CHAPTER XXVI
SURPRISES
"Some one wants Dr. Robbins on the 'phone."
The hall boy brought the message. Dr. Robbins jumped up from her book and hurried to the hall telephone.
"Yes. Hello! That you, Leland?"
"Yes, dear. So glad to get a word with you. How are you?"
"Well? Now, you really can't be——"
"What? Going away? Run away?"
There was a long pause after this monologue.
Dr. Robbins was listening to the voice—presumably that of Leland.
Then—"Leland! Are you crazy?"
Another pause. The young woman's face might have been interpreted, but the 'phone was silent to outsiders.
"You don't mean to say that you are going on some dangerous trip in the mountains—yes, I hear, in the mountains—to help some foolish girl? I know you did not say foolish; I said that. Leland, listen to me. Do you hear? All right. Now, listen. Don't you dare to go away again and not tell me exactly where you are going. I have only just—yes, I know all about your ideas. I am sure she is charming and worthy and all that, but——"
Dr. Robbins tapped her foot impatiently. Oh, the limits of the telephone! If only she could reach that brother!
"If you do not—report—look for you around Hemlock Bend! Yes, we'll do that. Oh, Leland!"
She dropped the receiver and stood like one shocked physically as well as mentally. For a moment she remained there, then turned back to the room at the side of the girls' suite.
Mr. Rand was sitting there.
"What has happened?" he demanded. "You look as if there had been a ghost in that message."
"Oh, there was, Mr. Rand! What shall I do? That brother of mine is running off again!"
"Where?"
"He didn't even say. His words were like those of some madman. If we did not hear from him within three days, we are to look for him about Hemlock Bend."
"Where in the world is Hemlock Bend?"
"As if we knew! That is just like Leland. Poor, dear Leland! Never practical enough even to send a straight message. Oh, Mr. Rand, that boy will kill us yet!"
"Don't you fear, little girl," and there was an unmistakable note of tenderness in Mr. Rand's voice. "One who means well usually does well, however strange may be his methods. The first thing to do is to see if we can get him again at the Restover."
Without waiting for her answer, the gentleman rushed out in the hall himself, and was presently calling up that hotel. As he happened to be one of the owners of the summer house, it was not difficult for him to get direct communication and answers. But the man asked for was gone. Had just gone. Had just caught a north-bound train—the express.
"Can't get him there," reported Mr. Rand to Dr. Robbins. "Now to find
Hemlock Bend."
Guide books and time-tables were hastily consulted, but evidently the place was too small for printed mention.
Dr. Robbins was in despair. That dreadful young man! Gone to some out-of-the-world place to rescue some absurd girl! And now he had actually gotten away!
Belle, Bess, Betty and Hazel had just returned from a melancholy ramble. Belle was better—really better now than some of her companions, who had been bearing up well under the strain—but all the young faces were very sad. The boys had telephoned that they had some hope for developments in the clew they had gone away to investigate, but that was very meager encouragement. The boys always had hope—over the 'phone. Dr. Robbins told them part of the story.
"Oh, the idea!" exclaimed Belle. "Isn't that like a tale of the olden times—for a young man to run away to rescue a lady! Now, what in the world is she being rescued from? Exactly. That's the impossible Leland. Never says who she is, what she is, or what about her. Now, as if we could put a story like that together!" She sank back as if mentally exhausted from the effort to "put it together."
"But we must find Hemlock Bend," said Betty. "I feel as if I could lay my finger on every bend in the White Mountains."
"All concentrated on your particular person," said Hazel, with a smile. "Well, I feel that way myself, only you being smaller, Betty, have a more compact concentration."
"I think I have it," exclaimed Mr. Rand, as he returned with his hands full of pamphlets. "It is near—near——"
"Let me look, Daddy," interrupted Betty. "I can see better, perhaps."
He handed her one little green booklet. She glanced over it and mumbled a lot of stuff through which she had to pass in order to get at what was wanted. Then she paused. "Oh, yes, there's a place on the Woodland Branch railroad called Hemlock Grove. Of course, that must be around the corner from Hemlock Bend."
They all agreed that it must be. Then to take the trip—they would not wait for three days. Mr. Rand said that would be absurd, but when the boys should return to the hotel, which would be that afternoon, they would all start out in their cars. They would make a double hunt—for Cora and for Leland.
"It is a long trip," said Mr. Rand, "but I will take the big car, and Benson—couldn't do it without Benson—and we will be able to ride or to walk almost the length and breadth of the county."
From that moment until the boys did return the young ladies were all excitement getting ready for the trip.
"I just feel now that something will happen," declared the optimistic
Betty. "If four girls and four boys, besides the best man in New
England, to wit, my daddy, cannot find them, then, indeed, they are
lost."
"Oh, I, too, feel so anxious," sighed Bess. "I think the run will do our nerves good, if nothing else."
"And I feel exactly as if I were starting out to meet Cora," declared
Belle. "Oh, what would I give——"
"We all would," interrupted Hazel.
"But to think that Leland should put us to trouble just now when our hands and hearts are so full," wailed Dr. Robbins.
"Well, as misery likes company, perhaps our trouble will get along better in pairs," said Hazel, without knowing exactly what she meant.
Jack entered the corridor. His handsome, dark face was tanned to a deep brown, and he looked different. Had he news?
"Where is Mr. Rand?" he asked.
"Just calling to the garage," said Belle, a note of question in her answer.
"Well, girls, we have found something. We have found Cora's gloves!"
"Oh, where?" It was a chorus.
"On the road to Sharon. I found one—Ed the other."
He took from his pocket the gloves. They were not very much soiled, and had evidently only lain in the road a short time.
"They are the ones she wore the night of the ball, when she disappeared," said Belle, looking at them carefully.
"Then we will take that road and search every inch of it," declared Bess, also inspecting the gloves. "The dear old things!" and she actually pressed them to her lips. "I feel as if you had brought us a message from Cora."
"Those gloves have never been out of doors a week," said Jack seriously. "They have been carried there—placed there—just to throw us off the track. We will start out in the opposite direction."
"To-night?"
"As soon as you girls can get equipped. We must find Cora now or——"
"We will find her," cried Bess. "I know we will. Oh, just let us get on the road! I think the cars will scent the trail! I feel as if I were simply going out to meet her by appointment."
It was a brave effort, for the girls felt anything but certain. So many hopes had arisen and been dashed down! so many clews had been followed, only to be abandoned! so many messages had been sent in vain!
But with such hope as they could muster up the party in four automobiles started out from the Tip-Top. Without exception every guest was interested in the case, and as the motorists chugged off many were the wishes of good luck that were wafted after them.
To find Cora! to find Leland! or——
Another disappointment would seem too cruel. Walter declared he could pick a trail they had never yet followed. Betty said she knew a very dark and dangerous pass, where she had lost her bracelet. Belle wanted to go by the river road, so that when it was actually left to Bess to decide, as she was next in authority to Cora in the Motor Girls' Club, she spoke for the way through the woods, straight up into a rough and shaggy pass.
"They would never dream of an automobile getting up there," she declared, "and if she is in hiding they have taken her far away from the good roads."
Wonderful for Bess! Wonderful, indeed, is the instinct of love!
Scarcely had they turned into the wooded way than they espied smoke stealing up through the trees.
"There must be some one over there," declared Bess, the first to make the discovery. "See! Yes, there is a flag!"
"Oh, maybe they are those dreadful Gypsies," murmured Belle. "Let us wait for Mr. Rand and the others."
"I am too anxious to see," objected her sister. "The rest are all within calling distance. See, there are the boys. Let us hurry into the side road. Whoever they are, they have had wagons up here."
It required careful driving to cover the pass, for the roadway was newly made, and by no means well-finished. Great stones continually rolled out from under the big, rubber wheels, and Bess was on the alert to use the emergency brake, although the road was somewhat up hill. She feared the motor would stop and that they might back down.
"See!" she exclaimed, "there are children! They must be Gypsy lads and lassies."
Over in a clump of evergreens could be seen some children, playing at a campfire. Yes, they might be Gypsies.
"Wait! wait," called Jack and Ed, who had now observed that the place was inhabited. "We will go in first."
"All right," called back Bess, a little sorry that she could not have had the glory of doing the investigating alone.
By this time most of the searching party had reached the spot.
"We will get out and walk over," suggested Jack, his voice trembling with anticipation.
It was growing dusk, and the smoke seemed to make the woods more uncanny, and the depths blacker and more dismal.
The children in the underbrush had climbed up into the low trees to get a view of the automobiles.
Jack, Ed and Walter were making their way through the brush to reach the spot whence the smoke was coming.
Mr. Rand and his men were hurrying over from the cross road.
"Go slow!" he called, with the disregard of speech that makes a saying stronger.
"All right," answered Jack. "We'll take it carefully."
"It's a camp!" exclaimed Walter, "and Gypsies, I'll wager."
"Oh, I am so frightened!" cried Belle. "Yet I would brave them alone for the sake of dear, darling Cora."
"Of course you would," Betty assured her, as she picked herself up from a fall over some hidden root.
Dr. Robbins had secured a stout stick, and she made her way with more care over the uncertain footing.
"There's a family of them, at any rate," remarked Jack, as he neared the open spot, where now could be seen a hut.
A rough-looking man was waiting to see what they wanted. He smoked a pipe, wore heavy shoes and clothing.
Mr. Rand spoke first.
"Good afternoon, stranger," he said in a pleasant voice.
The man touched his hat and replied with an indistinguishable murmur.
"Camping?" went on Mr. Rand, scarcely knowing how to get into conversation.
"Sort of," replied the man shortly.
"Might we intrude for a little water?" continued the old gentleman.
"The girls had a dusty ride."
"Certainly," replied the woodsman, motioning toward a pail and dipper on a bench in front of the hut.
"Hard to get at," whispered Jack to Walter, "but he doesn't look so bad."
"No, I rather think he is not the man we want," agreed the other young man.
"Stay here all year?" asked Ed, as he handed the brimming tin dipper to
Bess, and turned to the stranger.
"Pretty much," spoke the man with the pipe. "But is there anything wrong? Anything I could do for you?"
This caused the whole party to surmise that he must have heard that "something" was wrong. That looked suspicious.
A woman emerged from the hut. She was not altogether untidy, but of course showed that she lived far from civilization. She bowed to the party, then called to the children in the woods.
"Well," said Mr. Rand finally, "we are looking for somebody. You haven't happened to hear or to have seen anything of a young girl in these parts, a girl—who might have gotten lost in the woods; have you?"
"I have heard that a girl was lost," replied the man. "But I'm one of the forest rangers and I keep pretty close to my post at this time of the season, watching for fires. There are so many young folks camping and reckless with matches. Is there no trace of her? The missing girl from the hotel, is the one you mean, isn't it?"
Then he was not a gypsy! The forest ranger!
"No, I am sorry to say we have not yet discovered her," went on Mr. Rand. "But you being here in the very depths of the woods would likely know of any gypsy camps about, I believe."
"There are no camps in the woods this year," the man assured him. "We have kept them out of this particular clearing by law. There are a lot of them scattered about in the mountains, but as far as I could find there is no camp deep in the woods. You see every summer someone gets lost in these woods, and we don't like the gypsies to have the first chance of finding them. But sit down," and he cleared the bench of the water pail. "You must have had a weary search."
Everyone sighed. They were still without a possible clew.
"We will rest for a minute or two," said Mr. Rand, "but we must still cover a lot of road tonight. We are out to find her if she is on the White Mountains."
And so after some conversation and advice from the forest ranger the searching party again pressed on.