Annie jumped; but the part of the raft on which she was standing gave way under her feet, and she came down into the water. The water was not very deep. It came up, however, almost to Annie's knees. Rodolphus himself had leaped over to the shore, and so had, himself, escaped a wetting. He took Annie by the hand, and led her also out to the dry land.
Annie began to cry. Rodolphus soothed and quieted her as well as he could. He took off her stockings and shoes. He poured the water out of the shoes, and wrung out the stockings. He also wrung out Annie's dress as far as possible. He told her not to mind it; her clothes would soon get dry. It was all the fault of the boys, he said, who made the raft, for not nailing it together.
Rodolphus had had presence of mind enough to seize his basket, when he leaped ashore, so that that was safe. The raft, however, went all to pieces, and the fragments of it floated away down the stream.
Rodolphus and Annie then resumed their journey. Rodolphus talked fast to Annie, and told her a great many amusing stories, to divert her mind from the misfortune which had happened to them. He charged her not to tell her mother, when she got home, that she had been in the water, and made her promise that she would not.
At length they came to a large house which stood back from the road a little way, at the entrance to a valley. This was the house, Rodolphus said, where Beechnut lived. Rodolphus opened a great gate, and he and Annie went into the yard.
“I think that Beechnut is in some of the barns, or sheds, or somewhere,” said Rodolphus.
So he and Annie went to the barns and sheds. There was a horse standing in one of the sheds, harnessed to a wagon, but there were no signs of Beechnut.
“Perhaps he is in the yard,” said Rodolphus.
So Rodolphus led the way through a shed to a sort of back-yard, where there was a plank-walk, with lilac-bushes and other shrubbery on one side of it. Rodolphus and Annie walked along upon the planks. Presently, they came to a place where there was a ladder standing up against the house.
“Ah!” said Rodolphus, “he is upon the house. Here is the ladder. I think he is doing something on the house. I mean to go and see.”