She whispered this thought to Helen, and her friend was panic-stricken again. "We must warn Tom—oh, we must warn him somehow!" she gasped.
"Surely we will," declared the girl from the Red Mill. "Now, careful how you step. A creaking board might give us away."
They crept across the upper chamber to the rear of the house. Through another room they went, until they could look out of a broken window upon the sheds. There was Master Tom standing before the shed (the machine was hidden), wiping his hands upon a piece of waste, and looking out upon the falling rain.
He saw the girls almost instantly, and opened his mouth to shout to them, but Ruth clapped her own hand to her lips and motioned with the other for him to be silent. Tom understood.
He looked more than surprised—not a little startled, in fact.
"What will he think?" murmured Helen. "He's so reckless!"
"Leave it to me," declared Ruth, leaning out of the window into the still falling rain.
She caught the boy's eye. He watched her motions. There was built at this end of the house an outside stairway, and although it was in bad repair, she saw that an agile fellow like Tom could mount the steps without any difficulty.
Pointing to this flight, she motioned him to come by that means to their level, still warning him by gesture to make no sound. The boy understood and immediately darted across the intervening space to the house.
Ruth knew there was no dining-room window from which the ruffians downstairs could see him. And they had made no move as far as she had heard.