A LONG RIDE
"I wish we had brought Hero," thought Ruth regretfully as she hurried
down the shadowy road, "then he could have come with me for company."
For at the last moment before leaving home the little girls had decided
that it was not best to let Hero accompany them. There was not room for
him in the pony-cart, and for him to race along the streets might well
mean that he would again disappear; so Ruth had been quite ready to
leave him at home. But now she would have been very glad to have him
running along beside her. "Josephine" and "Cecilia" had also been left
behind; in fact neither Winifred nor Ruth had remembered the dolls until
after they had said good-bye to Aunt Deborah. And, while Ruth was
regretting the absence of Hero, Winifred, sitting close beside Fluff,
was wishing that her beloved Josephine was there to keep her company.
"It would be a great adventure for Josephine," she thought, looking up
through the overhanging branches of the big oak under which Fluff had
stopped to rest. For a time she amused herself by braiding the long
grass and weaving it about green twigs broken from an elder-bush until
she had made a wide, shallow basket with a handle. Into this she put the
violets and wild honeysuckle, resolving to take it home as a present to
her mother. She put it carefully under the seat of the pony-cart, and
then decided to search for a spring or brook, for she was thirsty.
Fluff showed no signs of wishing to start for home, or even to eat the
tempting young grass growing near.
"If I find a brook perhaps I can lead him, and then he will get a good
drink," thought Winifred, crossing the narrow road and pushing aside a
thick growth of wild shrubs.
"Oh!" she exclaimed, for she had stepped at once on to damp yielding
moss which covered her low cut slippers and whetted her feet as
completely as if she had stepped into a brook. Just beyond this moss lay
a clear little pool of water, evidently fed by springs.
Winifred discovered that the farther, or upper, bank of the pool was dry
and sandy, and in a few moments she was kneeling beside the clear water
and drinking thirstily. She then made her way back to the road, breaking
down branches of the shrubs to make a way for Fluff, who was now on his
feet looking about as if in search of his little mistress.
"Come on, Fluff," she said coaxingly, grasping the plume-like mane.
"Come and have a drink." The pony moved forward obediently. He hesitated
a moment at having to push his way through the undergrowth, but with
Winifred encouraging and urging him forward he was soon in sight of the
pool, and then sprang forward so suddenly that his mane slid through
Winifred's hands and she found herself on her hands and knees while
Fluff, with his nose in the clear water, was drinking thirstily.
Winifred laughed as she scrambled to her feet. Her shoes and stockings
were wet and muddy, her pretty blue linen dress was torn, and now she
realized that her hat was gone, that she must have lost it in pushing
her way through the undergrowth; but these things seemed of small
consequence to Winifred just then; for the pony, with his forefeet
planted firmly in the shallow water, was evidently more himself than he
had been since he had stopped short under the oak tree.
"I'll lead him back and harness him into the cart and start after Ruth,"
thought his little mistress happily, "and I do believe it is getting
dark!" she added aloud, realizing that the woods seemed very shadowy, as
she made her way toward the pool.
As she came near Fluff he lifted his head from the water, shook himself
much as a big dog would do, and whinnied with satisfaction. But as
Winifred approached more closely he gave a little dancing step into the
water just beyond her reach.
"Oh, Fluff! It isn't any time to play games. We must start for home
before it is really dark," said Winifred. But Fluff was now rested, and
free from his harness in a fragrant shadowy wood. He was sure that his
little mistress must be as ready as himself for a game, so he edged
along the pool until a clear space opened before him, and then he
stepped out, and trotted briskly away between the tall trees.
"Fluff! Fluff!" called Winifred, running after him. "Oh! where did he
go?" for the pony had disappeared as if the earth had swallowed him.
Winifred ran on until her way was blocked by thickly growing underbrush.
Then she turned back, but now she could not find the pool. The shadows
deepened; she could hardly distinguish one tree from another, and there
was no sound or sign from the gray pony.
"What shall I do?" she said, standing close to the trunk of a pine tree
that rose straight and tall with wide-spreading branches. She realized
that she must now be some distance from the road and the big oak tree
where she had left the pony-cart, and Fluff perhaps was deep in this
wilderness, unable to make his way back; and, worst of all, night was
close upon her.
It was indeed a dangerous position for a little girl to be alone in a
wilderness as Winifred found herself. It was a time when many wild
beasts still wandered about, often coming near to the outskirts of towns
and villages. Winifred remembered that only a few weeks earlier a
catamount had been killed at Fair Mount, and she knew that in the early
spring bears left the dens where they had slept through the winter, and
wandered through the woods eating the tender young buds and leaves. She
crouched closer to the tree as she remembered these things, and then
suddenly she recalled the words that she had worked on her sampler:
"There shall no evil befall thee. For he shall give his angels charge
over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways."
Her mother had traced the words, and Winifred had worked them in dull
blue yarns on the perforated wool cloth. She said them over aloud: "No
evil befall thee," and was no longer afraid. She did not think now of
the beasts of the dark wood, but of a kindly presence that would shelter
her.
"Perhaps Fluff will come and find me," she thought hopefully. "Anyway,
Ruth will soon be back with Gilbert, and they will call my name, and I
shall call back," and so comforted and encouraged Winifred sat down on
the soft pine spills and leaned back against the tall tree. A pair of
squirrels chattered noisily in the branches; a soft-footed little animal
sped by almost touching her feet, and she could hear faint calls from
nesting birds near at hand.
"For he shall give his angels charge over thee," the little girl
whispered to herself, and soothed and quieted by the spring fragrance of
the wood her eyes closed.
Ruth, meanwhile, was trudging along the road toward home. She was sure
that she could find the way without any trouble.
"All I have to do is to turn when I come to the river road and follow it
straight back to the city, and then any one can tell me how to get
home," she thought, hopefully. But she began to think she should never
reach the river road. Her thin shoes were scrubbed and dusty, and she
wondered what Aunt Deborah would say at her untidy appearance.
Now and then she would quicken her pace and run until she was out of
breath. She began to understand why Fluff was tired out. Just before she
reached the river road there was the sound of breaking twigs, and of
some animal making its way through the woods, and the next moment a deer
followed by a young fawn sprang into the road directly in front of the
surprised and startled little girl; but they vanished before Ruth
realized that they had been within reach of her hand.
"Oh! I wish Winifred could have seen them," she thought. The road now
hardly showed in the thick dusk. Ruth stumbled often, and began to be
both hungry and thirsty. She wished she could stop and rest; but the
thought of Winifred sitting alone under the big oak tree made her
resolve not to stop until she reached home.
At last she could see an open space ahead, and the dark line of the
river; and at the same moment she heard the sound of trotting feet on
the road behind her and a little gray figure ran swiftly by.
"That was Fluff! I know it was Fluff," she exclaimed, and called loudly
after the pony. But Fluff did not stop; he knew he was headed for home,
and it was much easier to run along free and unharnessed than to pull a
cart containing two little girls.
Ruth now hardly knew what to do. Perhaps Winifred might be coming
closely behind the pony.
"Perhaps I ought to wait and see if she is coming," thought Ruth,
puzzled and uncertain as to the right course to take. Before she could
decide she saw the gleam of a lantern, and heard the wheels of a
carriage coming rapidly over the road, and without a moment's
hesitation she called out: "Stop! Please stop!" and heard a familiar
voice respond:
"It's Ruth. It's Ruth." And the light of the lantern showed Gilbert and
his mother in Ned Farris's pony-cart.
In a moment they were standing in the road beside her, and Ruth was
telling the story of the woodland road, and of Winifred waiting beside
the pony-cart under a big oak tree.
"And Fluff just ran by, headed for home," she concluded.
"I thought it was Fluff who raced past us. I was sure it was he," said
Gilbert.
They were now puzzled what course to take. To leave Winifred alone so
far from any human habitation was not to be thought of; neither did Mrs.
Merrill wish Ruth to go on toward home without some one with her.
"Gilbert, you must go home with Ruth, and I will drive on after
Winifred," she decided. "Mrs. Pernell will be sadly troubled when Fluff
comes running home and she has no news of her little girl. Go as quickly
as you can."
Gilbert agreed; but he felt a little defrauded as he and Ruth turned
toward home. He would have enjoyed going up that dark hillside road,
where it seemed to him some interesting adventure might befall a
traveler.
Mrs. Merrill, with the lantern fastened to the front of the cart, drove
rapidly up the hill, trying to pierce the dusky shadows of the roadside.
Now and then she called Winifred's name, and listened intently for some
response, but none came.
At last the light from the lantern showed the pony-carriage in the
shadow of the big oak tree, and in a moment Mrs. Merrill was on the
ground beside it. But Winifred was not to be seen. "Winifred!" she
called over and over, but there was no reply.