THE KINGDOM OF PIPES
Ruth Fielding at first felt only hurt; then she felt angry. She was no
longer the timid, sensitive girl who had faced Jabez Miller when she
first came to the Red Mill with a tremulous smile, to be sure, but tears
standing thick in her eyes. No, indeed!
The present Ruth Fielding, a young woman of purpose and experience, not
only could hide her feelings--especially if they were hurt ones--but
possessed a saving sense of humor. And to her mind, just a moment later,
Tom Cameron's very military looking shoulders and stride seemed rather
funny.
He had hurt her; but then, he had hurt her as a boy might. It was true,
perhaps, Tom was not grown up. Ruth considered that she was--very much
so!
There he was, daring to complain because his army career had ended so
suddenly--wishing that he had remained in uniform. And how would his
father and his sister have felt if he had done so!
"He's a great, big booby!" Ruth whispered to herself. Then her smile came
back--that wistful, caressing smile--and she shook her head. "But he's
Tom, and he always will be. Dear me! isn't he ever going to grow up?"
So she hid her hurt and accepted the first partner thereafter who
offered; but it was not Chess. Secretly she knew what the matter with Tom
was. And she was too proud to let the ex-captain see that she cared.
Nevertheless she was sorry that the party from down the river broke up as
they did when the time to go home came.
She found herself in the Copley's launch again, with Chess' sisters and
the members of the house party the Copleys were entertaining at their
island. This dividing of the clans made it possible for Chess after
letting the others out at the Copley dock, to take Ruth to the moving
picture island alone.
It was a lovely, soft, moonlight night. The haze over the islands and the
passages between could not be called a fog, but it was almost as
shrouding as a fog. When Chess ran the launch outside into the main
stream, where the current was broad and swift, the haze lay upon the
rippling surface like a blanket.
They were going very swiftly here, for it was with the current. Suddenly
Chess shut off the engine. The "plop" of the exhaust ceased. They drifted
silently on the bosom of the St. Lawrence.
"I don't see why I am treated so, Ruth," Chess suddenly burst out. "Do
you know, I'm awfully unhappy?"
"You poor boy!" said Ruth in her warm-hearted way. "I think you are
over-sensitive."
"Of course I am sensitive. I shall always be when I am--am--interested in
any person and their treatment of me. It is congenital."
"Dear, dear!" laughed Ruth. "They have discovered that even incipient
congenital idiocy can be cured by the removal of the adenoids. But I
don't suppose such an operation will help you?"
"Oh, don't tease a fellow," complained her friend.
He reached for the throttle, then hesitated. Somewhere in the mist ahead
was the throb of another engine.
"Who's this?" muttered Chess.
"Maybe it is Tom--looking for us," said Ruth, chuckling.
"The gall of him," exclaimed the heated Copley. Then he made a gesture
for silence. A long, quavering "co-ee! co-ee!" came through the mist and
from the south.
"From one of the islands," said Chess quickly.
"What island is that over there?" demanded Ruth, in a whisper. "Isn't it
the one we took the first picture on?"
"It sure is," agreed the young fellow, but wonderingly.
"The Kingdom of Pipes," murmured Ruth.
"What's that?" asked Chessleigh.
Ruth repeated Helen's name for the rocky island on which Ruth had met the
queer old man. "That call came from the island, didn't it?" she asked.
"I believe it did. What's going on here?"
"Hush!" begged Ruth. "That launch is coming nearer."
As she spoke, a moving object appeared in the mist. There was no light
upon this strange craft. Chessleigh shuttered his own cockpit lamp
instantly.
"Good boy," acclaimed Ruth. "There is something going on here----"
They heard the call from the island again. There was a low reply from the
strange launch--a whistle. Then the launch pushed on and was hidden by
the mist again from the curious eyes of Ruth and her companion.
But they knew it had gone close to the island, if it had not really
touched there. Its engine was stilled. All they heard for a time was the
lapping of the waves.
"I'd like to know what it means," grumbled Chess.
Ruth agreed. "Let's wait a while. We may hear or see something more."
"Won't see much, I guess," replied her companion.
"Never mind. Let the boat drift. We're all right out here in the current,
are we not?"
"Guess so. It beats my time," said her friend. "They say there is a lot
of smuggling done along the border."
"Do you say so?" gasped Ruth, clasping her hands and almost as excited as
Helen might have been. "Smugglers! Think of it!"
"And bad eggs they are."
"Of course there is no danger?"
"Danger of what?" he asked.
"Wouldn't the smugglers hurt us if we caught them?"
"Don't know. I've got a loaded pistol in the cabin. Guess I'll get it
out," said Chess.
"I guess you won't!" Ruth exclaimed. "We'll go right away from here
before we get into a fight!"
"Humph!" grunted Chess. "You don't suppose they would welcome any spies
if they are smugglers, do you?" he asked.
"But what do they smuggle? Diamonds? Precious stones?"
"Don't know. Maybe. There is a heavy internal revenue tax on diamonds,"
Chess said.
"Goodness! wouldn't Helen like to be here."
"She'd want to go ashore and take a hand in it," grinned Copley. "I know
her."
"Yes, Helen is brave," admitted Ruth.
"Humph! She's foolish, you mean," he declared. "Whatever and whoever
those fellows are, they would not welcome visitors I fancy."
Their launch had been drifting by the island, the upper ridge and trees
of which they could see quite plainly. Suddenly a breath of wind--the
forecast of the breeze that often rises toward daybreak--swooped down
upon the river. It split the mist and revealed quite clearly the upper
end of the island where Ruth had interviewed the queer old man, and which
Copley's launch had now drifted past.
A light showed suddenly, and for a few moments, close to the water's
edge. It revealed enough for the two in the drifting launch to see
several figures outlined in the misty illumination of the light.
There was the bow of the mysterious boat close against the landing place.
At least three men were in the boat and on the shore. Ruth could not be
sure that either of them was the old man she had spoken with.
But she and Chess Copley saw that they were unloading something from the
boat--square, seemingly heavy boxes, yet not so heavy that they could not
be passed from hand to hand. One was about all the weight a man might
easily lift.
"What do you suppose those boxes are?" whispered Ruth, as the Copley
launch drifted into the mist again and the end of the island and the
other boat were blotted out of sight.
"Give it up. Provisions--supplies. Maybe they are going to camp there.
Lots of people camp out on these smaller islands."
"The King of the Pipes will have something to say about that," laughed
Ruth. "One thing sure about it," she added the next moment, as Chess
started his engine again. "Those boxes don't contain diamonds."
"I should say not!"
"So if we saw smugglers they are smuggling something besides precious
stones," said the girl gaily. "Won't Helen be interested when I tell
her!"