MOTHER WIT TO THE RESCUE
The young ruffian who was so notorious about the Four Corners was
really in a serious predicament. In making a long cast the boulder had
rolled under him and, being precipitated into the pond, he was pinned
to the bottom by his legs. The two boys with him had sprung into the
pond, and were now wet to their necks; but they could not roll back
the heavy boulder.
Just as Laura and Chet, with their school mates, arrived Hebe sank
back with a gurgle, and the water went over his head. He had been
barely able to keep his mouth and nostrils out of water until that
moment.
"Hebe's gettin' drowned! Hebe's gettin' drowned!" yelled Mike, the
victim's young brother, dancing up and down on the shore.
"Get in there at once and hold his head up!" commanded Laura Belding.
"Then we'll roll away the stone. But he _will_ drown if you don't hold
him up."
Mike did as he was bid. When Hebe got his breath again he began to use
language that was unfit for the girls to hear, at least.
"Say!" exclaimed Chet, his eyes blazing, "you stop that or I'll hold
your head under the water myself. What kind of a fellow are you,
anyway?"
Hebe gasped and kept still. Perhaps he had scarcely realized who the
people were about him. Laura said:
"Can't you boys, all together, roll away that stone?"
"We'll try," said Lance, already beginning to strip off his shoes and
stockings. "Come ahead, Chet."
They made even Purt Sweet join them, bare-footed and with their
trousers rolled up as far as they would go. They waded in and got
around the rock. Hebe was in a sitting posture, and the weight of the
stone bore both his legs down into the muddy bottom. But there was
hard-pan under the mud, and it was impossible to drag the victim from
beneath the huge rock.
But the boys couldn't even jar the rock. It had slipped from the bank
and rolled a little, and now it was settling slowly into the ooze,
bearing Hebe's legs down under it.
The situation was serious in the extreme. Slowly, as Hebe settled
beneath the rock, the water was creeping up about his lips and nose.
Although he held his head back the water would, in time, rise above
his mouth. And the rise was as steady as a tide.
Again and again Chet Belding and his comrades tried to push the huge
rock over. But, as at first, they could not even budge it. Mike began
to cry again. Hebe said, gruffly:
"I reckon I gotter croak, eh? This ain't no nice way to die, you bet!"
"Die--nothing!" cried Laura.
She ran back to the car and tore the piece of rubber pipe away from
the bulb of the horn. Handing this to Hebe, she showed him how he
could lie back in a more comfortable position, if he wished, and
breathe through the tube. She produced some cotton, too, so that he
could stop his ears and nostrils.
"Now, you keep up your courage," Mother Wit told him. "We'll soon find
a way of getting you out of this. You're not dead yet."
Hebe said nothing, but he watched her, when his eyes were above water,
with a grateful air.
"But I tell you, Laura, we can't begin to start this stone even,"
growled Chet, in her ear. "You will have to think of something better
than _this_."
"So I will," cried Laura. "I'll think of a rope."
"A rope?"
"Yes. A good, strong one. One that will go around that rock and then
be plenty long enough to hitch to one of the cars--the big car. I
believe we can start the rock that way."
"Hurrah!" cried Lance. "She's got the idea! What do you say, Chet?"
"Looks like it. But how about the rope? Where'll we get it?"
"We got a goot one at our house," said Otto, who was sitting down,
puffing, after having strained at the rock. "Dot hay rope, he be juist
de t'ing."
"The hay rope for ours, then," cried Chet. "Come on, Otto. We'll go
after it!"
He started for the machines, the Swiss youth after him. They got in
the Belding car immediately and started the engine. Purt Sweet sprang
up with a yell and ran along the shore of the pond after the car.
"Oh, oh! Stop!" he shrieked.
But Chet did not hear him. Lance caught Pretty by the arm and demanded
to know what he was yelling about.
"Why," gasped Purt, "they've driven off with a whole lot of the lunch
the girls spread on the seats. And look at them go! Why! it'll all be
joggled onto the floor of the tonneau before they get back."
"Oh--_you_!" exclaimed Lance, balked for words with which to express
his contempt.
The Belding car was quickly out of sight. The boys and girls gathered
around the spot where Hebe Pocock had met with his accident. Nobody
could help him, and he began to be in extreme pain. His head was under
water a good deal of the time; but the piece of rubber pipe allowed
him to breathe, and Mike, or the other smaller boy from the Four
Corners, held Hebe's face above water as much as possible.
Chet and Otto were not gone an hour; but it seemed, as Lance said, "a
creation of time." Pocock was pretty weak when the rope was brought.
Meanwhile the chauffeur had run the big car along the road and backed
it near the rock and headed in the proper direction. They passed the
heavy cable around the boulder and then wrapped it around the car so
that the strain would not come in any one place and perhaps do the car
damage.
"You bigger boys get in there," said Laura, "and take Hebe under the
arms. As soon as the rock moves pull him out. For the rope may slip
and the rock slide back deeper into the water than it is now. That
would kill him, perhaps."
"You're right, Laura," said her brother, gravely. "We'll take care."
Chet and Lance went to the aid of the unfortunate youth. Otto managed
the rope. The chauffeur started his engine and got into his seat.
"Ready! start easily," called Laura, when the boys were placed
directly behind Hebe.
The car lurched forward; the rope strained and creaked; then--slowly
but surely--the rock began to move.
"Easy, boys!" commanded Laura.
Hebe shrieked with pain. The boulder rolled and the rope slipped. But
the two boys darted back into deeper water, dragging the victim of the
accident with them.
It was all over and Hebe was released in a few seconds. But he had
lost consciousness and they carried him out and put him into the
Belding car.
"Shall we take him home?" Chet demanded.
"He ought to have a doctor at once," said Laura. "Better still, he
ought to be taken to the hospital."
"That's what we'll do," said Chet, quickly. "Lance, you and Purt come
with me. We'll make him easy in the tonneau. And gee! here's the
luncheon all in a jumble."
"What did I tell you?" wailed Prettyman.
"Oh, get in! get in!" exclaimed Chet. "You can stuff your face with
all those goodies while we ride into town. And maybe this poor fellow
will come to his senses and try Nellie's lemon meringue pie--it's a
dandy, Nellie!"
By the shortest road they could take--through the Four Corners--the ride
to the City Hospital was bound to occupy an hour--and another to
return. Meanwhile the remainder of the party had their lunch and then
went after the nut harvest. Despite the incident of the wounded
Pocock, the day ended happily enough and they went home at dusk with
stores of chestnuts and shellbarks.
The Beldings were late, of course, and Mammy Jinny, their old black
cook, held back dinner for them, but with many complaints.
"It's jest de beatenes' what disher fambly is a-comin' to," she
grumbled, as she helped wait at table when the family had gathered for
the belated meal. "Gits so, anyhow, dat de hull on youse is out 'most
all day long. Eberything comes onter Mammy's shoulders."
"That's all right, Jinny. They're good and broad," said Mr. Belding,
for she was a privileged character.
"Ya--as. Dat's wot youse allus say, Mars' Belding. Den dere was de
watah man come ter bodder we-uns. Sech a combobberation I never do
see. I tol' him we nebber drink no tap watah, but has it bro't in
bottles, same as nice fo'ks does----"
"The water man?" repeated Mrs. Belding, curiously. "I can't imagine
who that could be."
"Ya--as, ma'am!" exclaimed Mammy Jinny, who certainly loved the sound
of long words, and hard words. "He come yere enquiratin' erbout de
tuberculosis in de watah."
"Crickey jacks!" gasped Chet, choking. "What's that?"
"My son!" begged his mother. "Please do not use such awful
expressions. You are worse than Jinny."
"Ain't nothin' de matter wid wot I sez!" declared the old black woman.
"Dat's wot he wanted ter know erbout--de tuberculosis in de watah."
Mr. Belding recovered his breath. "Was by chance the man asking about
the _consumption_ of water, Jinny?" he asked.
"Dat's it," said the black woman. "Same t'ing, ain't it? Miss Laura
say so. 'Consumption' an' 'tuberculosis' jes de same--heh?"
"That's one on you, Laura!" shouted Chet, as Mammy Jinny indignantly
waddled out. "Shouldn't teach Mammy words of more than one 'syllabub.'
You've been warned before.
"By the way," he added, for they had told their parents about the
adventure of the afternoon, "that Pocock is in the ward with the man
Hester Grimes saved from the forest fire--right in the next bed to
Billson. Pocock had both legs broken, the doctors told me--one above
the knee and the other below. He's going to have a bad time of it."
"Pocock, eh?" said Mr. Belding. "Hebron Pocock is the name of the
person who applied to the Board of Education for the job of watchman
at the girls' gymnasium. I believe he gave Henry Grimes as reference.
But I think we shall keep Jackway. He's a faithful soul and, whoever
got into the gym. and did that damage, I am convinced that it was not
Jackway's fault."
"No; it wasn't Jackway's fault," muttered Chet to Laura. "But I guess
we could find the person at fault pretty easily, eh?"