THE WOUNDED BIRD
“Good-bye Ralph!” said Barbara, extending her hand to her old friend.
“Good-bye, Barbara,” Ralph answered, politely. “It has been a great pleasure for Hugh and me to see you and the other girls in your forest retreat. I am sorry we must be off so soon.”
“But you will come back again, in a week or two won’t you?” begged Ruth. “I heard you promise those lovely English girls, Hugh, to take part in the autumn sports at Lenox.”
“Oh, we shall be back if possible, Ruth.” Hugh assured her. “I think we can promise to give Lenox a taste of our charming society, say near the first week in October.”
“Let’s be off, Hugh,” called Ralph. “Here is that Latham fellow coming up the hill.”
Bab laid her hand on Ralph’s sleeve. “You are not angry with me for going off with Reginald Latham last night are you? Truth of the matter, Ralph, I don’t believe I like Mr. Latham any better than the others do. But I am rather sorry for him; he seems queer and nervous. Why, the other day, even at his own house, all the young people except me ran away from him. I don’t think he is very happy. That’s why he is always fooling with inventions and things. He’s a weak kind of fellow, Ralph, but I don’t think he is horrid.”
Ralph laughed and his face cleared. “Good for you, Bab. Always looking after the oppressed. But I don’t think you need feel sorry for a fellow who has such a lot of money coming his way as Reg Latham.”
“He hasn’t it yet!” was Bab’s wise comment.
As Ralph and Hugh disappeared, Reginald Latham joined the four girls. He wore his shooting clothes, and his dark face was transformed with pleasure. He knew he was not popular with young people and the idea made him unhappy. He had been brought up in a foreign country and was shy and ill at ease. His mother had always kept him in her society. Now, he was delighted with the independence and courage of “The Automobile Girls” and longed to be friends with them.
“I hope I am in time for the shooting,” he declared. “My uncle sent me up to apologize for the chapter of accidents that occurred last night in our coon hunt. Gwendolin Morton is laid up with a bad ankle, Franz Heller has influenza, and everyone else is tired out with the long tramp. But you look entirely rested.” He turned to Barbara and spoke under his breath. “Forgive me for last night’s performance.”
“Come, Naki,” called Ruth to their guide, “we are ready for our target practice. Mr. Latham is here.”
Ruth led the way over the hill. At a little distance from the house Naki set up a pasteboard target, which he nailed to the side of a big cedar tree, at the edge of a slight embankment. Below it was nothing but underbrush. No one was near. It seemed a perfectly safe place for the rifle practice.
Mollie sat on the ground back of the eager sportsmen. Nothing could induce her to handle a gun. “I suppose I am safe, back here,” she laughed, “so, I shall sit here and watch this famous shooting match. Only, for goodness’ sake, all of you be careful!”
Bab, Ruth and Grace were each to have ten shots at the target, Naki showing them how to load and fire. Reginald Latham would keep the score. The girl who hit the bull’s eye the greatest number of times was to be proclaimed champion.
Bab fired first. She hit the second ring from the center of the bull’s eye.
“Good for you!” Ruth cried, taking aim. But she missed the target altogether. The shot from her rifle went down the hill.
Mollie thought she saw something stir. “Isn’t this a dangerous business?” she asked Reginald Latham.
“There is nothing in these woods to harm, Miss Mollie,” he explained. “Most of the birds have already flown away.”
For an hour the girls fired at the target. Grace had grown tired and had taken her seat by Mollie, but Ruth and Barbara were both enthusiastic shots. Ruth’s score stood two ahead of Bab’s, who still had three more shots to fire.
Suddenly Barbara raised her rifle. “No, don’t show me, Naki,” she protested. “I think I can take aim myself.” As Bab fired Mollie rose to her feet with a cry. She had seen something brown and scarlet moving in the underbrush on the hill below them.
Bab’s shot had missed the target. But did they hear a low moan like the sound of a wounded dove?
Barbara turned a livid white. “I have hit something!” she called to Ruth. But Ruth was after Mollie, who was scrambling down the hill.
The whole party followed them, Barbara’s knees trembling so that she could hardly walk.
There were tears streaming from Mollie’s eyes as she looked up at Bab. The child’s arms were around a little figure that had fallen in the underbrush, a little figure in brown and scarlet, with a wreath of scarlet autumn leaves in her hair.
“I have been afraid of this,” said Naki, pushing the others aside.
“It’s my little Indian girl!” Mollie explained. “She couldn’t bear to keep away from us, and at first I thought her the ghost of Lost Man’s Trail. I have seen her around our hut nearly every day; but I promised not to tell you girls about her. Is she much hurt, Naki?”
The man shook his head. “I can’t tell,” he said. “Better take her to the house and see.”
At this Eunice opened her eyes. Her lips were drawn in a fine line of pain, but she did not flinch.
“I will go home to my own tent,” she protested. “I will not enter the abode of my enemies.” The little girl struggled out of Mollie’s hold and rose to her feet. One arm hung limp and useless at her side.
When Reginald Latham touched her, she shuddered. Tiny drops of blood trickled down to the ground.
“Give me your handkerchief, please?” asked Bab as she went up to Eunice. “It is I who have hurt you,” she said, “though I did not mean to do so. Surely you will let me help you a little if I can.”
She tore open Eunice’s sleeve and tenderly wiped the blood. Naki brought two sticks, and, with his assistance, Bab bound up the wounded arm, so the blood no longer flowed. “Now you must go home to our cabin with us!” she pleaded.
But Eunice broke away from them and started to flee. She trembled and would have fallen had not Mollie caught her.
“See, you can’t go home alone, Eunice dear,” Mollie remonstrated. “And you must see a doctor. The bullet from the rifle may still be in your arm.”
Eunice was obstinate. “Indians do not need doctors,” she asserted.
But Naki came and took her in his arms. “We will take you to your own tent,” he declared. “She will rest better there,” he explained to the girls, “and I know the way over the hills. You may come with me. The Indian squaw, her grandmother, will be hard to manage.”
“But how shall we get a doctor up there?” asked Grace.
“I will go down for him later,” Naki answered briefly. “You need have no fear. An Indian knows how to treat a wound. They have small use for doctors.”
“Is your guide an Indian?” asked Reginald Latham of Ruth.
Ruth shook her head. “He may have some Indian blood,” she said. “I didn’t know it. But this Indian child, where did she come from? And to think her name is Eunice!”
“Eunice!” cried Reginald Latham in a strange voice. “Impossible. Why Eunice is not an Indian name!”
“But it is what Mollie called her,” protested Ruth. “And Mollie seems to know who she is.”
Reginald Latham’s face had turned white.
Ruth felt her dislike of him slipping away. He seemed very sympathetic. Mollie, Bab and Grace were hurrying along after Naki, over whose broad shoulder hung the little Indian girl. Her black hair swept his sleeve, her broken arm drooped like the wing of a wounded bird.
Once she roused herself to say. “My grandmother will not like these people to come to our tent. We live alone like the beasts in the forest.”
But Barbara, Ruth, Grace and Mollie trudged on after Naki. While silently by their side walked Reginald Latham.