“There is a fight, Jennie,” replied Bab, almost sobbing in her excitement. “We must get help quickly from somewhere. Are the Gypsies far from here?”
“Yes,” answered Jennie. “Not so near as the hall. But wait! Come with me,” and her face was illumined by the expression of one who is about to reveal a well-kept secret.
“But, Jennie, is it help you are bringing us?” asked Ruth, demurring a little.
“You may trust old Jennie,” exclaimed the blind woman. “Be ye not the friends of young Master Stephen?”
The two girls followed without a word.
Almost in sight of the fighters, she paused by the stump of a hollow tree which, when rolled away by her strong arm, disclosed a sort of trapdoor underneath. Lifting the door, crudely constructed with strips of wood, the bark still on, the girls saw a small underground chamber dug out like a cellar. The walls were shored up with split trees which also did duty as cross beams. There was a rough, hand-made ladder at the opening, and at one side a shelf on which was neatly folded—could they believe their eyes—the suit of green velveteen. Old Jennie, who seemed to be peering down into the cavity with her sightless blue eyes, shook Bab’s arm impatiently.
“Get the firearms,” she whispered. “They be on the shelf. I felt them there last time.”
Sure enough, lying in the shadow at the far end of the shelf the girls made out two pistols gleaming ominously in the dark. Without a word, Bab bounded down the ladder, and seizing the pistols was up again almost as quickly.
“Ruth,” she said, “have you forgotten our rifle practice in the Berkshires?”
“No,” replied her friend. “All you have to do is to cock it and pull the trigger, isn’t it?”