Read Ebook: Die letzten zwanzig Jahre deutscher Litteraturgeschichte 1880–1900 by Thomas Emil

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 152 lines and 5903 words, and 4 pages

"We gotter p'int up-stream," growled Uncle Jabez, after wringing his neck around again to spy out the landing near Lakeby's store. "Pesky current's kerried us too fur down."

He gave a mighty pull to his own oar to rehead the boat. It was a perilous move, and in a perilous place. Here the water ran, troubled and white-capped, over a hidden reef.

"Oh! do be careful, Uncle!" cried Ruth.

"Pull!" yelled the old man, in return.

Like a flash the heavy oar flew out of its socket, and the old man sprawled on his back in the bottom of the boat. The latter whirled around in the current, and before Ruth could scream, even, it crashed broadside upon the rock!

The rotting planks of the boat could not stand such a blow. Ruth saw the plank cave in, and the water followed. Down the boat settled upon the submerged part of the rock--a hopeless wreck!

This was not the worst of the accident. In seeking to recover his seat, Uncle Jabez went overboard, as the old boat tipped. He dove into the shallow water, and struck his head heavily on the reef.

Blood-stained bubbles rose to the surface, and the old man struggled only feebly to rise.

"He is hurt! he will be drowned!" gasped Ruth, and seeing him so helpless, she sprang nimbly over the canted side of the boat and sought to draw her uncle's head out of the water.

Although she was a good swimmer, and was not afraid of the water, the current was so swift, and her own footing so unstable, it was doubtful if Ruth Fielding could save both the miller and herself from the peril that menaced them.

ROBERTO, THE GYPSY

Ruth Fielding, following the death of her parents and while she was still a small girl, had left Darrowtown and Miss True Pettis, and all her other old friends and acquaintances, to live with her mother's uncle, at the Red Mill. Her coming to the mill and her early adventures in and about that charming place were related in the first volume of this series, entitled "Ruth Fielding of the Red Mill."

Ruth made many friends in her new home, among them Helen and Tom Cameron, the twin, motherless children of a wealthy dry-goods merchant who had a beautiful home, called "the Outlook," near the mill, and Mercy Curtis, the daughter of the railroad station agent at Cheslow, the nearest important town to Ruth's new home. Ruth, Helen, and Mercy all went to Briarwood Hall, a girls' school some distance from Cheslow, while Master Tom attended a military academy at Seven Oaks, near the girls' institution of learning. The incidents of their first term at school are related in the second volume of the series, while in the mid-winter vacation Ruth and her friends go to Snow Camp in the Adirondacks.

Later, our friends spent part of a summer vacation at Lighthouse Point on the Atlantic Coast, after which they visited Silver Ranch in Montana. The sixth volume tells of another mid-winter camping adventure on Cliff Island, while the volume previous to our present story--number seven, in fact--was entitled "Ruth Fielding at Sunrise Farm."

This story narrated Ruth's particular interest in Sadie Raby, a strange, wild girl who ran away from cruel people who had taken her "to raise." Her reunion with her twin brothers, Willie and Dickie, and how they all three became the special care of Mr. Steele, the wealthy owner of Sunrise Farm, is told. It is through Ruth's efforts that the Rabys are settled in life and win friends.

Now Ruth and her schoolmates had returned to the Red Mill and Cheslow, and but a brief space would elapse before the girls would begin their third year at Briarwood Hall; they were all looking toward the beginning of the fall term with great eagerness.

Had Ruth Fielding been able to think at this moment of the boat's overturn, or of anything but her uncle's peril, she might have considered that the possibility of her ever seeing Briarwood Hall again was somewhat doubtful!

The hurrying water tugged at her as though a hundred hands had laid hold of her person. She was nearly arm-pit deep in the flood, and her uncle's body was so heavy that she had all she could do to hold his head above the surface.

She could not get him back into the boat, even, and perhaps that would not have been a wise move. For the old skiff, shaking and rocking, was likely to be torn free by the battling current. If it should swing into deep water, it must sink almost at once, for the water was pouring in through the hole that had been battered in its side.

The flour was fast becoming saturated with the river-water, and its increased weight would bear the boat to the bottom, if it slipped from the reef.

Unable to see any good of boarding the boat again, Ruth tried to work her way along the reef until she stood upon a higher part of it. Uncle Jabez was unconscious, blood flowed from a deep cut on his head, and he lay a dead weight in her arms.

Never had Ruth Fielding been in greater peril. She was frightened, but mostly for the old man who seemed so seriously hurt.

Tossing her loosened hair out of her eyes, she stared longingly at the landing near Lakeby's store. It was some distance up-stream, and not a person was in sight. She feared, too, that it was too far away for her voice to carry.

Yet she must scream for help. She shouted again and again, endeavoring to put all the strength of her voice into the cries. Was that an answer? The girl held her uncle high in her arms and looked all about.

Nobody was at the store landing. Nobody was behind on the other shore of the river--and she was glad that Aunt Alvirah and Mercy had not seen the accident, for neither of them could have helped in this predicament.

Yes! there was the repeated shout--and nearer. Ruth's eyes turned to the north shore of the Lumano again. There was somebody running down the bank--not near the store kept by Timothy Lakeby, but directly opposite the rock on which the old boat had stranded.

"Oh! oh! Help! help!" shrieked the girl of the Red Mill.

"Hold on! I'm coming!"

The voice came to her more strongly than before. She could not see who the person was, but she knew he was alone. She could not imagine how he was to aid them.

Why did he not run to the store and bring other men to help? There! he seemed to have leaped right into the river!

"Oh, dear me! the strongest swimmer could not reach us, let alone help Uncle Jabez ashore," was Ruth's thought.

But up came the figure into sight again. Dripping, of course, now he stood firmly on a peak of rock that was thrust above the tide, and shook back the long black hair from his eyes.

He was a wild looking person. His feet were bare and his ragged trousers were rolled to his knees. He wore neither vest nor coat, and his shirt was open at his throat. To Ruth he seemed very bronzed and rough looking.

But whoever, or whatever, he might be, the girl prayed that he would prove able to rescue Uncle Jabez. She felt that she could save herself, but she was having all she could do to bear up the unconscious miller.

"Hold on!" shouted the rescuer again.

Once more he plunged forward. He disappeared off the rock. Was he swimming again? The half-overturned boat hid him from Ruth's gaze.

Suddenly he shouted close at hand. Up he bobbed on the higher point of rock just beyond the boat.

"What's the matter, Missy?" he demanded. "Is the old man hurt?"

"He hit his head. See! he is unconscious," explained Ruth.

"I'll get him! Look out, now; I've got to push off this old boat, Missy. She ain't no good, anyway."

Ruth saw that he was a big, black-haired, strong looking boy. His complexion was very dark and his eyes sparkling--like cut jet beads. He might have been seventeen or eighteen years old, but he was fully as tall, and apparently as strong, as an ordinary man.

His long hair curled and was tangled like a wild man's. His beard had begun to grow on his lip and chin. In his ears Ruth saw small gold rings and his wrists and forearms--which were bared--were covered with an intricate pattern of tattooing in red and blue ink.

Altogether, she had never seen so strange a boy in all her life--and certainly none so strong. He leaped into the broken boat, seized Ruth's oar that had not been lost in the overset, and bracing it against the rock, pushed the trembling boat free in a moment.

Ruth could not repress a scream. It looked as though he, too, must be thrown into the river, as the boat was caught by the current and jerked free.

But the wild boy laughed and leaped upon the higher part of the rock. As the miller's old boat drifted down stream, he sprang into the water again and reached the girl and her burden.

"Give him to me!" commanded the boy. "I can bear him up better than you, Missy. We'll get him ashore--and you can't be any wetter than you are now."

"Oh, never mind me!" cried Ruth. "I am not afraid of a ducking. And I can swim."

He turned, carrying the heavy figure of the miller in his arms as though he weighed but a hundred pounds instead of nearer two, and set off toward the shore along the ledge of rock by which he had come.

Ruth saw, now, that beyond where the boat had been wrecked, the rock joined the shore, with only here and there a place where it was deep under water.

She saw, too, that the boat was now sinking. It had not sailed ten yards in the fierce current before its gunwales disappeared. It sank in a deeper channel below--flour and all! Ruth realized that Uncle Jabez would be sorely troubled over the loss of those bags of flour.

Ruth paddled to the shore behind the strong boy, but before they really reached terra firma, she knew that Uncle Jabez was struggling back to consciousness. The boy lowered the miller easily to the ground.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet