CAUGHT IN THE STORM
The Shadyside gymnasium was equipped with a fine pool, and it was the
school's boast that every girl learned to swim during her first term.
Perhaps the proximity of the lake and the lure of the small fleet of
canoes and rowboats tied up at the wharf had something to do with the
success of the swimming classes. No girl who could not swim was permitted
on the lake, alone or with a companion.
Betty and her chums awaited their final tests eagerly--so excited the
last day or two they could scarcely keep their minds on their books or
sit in patience through a recitation--and passed them with flying colors.
Constance Howard was an excellent swimmer, and it was the sight of her
paddling gracefully about the lake on sunny Saturday afternoons that
spurred the seven who could not swim on to greater effort.
"Come on," cried Betty gaily, taking the gymnasium steps two at a time.
"Come, girls--this afternoon we go rowing. I've my 'stiffcut,' as Mr.
Peabody used to call it, and we've all passed. Oh, it's cloudy!"
She looked at the sky disappointedly. When they had gone into the pool an
hour before the sun had been shining brightly, but now the gray clouds
were thick overhead and the air was chilly.
"Who cares for the weather?" said Bobby scornfully. "Guess it will take
more than a little rain to stop me! I've been crazy to take a row-boat
out for three weeks."
"Perhaps it will clear," contributed the optimistic Louise.
But after lunch the sky was still overcast.
"Don't be silly--it won't rain," urged Bobby, as her chums demurred.
"Next Saturday it may be too cold. Oh, come on, girls."
Thus incited, they went down to the wharf and made their choice of boats.
Norma and Alice wanted to take out a canoe, and they offered to paddle
for Libbie, who seemed disinclined to exercise. Betty had wondered once
or twice if the girl were ill, for she seemed very nervous, jumped if a
door slammed or some one spoke to her suddenly, and in the morning looked
as if she had not slept well.
Betty and Bobby selected a flat-bottomed row-boat and for passenger they
took Frances, who offered to help row if they became tired.
Louise and Constance chose another canoe.
They headed north, and once out in the center of the lake, paddled
and rowed steadily. Betty's rowing experience was limited, but Bobby
was proud of her "stroke," and soon taught her chum the secret of
handling the oars.
"Ship ahoy!" shouted Bobby presently.
Libbie jumped and looked ahead anxiously.
"It's only the boys," she said dully.
An eight-oared rowing shell shot down to them, and the freckled-faced
coxswain, Gilbert Lane, one of the boys the girls had met at Bob and
Tommy's "party," grinned cheerfully.
"Where you going?" he asked, resting a friendly hand on the
rowboat's rim.
Bobby described an arc with her oar that incidentally showered the
questioner with shining water drops.
"We're out for adventure," she answered airily.
"Just got our swimming certificates to-day," volunteered Betty.
Bob flashed her a congratulatory smile.
"Race you to the end of the lake?" suggested Tommy Tucker.
Bobby regarded him with magnificent scorn.
"As if eight of you couldn't beat two!" she said significantly. "I never
heard such talk! Why you'd have a walk!" she added.
The boys shouted with laughter.
"You're a poet, Bobby," declared Tommy. "Tennyson had nothing on
you--had he, Libbie?"
Libbie turned her dark eyes on him and frowned a little.
"I wasn't listening," she said indifferently.
"Well, anyway, row up to the end of the lake, will you?" suggested
Gilbert. "With drill night ahead of us, we want a little brightness to
remember the day by."
Canoes, rowboat and shell swept on up the lake, and when the scrubby
pines that bordered the narrow peak of the north shore were in sight,
Bobby glanced back over her shoulder at Betty.
"You're spattering me," she complained.
"I thinks it's beginning to rain," said Betty mildly, and even as she
spoke, Louise called to them:
"Girls, it's beginning to pour!"
A sudden blast of wind struck them, blowing the rain against their backs.
"Keep on rowing!" shouted Bob's voice. "We'll have to land and walk back.
You girls can never beat back against this storm. We're almost to the
shore now."
A few minutes more and the boats touched shore. The boys were out in an
instant and helped the girls to land.
"We'll carry up the boats--don't you think that is best, Tommy?" shouted
Bob. "If we carry them up high enough and leave them, they will be
perfectly safe."
The wind and the rain made shouting necessary if one's voice were to
carry above the storm. The boys lifted the light boats and carried them
into the woods, turning them over so that the keels were up.
"Now the question is," said Bob, who seemed by common consent to have
been elected leader, "shall we walk along the shore and get drenched, or
take a chance of finding our way through the woods?"
To their astonishment, Libbie burst into a fit of hysterical weeping.
"Don't go through the woods," she begged, her teeth chattering. "We'll
fall into that awful Indian Chasm."
Bobby's heart reproached her for her thoughtless joke and she put an arm
around her cousin.
"Libbie, you never thought I was serious about pushing you into the
chasm, did you?" she asked anxiously. "Is that what has been making you
act so queerly ever since? I was only fooling."
So, thought Betty, Bobby, too, had noticed Libbie's unnatural behavior.
"Oh, it isn't that," sobbed Libbie. "I can't explain--but if we go
through the woods, I'm sure I shall go crazy."
"Well, then, that settles it," said Bob comfortably. "Better to be
drowned than to go crazy. Can you turn up your sweater collars, girls? I
wish we'd brought some raincoats along."
Splashing and stumbling, they followed Bob down to the shore and began
the weary walk that would lead them back to the school. After fifteen
minutes' steady walking they came to a dense undergrowth that was
impossible to penetrate.
"No use, we'll have to make a cut through the woods," announced Bob. "Up
this way and over, ought to bring us out right."
He was so cheerful and patient that the tired, rain-soaked girls could
not do otherwise than follow his example. Libbie was crying silently, but
the others tramped along cheerfully, singing, at Betty's suggestion, old
college and school songs.
"Look here, Bob," said Tommy Tucker in an undertone, "I don't think we're
going in the right direction. Don't you say it would be better to take
the girls to that deserted cabin we found the other day and leave them
there while we explore a bit? They're getting soaked through, and Libbie
Littell is fixing to have hysterics. Leave a couple of the boys with 'em,
so they won't be afraid, and then we'll locate the right trail and take
'em over it home in a hurry."
This suggestion sounded like good, common-sense to Bob, and he said so.
"Betty could walk ten miles and be all right," he declared proudly, "and
I think Bobby is good for a hike, too. But Frances Martin can't see when
the rain gets on her glasses, and, as you say, something is the matter
with Libbie. So let's make for the cabin, quick."
The Salsette boys had explored the woods pretty thoroughly, and on a
recent expedition Bob and his chums had stumbled on an old one-room
cabin, buried deep in the woods and evidently unoccupied for years. It
was not far from the end of the lake, and toward it they now led the
girls, explaining as they went what they intended to do.
"We'll be all right," said Betty at once. "I think if Libbie can sit down
and rest she'll feel better, too. And if you all want to go and hunt for
the trail, you needn't worry about us."
"Oh, Sydney and I intend to stay," Gilbert Lane assured her quickly. (The
boys had settled that among themselves.) "We'll be handy in case any
Indians or the like come after you."
Betty gave him a warning glance, for Libbie looked frightened. Surely
something was wrong with the girl!
The cabin door was open and the interior was comparatively dry. There was
no furniture, but three or four old packing boxes furnished the girls
with seats. Bob and five of his friends disappeared, whistling. Gilbert
and Sydney were investigating the ramshackle fireplace to see what the
prospects were for starting a fire when a shriek from Libbie brought them
to their feet.
"A ghost!" cried the girl. "A ghost! Over there in the corner!"
Frances Martin gave a cry, and Betty and Bobby went white. Even Gilbert
afterward confessed that his scalp prickled when a figure stepped forward
from a narrow closet against the wall.
"Ugh! Howdy!" he grunted, and they saw that he was a very old and very
dirty Indian.
"Rain," he said slowly, pointing to the door. "Stop soon now. Go
get supper."
He shuffled over the doorsill and at the edge he turned.
"Howdy!" he said, apparently with some vague idea of farewell.
"Much rain!"
Petrified, they watched him hobble away through the woods.