“Of course,” said Ruth, putting her arm about the younger girl. “As soon as we start to take the first picture you may sit on the fence—provided there is one!—and watch to your heart’s content.”
Ellen sighed with complete happiness at the prospect, and even Mary’s troubled eyes brightened.
“If I could only act in the moving pictures just once I think I should die happy,” said Ellen. “I would even—forgive Lieberstein!”
Ruth laughed at that extravagance, and then they found that they had reached the road.
The girls were sorry over the prospect of parting with their new-found friend. But Ruth was on fire to get back to Knockout Point, to tell Tom what she had heard about Bloomberg.
“It’s a long way back to the river front,” said Mary. “It would be a long tramp, even for some one who is used to walking——”
“Well, I’m that some one—” Ruth was beginning when Ellen interrupted.
“Look there!” she cried, pointing to a cloud of dust that appeared in the distance. “Dust means horsemen. Some one is coming this way——”
“And coming fast!” finished Ruth hopefully.
Horsemen meant the possibility of a lift back to Knockout Point, or at least the conveying of a message there to her friends. Ruth was still weak from her terrible experience in the tunnel and the prospect of a long walk along an unknown road had not appealed to her as much as she had been pleased to pretend.