A "GHOSTESS" ABROAD.
Suddenly, like an inspiration, Jack thought of a way in which he might
free his captive hands. Naturally quick-witted, the emergency he found
himself facing had made his mind more active than usual.
"That grindstone," he thought. "I can work the treadle with my foot,
while I stand backward to it. If I hold the rope against the sharp edge
of the stone it ought to cut through in a very short time."
It was quite a task to locate the grindstone in the darkness without
making a noise. But at last Jack, by dint of feeling softly along the
walls, located it. Then he turned his back to the machine and put his
foot on the treadle. As the wheel began to turn he pressed the rope that
bound his hands against the rough stone. In ten minutes he was free.
"Now for the next move," counseled the boy. "I've got to do whatever I
decide upon quickly. If I don't escape, and that gang finds how I've
freed my wrists, they'll shackle me hand and foot, and I'll not get
another chance to get away. If it was only daylight I'd stand a much
better opportunity of getting out."
There was the door, but to try that was out of the question. Jack had
heard it locked and the key turned. The window? It was too small for a
big, well-grown boy like Jack to creep through. He had noted that during
the time the door was open and his prison was lighted by the rays of the
lantern.
"There's that fireplace," thought the boy, "that's about the last
resort. I wonder----"
He located the big, old-fashioned chimney, built of rough stones and
full of nooks and crannies, without trouble. Getting inside it on the
hearthstone he looked upward; it was open to the sky and at the top he
could see a faint glow.
"It's getting daylight," he exclaimed to himself.
The next moment he noticed that right across the top of the chimney was
the stout branch of a tree.
"If I could get up the chimney that branch would afford me a way of
getting to the ground," he thought.
"By Jove! I believe I could do it," he muttered, as the light grew
stronger and he saw how roughly the interior of the chimney was built.
"It's not very high, and those rough stones make a regular ladder."
As time was pressing, Jack began the ascent at once. For a lad as active
as he was, it proved even more easy than he had anticipated. But long
before he reached the top he was covered from head to foot with soot,
although, oddly enough, that thought never occurred to him. At length,
black as a negro in mourning, he reached the top of the chimney and
grasped the tree branch he had noticed from below.
He swung into it and made his way to the main trunk of the tree, an
ancient elm. It was no trick at all then for him to slide to the ground.
Then, silently as a cat, he tiptoed his way from the old stone house,
with its occupants sleeping and snoring, blissfully unaware that Jack
had stolen a march on them.
"Well, things have gone finely so far," he mused. "Now, what shall be
the next step?"
He looked about him. The country was a wild one. There was no sign of a
house, and, as far as he could see, there was nothing but an expanse of
timber and rocks.
"This is a tough problem," thought the boy. "I've no idea where I am, or
the points of the compass. If I go one way, I might come out all right,
but then again I might find myself lost in the forest. Hanged if I know
what to do."
But, realizing that it would not do to waste any time around the old
house, Jack at length struck off down what appeared to have been, in
bygone days, some sort of a wood road. It wound for quite a distance
among the trees, but suddenly, to his huge delight, the boy beheld in
front of him the broad white ribbon of a dusty highway.
Suddenly, too, he heard the sound of wheels and the rattle of a horse's
hoofs coming along at a smart rate.
"Good; now I can soon find out where I am," thought the boy, and he
hurried forward to meet the approaching vehicle. It contained a pretty
young woman, wearing a sunbonnet.
Jack had no hat to lift, but he made his best bow as the fair driver
came abreast of him.
"I beg your pardon," he began, "but could you tell me----"
The young woman gave one piercing scream.
"Oh-h-h-h-h-h!" she cried, and gave her horse a lash with the whip that
made it leap forward like an arrow. In a flash she was out of sight in a
cloud of dust.
"Well, what do you know about that?" exclaimed Jack. "She must be crazy,
or something, or else she's the most bashful girl I ever saw."
He sat down on a rock at the side of the road to rest and waited for
another rig or a foot passenger to come by. Before long he heard a
sprightly whistle, and a barefooted boy, carrying a tin pail, and with a
fish pole over his shoulder, appeared round a curve in the road.
"Now, I'll get sailing directions," said Jack to himself, and then, as
the boy drew near:
"Hullo, sonny! Can you tell me----"
The boy gave one look and then, dropping his can of bait, and his pole,
fled with a howl of dismay.
"Hi! Stop, can't you? What's the matter with you?" shouted Jack. He ran
after the boy at top speed. But the faster he ran the faster the
youngster sped along the road.
"Oh-h-h-h-h! Help! Mum-muh!" he yelled, as he ran, in terrified tones.
At length Jack gave up the chase. He leaned against a fence and gave way
to his indignation.
"Bother it all," he said. "What can be the matter with these people?
Everyone I speak to runs away from me, as if I had the plague or
something. Anyhow, that youngster can't be very far down this road. I
guess I'll keep right on after him, and then I'm bound to come to some
place where there are some sensible folks."
As he assumed, it was not long before he came in sight of a neat little
farm-house, standing back from the road in a grove of fine trees. He
made his way toward it. In the front yard an old man was trimming
rose-bushes.
"Can you tell me----" began Jack.
The old man looked up. Then uttering an appalling screech, he ran for
his life into the house. "Mandy! Mandy! Thar be a ghostess in the yard!"
he yelled, as he ran.
Jack looked after him blankly. What could be the matter?