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[Illustration: SHE WAS UNCONSCIOUS WHEN THEY LIFTED HER OUT. Ruth
Fielding at Lighthouse Point. Page 78]
RUTH FIELDING AT LIGHTHOUSE POINT
OR
NITA, THE GIRL CASTAWAY
BY
ALICE B. EMERSON
Author of Ruth Fielding of The Red Mill,
Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall etc.
ILLUSTRATED
NEW YORK
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Books for Girls
By ALICE B. EMERSON
RUTH FIELDING SERIES
12mo. Cloth. Illustrated.
RUTH FIELDING OF THE RED MILL
Or, Jasper Parloe's Secret.
RUTH FIELDING AT BRIARWOOD HALL
Or, Solving the Campus Mystery.
RUTH FIELDING AT SNOW CAMP
Or, Lost in the Backwoods.
RUTH FIELDING AT LIGHTHOUSE POINT
Or, Nita, the Girl Castaway.
RUTH FIELDING AT SILVER RANCH
Or, Schoolgirls Among the Cowboys.
Cupples & Leon Co., Publishers, New York.
Copyright, 1913, by
Cupples & Leon Company
Ruth Fielding at Lighthouse Point
Printed in U.S.A.
CONTENTS
Chapter Page
I AN INITIATION 1
II THE FOX AT WORK 9
III ON LAKE OSAGO 16
IV TROUBLE AT THE RED MILL 24
V THE TINTACKER MINE 32
VI UNCLE JABEZ AT HIS WORST 42
VII THE SIGNAL GUN 49
VIII THE LIFEBOAT IS LAUNCHED 57
IX THE GIRL IN THE RIGGING 64
X THE DOUBLE CHARGE 72
XI THE STORY OF THE CASTAWAY 80
XII BUSY IZZY IN A NEW ASPECT 90
XIII CRAB PROVES TO BE OF THE HARDSHELL VARIETY 97
XIV THE TRAGIC INCIDENT IN A FISHING EXCURSION 103
XV TOM CAMERON TO THE RESCUE 114
XVI RUTH'S SECRET 120
XVII WHAT WAS IN THE NEWSPAPER 128
XVIII ANOTHER NIGHT ADVENTURE 137
XIX THE GOBLINS' GAMBOL 145
XX "WHAR'S MY JANE ANN?" 153
XXI CRAB MAKES HIS DEMAND 162
XXII THIMBLE ISLAND 171
XXIII MAROONED 179
XXIV PLUCKY MOTHER PURLING 187
XXV WHAT JANE ANN WANTED 196
RUTH FIELDING AT LIGHTHOUSE POINT
CHAPTER I
AN INITIATION
A brown dusk filled the long room, for although the windows were shrouded
thickly and no lamp burned, some small ray of light percolated from
without and made dimly visible the outlines of the company there gathered.
The low, quavering notes of an organ sighed through the place. There
was the rustle and movement of a crowd. To the neophyte, who had been
brought into the hall with eyes bandaged, it all seemed very mysterious
and awe-inspiring.
Now she was set in a raised place and felt that before her was the
company of masked and shrouded figures, in scarlet dominoes like those
worn by the two guards who had brought her from the anteroom. The
bandage was whisked from her eyes; but she could see nothing of her
surroundings, nor of the company before which she stood.
"Candidate!" spoke a hollow, mysterious voice somewhere in the gloom,
yet sounding so close to her ear that she started. "Candidate! you stand
before the membership body of the S. B.'s. You are as yet unknown to
them and they unknown to you. If you enter the secret association of
the S. B.'s you must throw off and despise forever all ties of a like
character. Do you agree?"
The candidate obeyed, in so far as she prodded her sharply in the ribs
and a shrill voice whispered: "Say you do--gump!"
The candidate obeyed, in so far as she proclaimed that she did, at least.
"It is an oath," went on the sepulchral voice. "Remember!"
In chorus the assembly immediately repeated, "Remember!" in solemn
tones.
"Candidate!" repeated the leading voice, "you have been taught the
leading object of our existence as a society. What is it?"
Without hesitation now, the candidate replied: "Helpfulness."
"It is right. And now, what do our initials stand for?"
"Sweetbriar," replied the shaking voice of the candidate.
"True. That is what our initials stand for to the world at large--to
those who are not initiated into the mysteries of the S. B.'s. But
those letters may stand for many things and it is my privilege to explain
to you now that they likewise are to remind us all of two virtues that
each Sweetbriar is expected to practice--to be sincere and to befriend.
Remember! Sincerity--Befriend. Remember!"
Again the chorus of mysterious voices chanted: "Remember!"
"And now let the light shine upon the face of the candidate, that the
Shrouded Sisterhood may know her where'er they meet her. Once! Twice!
Thrice! Light!"
At the cry the ray of a spot-light flashed out of the gloom at the far
end of the long room and played glaringly upon the face and figure of
the candidate. She herself was more blinded by the glare than she had
been by the bandage. There was a rustle and movement in the room, and
the leading voice went on:
"Sisters! the novice is now revealed to us all. She has now entered into
the outer circle of the Sweetbriars. Let her know us, where'er she meets
us, by our rallying cry. Once! Twice! Thrice! _Now!_"
Instantly, and in unison, the members chanted the following "yell":
"S. B.--Ah-h-h!
S. B.--Ah-h-h!
Sound our battle-cry
Near and far!
S. B.--All!
Briarwood Hall!
Sweetbriars, do or die--
This be our battle-cry--
Briarwood Hall!
_That's All!_"
With the final word the spot-light winked out and the other lights of
the hall flashed on. The assembly of hooded and shrouded figures were
revealed. And Helen Cameron, half smiling and half crying, found herself
standing upon the platform before her schoolmates who had already joined
the secret fraternity known as "The Sweetbriars."
Beside her, and presiding over the meeting, she found her oldest and
dearest friend at Briarwood Hall--Ruth Fielding. A small megaphone stood
upon the table at Ruth's hand, and its use had precluded Helen's
recognition of her chum's voice as the latter led in the ritual of the
fraternity. Like their leader, the other Sweetbriars had thrown back
their scarlet hoods, and Helen recognized almost all of the particular
friends with whom she had become associated since she had come--with
Ruth Fielding--the autumn before to Briarwood Hall.
The turning on of the lights was the signal for general conversation
and great merriment. It was the evening of the last day but one of
the school year, and discipline at Briarwood Hall was relaxed to a
degree. However, the fraternity of the Sweetbriars had grown in favor
with Mrs. Grace Tellingham, the preceptress of the school, and with the
teachers, since its inception. Now the fifty or more girls belonging
to the society (fully a quarter of the school membership) paired off to
march down to the dining hall, where a special collation was spread.
Helen Cameron went down arm-in-arm with the president of the S. B.'s.
"Oh, Ruthie!" the new member exclaimed, "I think it's ever so
nice--much better than the initiation of the old Upedes. I can talk about
them now," and she laughed, "because they are--as Tommy says--'busted
all to flinders.' Haven't held a meeting for more than a month, and
the last time--whisper! this is a secret, and I guess the last remaining
secret of the Upedes--there were only The Fox and I there!"
"I'm glad you're one of us at last, Helen," said Ruth Fielding,
squeezing her chum as they went down the stairs.
"And I ought to have been an original member along with you, Ruth,"
said Helen, thoughtfully. "The Up and Doing Club hadn't half the
attractiveness that your society has----"
"Don't call it _my_ society. We don't want any one-girl club. That
was the trouble with the Up and Doings--just as 'too much faculty' is
the objection to the Forward Club."
"Oh, I detest the Fussy Curls just as much as ever," declared Helen,
quickly, "although Madge Steele _is_ president."
"Well, we 'Infants,' as they called us last fall when we entered
Briarwood, are in control of the S. B.'s, and we can help each other,"
said Ruth, with satisfaction.
"But you talk about the Upedes being a one-girl club. I know The Fox
was all-in-all in that. But you're pretty near the whole thing in the
S. B.'s, Ruthie," and Helen laughed, slily. "Why, they say you wrote
all the ritual and planned everything."
"Never mind," said Ruth, calmly; "we can't have a dictator in the
S. B.'s without changing the constitution. The same girl can't be
president for more than one year."
"But you deserve to boss it all," said her chum, warmly. "And I for
one wouldn't mind if you did."
Helen was a very impulsive, enthusiastic girl. When she and Ruth Fielding
had come to Briarwood Hall she had immediately taken up with a lively
and thoughtless set of girls who had banded themselves into the Up and
Doing Club, and whose leader was Mary Cox, called "The Fox," because
of her shrewdness. Ruth had not cared for this particular society and,
in time, she and most of the other new pupils formed the Sweetbriar
Club. Helen Cameron, loyal to her first friends at the school, had not
fallen away from Mary Cox and joined the Sweetbriars until this very
evening, which was, as we have seen, the evening before the final day
of the school year.
Ruth Fielding took the head of the table when the girls sat down to
supper and the other officers of the club sat beside her. Helen was
therefore separated from her, and when the party broke up late in
the evening (the curfew bell at nine o'clock was abolished for this
one night) the chums started for their room in the West Dormitory at
different times. Ruth went with Mercy Curtis, who was lame; outside
the dining hall Helen chanced to meet Mary Cox, who had been calling
on some party in the East Dormitory building.
"Hello, Cameron!" exclaimed The Fox. "So you've finally been
roped in by the 'Soft Babies' have you? I thought that chum of
yours--Fielding--would manage to get you hobbled and tied before
vacation."
"You can't say I wasn't loyal to the Upedes as long as there was any
society to be loyal to," said Helen, quickly, and with a flush.
"Oh, well; you'll be going down to Heavy's seashore cottage with them
now, I suppose?" said The Fox, still watching Helen curiously.
"Why, of course! I intended to before," returned the younger girl. "We
all agreed about that last winter when we were at Snow Camp."
"Oh, you did, eh?" laughed the other. "Well, if you hadn't joined
the Soft Babies you wouldn't have been 'axed,' when it came time to
go. This is going to be an S. B. frolic. Your nice little Ruth Fielding
says she won't go if Heavy invites any but her precious Sweetbriars to
be of the party."
"I don't believe it, Mary Cox!" cried Helen. "I mean, that _you_ must
be misinformed. Somebody has maligned Ruth."
"Humph! Maybe, but it doesn't look like it. Who is going to Lighthouse
Point?" demanded The Fox, carelessly. "Madge Steele, for although she
is president of the Fussy Curls, she is likewise honorary member of the
S. B.'s."
"That is so," admitted Helen.
"Heavy, herself," pursued Mary Cox, "Belle and Lluella, who have all
backslid from the Upedes, and yourself."
"But you've been invited," said Helen, quickly.
"Not much. I tell you, if you and Belle and Lluella had not joined her
S. B.'s you wouldn't have been numbered among Heavy's house party.
Don't fool yourself on that score," and with another unpleasant laugh,
the older girl walked on and left Helen in a much perturbed state of mind.