oh, how glad I am!" she exclaimed. "I was afraid that Peter had caught
you and tied you up with your friend, and that you would think I had
sent you up there so that he would trap you! How did you escape?"
"I climbed down the rocks," said Bessie simply, and smiled at Lolla's
gasp of astonishment.
"_You_ climbed down the rocks!" cried the gypsy. "However did you do
that? There ain't many men--not even many of our men--would try that, I
can tell you. I thought perhaps you would try to do that, and I was
coming around this way to get to the foot of the rocks and see if I
could find out what had become of you."
"You know where we are and how to get back, then?" asked Bessie.
"Of course I do. I know all these woods." Lolla laughed. "I have set
traps for partridges and rabbits here many and many a time, but the
guides never saw me. You knew where you were going, didn't you? If you'd
kept on as you were going when you met me you would have come to the
main trail in a minute or two, and then, if you'd turned to the right,
and kept straight on, you'd have come to Long Lake, where you started
from."
"I thought that was what would happen, Lolla, but I wasn't quite sure."
"Did you hear me shouting when Peter came along? I hoped you would
understand and bide yourself some way, so that he wouldn't find you.
What I was most afraid of was that you would be in the woods with your
friend, and that you wouldn't hear us."
"Yes, I heard you, and I knew what you were doing, Lolla; that you meant
to warn me that Peter had come sooner than you thought he would. I was
grateful, too, but I was afraid just to hide myself and let him go by,
because the woods were so thick on each side of the trail that I was
afraid he would see where I had broken through and catch me."
Lolla nodded her head.
"You are wise. You would be a good gypsy, Bessie. You would soon learn
all the things we know ourselves. Peter has very quick eyes, and he is
very suspicious, too. He saw you at the camp, you know, and he would
have guessed right away, if he had seen you there, that you were looking
for Dolly."
"That was just what I was afraid of, Lolla. He would have tied me up
with her if he had found me, wouldn't he?"
"Yes. He's a bad man, that Peter. I think if John and he were not so
friendly John would not have done this. He is kind, and brave, and he
always tried to stop anyone who wanted to steal children. He would steal
a horse, or a deer, but never a child; that was cowardly, he said."
"He didn't hurt you, did he, Lolla?"
The gypsy girl laughed.
"Oh, no. He tried to hit me, but I got away from him too quickly. I
would not let him touch me. With John it is different. He is my man; he
may beat me if he likes. But not Peter; I hate him. If he beat me I
would put this into him."
Bessie, surprised by the look of hate in Lolla's eyes, drew back in fear
as Lolla produced a long, sharp knife from the folds of her dress, and
flourished it for a moment.
"Oh, Lolla, please put that away!" she exclaimed. "There's no one here
to be afraid of." Lolla laughed.
"No, but I have it if I need it," she said meaningly.
"What are we going to do now, Lolla? We can't leave Dolly up there much
longer. They've got her tied up, and gagged, so that she can't call out,
and she's terribly uncomfortable, though I don't think she's suffering
much."
"We will get her soon," said Lolla, confidently.
"You stay near where she is, so that they can't get her away," said
Bessie, "and I'll go and get help. Then we shan't have any trouble."
But Lolla frowned at the suggestion.
"You would get those guides, and they would catch my man and put him in
prison, oh, for years, perhaps! No, no; I will get her away, with you to
help me. Leave that to me. Peter is stupid. Come with me now; I know
what we must do."
"Where are you going? This isn't the way back to where Dolly is,"
protested Bessie, as Lolla pressed on in the direction from which
Bessie had come. "We can never get up those rocks, Lolla; it was hard
enough to come down."
"We are not going there, not yet," said Lolla. "I must go to the camp
and find out what John is doing. If he comes back to watch her himself
it will be harder. But if he has to stay, and Peter looks after her,
then we shall have no trouble. You shall see; only trust me. I managed
so that you saw her, didn't I? Doesn't that show you that I can do what
I say?"
"I suppose so," sighed Bessie. "I should think you wouldn't care if that
man does go to prison, though, Lolla. He isn't nice to you, and you say
he'll beat you when you're married. American men don't beat their wives.
If they did they would be sent to prison. I should think you'd give him
up--"
Lolla's dark eyes flamed for a moment, but then she smiled, as if she
had remembered that Bessie, not being a gypsy, could not be expected to
understand the gypsy ways.
"He is a good man," she said. "He will always see that I have enough to
eat, and pretty things to wear. And if he beats me, it will be because I
have been wicked, and deserve to be beaten. When I am his wife he will
be like my father; if I am bad he will punish me. Is it not so among
your people?"
Bessie struggled with a laugh at the thought of the only married couple
she had ever known at all well: Paw and Maw Hoover. The idea that Paw
Hoover, the mildest and most inoffensive of men, might ever beat his
wife would have made anyone who knew that couple laugh.
Instead of turning when they reached the trail which Bessie had followed
after her descent from the rocks, Lolla led the way straight on.
"Are you sure you know where you are going, Lolla!" asked Bessie.
Lolla smiled at her scornfully.
"Yes, but it is not the way you would go," she said. "The trail to the
camp will be full of people. They will be out all over the camp
particularly. We must come to it from another direction. That is why we
are going this way."
It was not long before Bessie was as thoroughly lost as if she had been
in a maze. Lolla, however, seemed to know just where she was going. She
left one trail to turn into another without ever showing the slightest
doubt of her direction, and, at times, when the woods were thin, she
would take short cuts, leading the way through entirely pathless
portions of the forest with as much assurance as if she had been walking
through the streets of a city where she had lived all her life. Even
Bessie, used to long walks around Hedgeville, in which she had learned
the country thoroughly, was surprised.
"I don't believe I'd ever get to know these woods as well as you do,"
she said admiringly. "Why, you never seem even to hesitate."
"I've been here every summer since I was born," said Lolla, in a
laughing tone. "I ought to know these woods pretty well, I think."
"I hope no one sees us now," said Bessie, nervously. "I really do feel
as if it were wrong for me to keep away. Miss Mercer must be as anxious
about me as she is about Dolly."
"Is she the lady who is with you girls?"
"Yes. You see, she probably thinks that was carried off, as well as
Dolly."
"She will stop being anxious all the sooner for not knowing where you
are. I think it will not be long now before we get your friend away from
that place where she is hidden."
"Well, I certainly hope so. Listen! I think I can hear voices in front
of us."
"I heard them two or three minutes ago," said Lolla, with a smile. "Stay
here, now; hide behind that clump of bushes. I will go ahead and see
what I can find. Even if it is some of your friends they would not
suspect me; they would think I was just out for a walk."
So Bessie waited for perhaps ten minutes, while Lolla crept forward
alone. But the gypsy was back soon, smiling.
"All is safe now," she said. "Come quickly, though, so we shall get
behind them and be able to get near the camp. There is a place there
where you may hide while I find out what is going on."
They reached the spot Lolla meant in a few minutes more, and again
Bessie had to play the inactive part and wait while Lolla went on to
gain the information she needed. When she came back she was smiling
happily.
"That John is stupid, though he is so brave," she said to Bessie. "He
went back there to the camp, and he is sitting in front of his wagon.
There is a guide with a gun sitting near him, and my sister tells me
that the guide says he will follow him and shoot him if he tries to get
away.
"There are many people there, and the whole camp is angry and
frightened. The king says he will punish John, but John will not admit
that he knows where your friend is. We are safe from him. They will not
let him get away for a long time."
Bessie was comforted by the news. With her captor under guard, Dolly
had nothing to fear from him, and, though Peter might be a sullen and
dangerous man, Bessie felt that Lolla was right, and that he was too
thick witted to be greatly feared.
They made the return trip with hearts far lighter than they had been as
they made their way to the gypsy camp. Bessie had seen that Lolla was
afraid of John, though now that he, had been over-reached she was ready
enough to laugh at him.
"What are you going to do! How are you going to get her away, Lolla?"
asked Bessie, as they neared the point where she had first seen her
ally."
"I don't know yet," said Lolla, frankly. "If Peter is on the trail it
will be harder. I hope he will be inside, so that we can slip by without
his seeing us. If he is, and we get by, then you are to wait until you
hear me sing. So."
She sang a bar or two of a gypsy melody, and repeated it until Bessie,
too, could hum it, to prove that she had it right, and would not fail to
recognize it.
"When you hear me sing that, remember that you must run down and go to
your friend. Here is nay knife. Use it to cut the cords that tie her.
Then you and she must go back toward the rocks where you went down. And
when you hear me sing again you are to go down, as quickly as you can,
but quietly, and, as soon as you are past the place where she was
hidden, you must start running. I will try to catch up with you and go
with you, but do not wait for me."
"I don't quite understand," Bessie began.
But now Lolla was the general, brooking no defiance. She stamped her
foot.
"It does not matter whether you understand or not," she said sharply.
"If you want me to save your friend and get back to the others you must
do as you are told, and quickly. Now, come."
They went on up the trail, and, at the bend just below the spot where
she had broken through to reach Dolly before, Bessie waited while Lolla,
who had recognized the place from Bessie's description of it, crept
forward to make sure that the way was clear.
"All right," she whispered. "Come on."
Silently, but as swiftly as they could, they crept past the place, and,
when they were out of sight stopped.
"Now, you will know my song when you hear it?"
"Yes, indeed, Lolla. Why, what have you got there?"
"What I need to make Peter come with me," laughed Lolla. "See, a fine
meal, is it not? I got it at the camp. Let him smell that stew and he
would follow me out of the woods."
Bessie began to understand Lolla's plan at last. She was going to tempt
Peter to betray his orders from his friend by appealing to his stomach.
And Bessie wondered again, as she had many times since she had met
Lolla, at the cunning of the gypsy girl.
Her confidence in Lolla was complete by now, and she did not at all mind
waiting as she saw the little brightly clad figure disappear amidst the
green of the trail.
It was some time, however, before she heard any signs that indicated
that Lolla had obtained any results. And then it was not the song she
heard, but Lolla's clear laugh, rising above the heavy tones of Peter.
"Oh, oh! You would give me orders when I bring you breakfast? No, no,
Peter; that won't do. Come, she is safe there; come and eat with me,
where she cannot put a spell on your food to make it choke you."
"Do you think she would do that?"
That was Peter's voice, stupid and filled with doubt. Bessie laughed at
Lolla's cleverness. Peter, she thought, would be just the sort of man to
yield to the fears of superstition.
"I know she would; she hates us. Come, Peter; does it not look good?"
"Give it to me. There, I'll catch you--"
Then there was a sound of scuffling and running, but Bessie, noticing
that it drew further and further away, laughed. Lolla was a real
strategist. She understood how to handle the big gypsy, evidently. And a
moment later Bessie, her nerves quivering, all alert as she waited for
the signal, heard the notes of Lolla's song. At once she rushed down,
broke through the tangled growth, and was at Dolly's side, cutting away
at the cords that bound Dolly, and, first of all, tearing the
handkerchief from her mouth.
"It's all right now, we're safe, Dolly. Only you'll have to come
quickly, dear, when I get you free. There, that's it. Are you stiff? Can
you Stand up?"
"I guess so," gasped Dolly. "Oh, I'd do anything to get away from here.
Bessie, look!"
Bessie turned, to face Peter and Lolla, their faces twisted into
malignant grins. Lolla had betrayed her!