Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp; Or, Lost in the Backwoods

Produced by Avinash Kothare, Tom Allen, Charles Franks and
the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
I don't think we'd better go home that way, Helen.
Why not? Mr. Bassett won't care—and it's the nearest way to the road.
But he's got a sign up—and his cattle run in this pasture, said Ruth Fielding, who, with her chum, Helen Cameron, and Helen's twin brother, Tom, had been skating on the Lumano River, where the ice was smooth below the mouth of the creek which emptied into the larger stream near the Red Mill.
Aw, come on, Ruthie! cried Tom, stamping his feet to restore circulation.
The ground was hard and the ice was thick on the river; but the early snows that had fallen were gone. It was the day after Christmas, and Helen and Ruth had been at home from school at Briarwood Hall less than a week. Tom, too, who attended the Military Academy at Seven Oaks, was home for the winter holidays. It was snapping cold weather, but the sun had been bright this day and for three hours or more the friends had enjoyed themselves on the ice.
Surely Hiram Bassett hasn't turned his cows out in this weather, laughed Helen.
But maybe he has turned out his bull, said Ruth. You know how ugly that creature is. And there's the sign.
I declare! you do beat Peter! ejaculated Tom, shrugging his shoulders. We are only going to cut across Bassett's field—it won't take ten minutes. And it will save us half an hour in getting to the mill. We can't go along shore, for the ice is open there at the creek.
All right, agreed Ruth Fielding, doubtfully. She was younger than the twins and did not mean to be a wet blanket on their fun at any time; but admiring Helen so much, she often gave up her own inclinations, or was won by the elder girl from a course which she thought wise. There had been times during their first term at Briarwood Hall, now just completed, when Ruth had been obliged to take a different course from her chum. This occasion, however, seemed of little moment. Hiram Bassett owned a huge red herd-leader that was the terror of the countryside; but it was a fact, as Helen said, that the cattle were not likely to be roaming the pasture at this time of year.