It was more than a week before Sallie could step on her sore paw. Meanwhile she stayed in her own yard—at the house where she lived with Mrs. Watson, her mistress. Ruddy came over to see her each day, and the two became better friends than ever. Mrs. Watson thanked Rick and Ruddy for having brought home her pet cat, and as for Ruddy, Sallie's mistress saved for him every nice bone she got from the butcher's.
"I never knew a dog who was so smart," she said. "And it's remarkable how he seems to like Sallie, especially when he used to chase her so at first."
One day, when he came home from school, Rick asked his mother if he might go to the woods and see if he could get some chestnuts.
"Yes," she answered, "but don't stay too long. Don't get lost as you once did, and be home before dark."
Rick promised to be careful, and to be home before supper, and then, taking a cloth salt bag, in which to carry the chestnuts if he should find any, off he started with Ruddy following. And the dog leaped about and barked happily. Nothing pleased him more than going to the woods with Rick.
Now chestnut trees were rather hard to find in the forest near where Rick lived. The blight had killed many of them, and some did not have any nuts on. So it was not until he had gone more than a mile into the woods before the small boy found a place where the ground was fairly well covered with the brown nuts.
"Now I'll get some!" cried Rick, as he began picking them up. "I'll take some home, and Mazie and I can roast them on the stove after supper."
While Rick picked up the nuts Ruddy raced here and there. He was having as much fun as was his master. At last the boy saw no more nuts on the ground, but there were many on the tree, and Rick began to look for a way to climb up and shake them down. The chestnut trunk was too big for him to span with his arms, so he started up a slim maple that grew next to it. Rick was a good tree climber, but to-day he was out of luck. He managed to scramble up a few feet and then he suddenly slipped in a queer way. One leg was caught fast between the trunk of the maple and a slim branch, and the next Rick knew, he was lying on his back on the ground, under the tree, with one leg stuck almost upright, and held fast. Rick was caught, almost as if he were in a trap.
CHAPTER XI
A MYSTERIOUS WHISTLE
Rick was at first so shaken and stunned by the fall that he could not speak. The breath seemed to have been jarred out of him, as it was once when he fell down stairs, and he could not even cry for nearly a quarter of a minute. But at last his breath came back to him, and he exclaimed: