The Corner House Girls Growing Up / What Happened First, What Came Next. And How It Ended

CHAPTER XV

"Dot!"

"'Tis so. The other wan—Theresa—was here asking for her before noon-time," the cobbler added.

Neale waited for nothing further—not even to read his letter, which he slipped into his pocket; but hurried over the back fence into the rear premises of the Corner House.

By this time the entire neighborhood was aroused. Luke had called up the police station and given a description of Sammy and Dot. The telephone had been busy most of the time after he and Ruth had returned from their unsuccessful visit to the canal.

Agnes, red-eyed from weeping, ran at Neale when she saw him coming.

"Oh, Neale O'Neil! Why weren't you here! Get out the auto at once! Let us go and find them. I know they have been carried off—"

"Who's carried them, Aggie?" he demanded. "Brace up. Let's hear all the particulars of this kidnapping."

"Oh, you can laugh. Don't you dare laugh!" expostulated Agnes, quite beside herself, and scarcely knowing what she said. "But somebody must certainly have stolen Dot."

"That might be," confessed Neale. "But who in the world would want to steal Sammy? I can't imagine anybody wanting a youngster like him."

"Do be serious if you can, Neale," admonished Ruth, who had likewise been weeping, but was critical of the ex-circus boy as usual.

"I am," declared Neale. "Only, let's get down to facts. Who saw them last and where?"

He listened seriously to the story. His remark at the end might not have been very illuminating, but it was sensible.

"Well, then, if Mrs. Kranz and Joe Maroni saw them last, that's the place to start hunting for the kids."

"Didn't we go there?" demanded Ruth, sharply. "I have just told you—"

"But you didn't find them," Neale said mildly. "Just the same, I see nothing else to do but to make Mrs. Kranz's store the starting point of the search. The whole neighborhood there should be searched. Start running circles around that corner of Meadow Street."

"Didn't Luke and I go as far as the canal!" and Ruth was still rather warm of speech.

"But I guess Neale is right, Ruth," Luke put in. "I don't know the people over there or the neighborhood itself. There may have been lots of hiding places they could have slipped into."

"It's the starting point of the search," Neale declared dogmatically. "I am going right over there."

"Do get out the auto," cried Agnes, who had uncanny faith in the motor car as a means of aid in almost any emergency. "And I'm going!"

"Let's all go," Cecile Shepard suggested. "I think we ought to interview everybody around that shop. Don't you, Luke?"

"Right, Sis," her brother agreed. "Come on, Miss Ruth. Many hands should make light work. It isn't enough to have the constables on the outlook for the children. It will soon be night."

Although Ruth could not see that going to Meadow Street again promised to be of much benefit, save to keep them all occupied, she agreed to Neale's proposal which had been so warmly seconded by Luke.

The boys got out the automobile and the two older Corner House girls, with Cecile, joined them. The car rolled swiftly away from home, leaving Tess in tears, Mrs. MacCall, Aunt Sarah, Uncle Rufus and Linda in a much disturbed state of mind, and poor Mrs. Pinkney in the very lowest depths of despair.

They had all had a late luncheon—all save Neale. He had eaten only what he had put in his pocket when he left for his fishing trip to Pogue Lake that morning. It was approaching dinner time when they reached Meadow Street, but none of the anxious young people thought much about this fact.

The news of the loss of Dot Kenway and Sammy Pinkney had by this time become thoroughly known in the neighborhood of the Stower property on Meadow Street. Not only were the tenants of the Corner House girls, but all their friends and acquaintances, interested in the search.

Groups had gathered about the corner where Mrs. Kranz's store and Joe Maroni's fruit stand were situated, discussing the mystery. Suggestions of dragging the canal had been made; but these were hushed when the kindly people saw Agnes' tear-streaked face and Ruth Kenway's anxious eyes.

"Oh, my dear!" gasped Mrs. Kranz, her fat face wrinkling with emotion, and dabbing at her eyes while she patted Ruth's shoulder. "If I had only knowed vat dem kinder had in der kopfs yedt, oh, my dear! I vould haf made dem go right avay straight home."

"De leetla padrona allow, I go right away queek and looka for theem—yes? Maria and my Marouche watcha da stan'—sella da fruit. Yes?" cried Joe Maroni to the oldest Corner House girl.

"If we only—any of us—knew where to search!" Ruth cried.

Neale and Luke got out of the automobile, leaving the girls surrounded by the gossipy, though kindly, women of the neighborhood and the curious children. Neither of the young fellows had any well defined idea as to how to proceed; but they were not inclined to waste any more time merely canvassing the misfortune of Dot and Sammy's disappearance.

Neale, being better acquainted with the dwellers in this neighborhood, seized a half-grown youth on the edge of the crowd and put several very pertinent questions to him.

Was there any place right around there that the children might have fallen into—like a cellar, or an excavation! Any place into which they could have wandered and be unable to get out of, or to make their situation known? Had there been an accident of any kind near this vicinity during the day?

The answers extracted from this street youth, who would, Neale was sure, know of anything odd happening around this section of Milton, were negative.

"Say, it's been deader'n a doornail around here for a week," confessed the Meadow Street youth. "Even Dugan's goat hasn't been on the rampage. No, sir. I ain't seen an automobile goin' faster than a toad funeral all day. Say, the fastest things we got around here is the canalboats—believe me!"

"Funny how we always come around to that canal—or the barges on it—in this inquiry," murmured Luke to Neale O'Neil.

The two had started down the street, but Neale halted in his walk and stared at the young collegian.

"Funny!" he exclaimed suddenly. "No, there isn't anything funny in it at all. The canal. Canalboats. My goodness, Mr. Shepard, there must be something in it!"

"Water," growled Luke. "And very muddy water at that. I will not believe that the children fell in and were drowned!"

"No!" cried Neale just as vigorously. Then he grinned. "Sammy Pinkney's best friends say he will never be drowned, although some of them intimate that there is hemp growing for him. No, Sammy and Dot would not fall into the canal. But, crickey, Shepard! they might have fallen into a canalboat."

"What do you mean? Have been carried off in one? Kidnapped—actually kidnapped?"

"Sh! No. Perhaps not. But you never can tell what will happen to kids like them—nor what they will do. Whew! there's an idea. Sammy was always threatening to run away and be a pirate."

"The funny kid!" laughed Luke. "But Dot did not desire such a romantic career, I am sure."

"Did you ever find out yet what was in a girl's head?" asked Neale, with an assumption of worldly wisdom very funny in one of his age and experience. "You don't know what the smallest of them have in their noddles. Maybe if Sammy expressed an intention of being a pirate she wasn't going to be left behind."

He laughed. But he had hit the fact very nearly. And it seemed reasonable to Luke the more he thought of it.

"But on a canalboat?" he said, with lingering doubts.

"Well, it floats on the water, and it's a boat," urged Neale. "Put yourself in the kid's place. If the idea struck you suddenly to be a pirate where would you look around here for a pirate ship and water to sail it!"

"Great Peter!" murmured Luke. "The boundless canal!"

"Quite so," rejoined Neale O'Neil, his conviction growing. "Now, on that basis, let's ask about the barges that have gone east out from Milton to-day."

"Why not both ways?" queried Luke, quickly.

"Because most of the canalboats coming west go no farther than the Milton docks; and if the kids had got a ride on one into town, they would long since have been home. But it is a long journey to the other end of the canal. Why, it's fifteen or eighteen miles to Durginville."

"How are you going to find out about these boats?"

Neale had a well defined idea by this time. He sent Luke back to the car to pacify the girls as best he could, but without taking time to explain to the collegian his intention in full. Then the boy got to work.

Within half an hour he interviewed the blacksmith and half a dozen other people who lived or worked in sight of the canal. He discovered that, although two barges had gone along to the Milton Lock at the river side since before noon, only the old Nancy Hanks had gone in the other direction.

He came back to the car and the waiting party in some eagerness.

"Oh, Neale! have you found them!" cried Agnes.

"Of course he hasn't. Do not be so impatient, Aggie," admonished Ruth.

"I have an idea," proclaimed Neale, as he stepped into the car and turned the starting switch.

"A trace of the children?" Cecile asked.

"It's worth looking into," said Neale with much more confidence than he really felt. "We'll run up to the first lock and see if the lock-keeper noticed anybody save the captain and his little girl on that barge that went through this afternoon. Maybe Dot got friendly with the girl and she and Sammy went along for a ride on the Nancy Hanks. They say this Bill Quigg that owns that canalboat isn't any brighter than the law allows, and he might not think of the kids' folks being scared."

"Oh! it doesn't seem reasonable," Ruth said, shaking her head.

But she did not forbid Neale to make the journey to the lock. The road was good all the way to Durginville and it was a highway the Corner House girls had not traveled in their automobile. At another time they would have all enjoyed the trip immensely in the cool of the evening. And Neale drove just as fast as the law allowed—if not a little faster.

Agnes loved to ride fast in the auto; but this was one occasion when she was too worried to enjoy the motion. As they rushed on over the road, and through the pleasant countryside, they were all rather silent. Every passing minute added to the burden of anxiety upon the minds of the two sisters and Neale; nor were the visitors lacking in sympathy.

After all, little folk like Sammy and Dot are in great danger when out in the world alone, away from the shelter of home. So many, many accidents may happen.

Therefore it was a very serious party indeed that finally stopped at Bumstead Lock to ask if the lock-keeper or his wife, who lived in a tiny cottage and cultivated a small plot of ground near by, had noticed any passengers upon Cap'n Bill Quigg's barge.

"On the Nancy Hanks?" repeated the lock-keeper. "I should say 'no'! young lady," shaking his head emphatically at Ruth's question. "Why, who ever would sail as a passenger on that old ramshackle thing? I reckon it'll fall to pieces some day soon and block traffic on the canal."

Ruth, disappointed, would not have persevered. But Luke Shepard asked:

"Is there much traffic on the canal?"

"Well, sometimes there is and sometimes there ain't. But I see all that goes through here, you may believe."

"How many canalboats went toward Durginville to-day?" the collegian inquired.

"Why—lemme see," drawled the lock-keeper thoughtfully, as though there was so much traffic that it was a trouble to remember all the boats. "Why, I cal'late about one. Yes, sir, one. That was the Nancy Hanks."

"She ought to be a fast boat at that," muttered Neale O'Neil. "Nancy Hanks was some horse."

"So that was the only one?" Luke persevered. "And you spoke with Cap'n Quigg, did you?"

"With Bill Quigg?" snapped the lock-keeper, with some asperity. "I guess not! I ain't wastin' my time with the likes of him."

"Oh-ho," said Luke, while his friends looked interested. "You don't approve of the owner of the Nancy Hanks?"

"I should hope not. I ain't got no use for him."

"Then he is a pretty poor citizen, I take it?"

"I cal'late he's the poorest kind we got. He ain't even wuth sendin' to jail. He'd gone long ago if he was. No. I've no use for Cap'n Bill."

"But you saw there was nobody with him on the boat—no children?"

"Only that gal of his."

"No others?"

"Wal, I dunno. I tell you I didn't stop none to have any doin's with them. I done my duty and that's all. I ain't required by law to gas with all the riffraff that sails this here canal."

"I believe you," agreed Luke mildly. He looked at Neale and grinned. "Not very conclusive, is it?" he asked.

"Not to my mind. Bet the kids were on there with this little girl he speaks of," muttered Neale.

"Oh, do you believe it, Neale?" gasped Agnes, leaning over the back of the seat.

"I am sure we are much obliged to you, sir," Ruth said, sweetly, as the engine began to roar again.

"What's up, anyway?" asked the crabbed lock-keeper. "You got something on that Bill Quigg?"

"Can't tell, Mister," Neale said seriously. "You ask him about it when he comes back."

"Now, Neale, you've started something," declared Ruth, as the automobile sped away. "You just see if you haven't."

CHAPTER XVI

"Why, of course, our guess may be wrong, Ruth," Luke said thoughtfully, turning around the better to speak with the oldest Corner House girl. "However, we are traveling so fast that it will not delay us much."

"Pshaw, no!" exclaimed Neale. "We'll be in Durginville in a few minutes."

But they did not get that far. Crossing the canal by a liftbridge they swept along the other side and suddenly coming out of the woods saw before them a tented city.

"Why!" cried Cecile, "it's a circus!"

"I saw the pictures on the billboards," her brother admitted. "If we only had the children with us, and everything was all right, we might go."

"Sure we would," responded Neale, smiling.

"Oh, Neale!" cried Agnes, "is it Uncle Bill's?"

"Yes. I have a letter in my pocket now from him that I've had no chance to read."

"You don't suppose Mr. Sorber knows anything about the children?" said Ruth, a little weakly for her.

"How could he?" gasped Agnes. "But we ought to stop and ask."

"And see about the calico pony," chuckled Neale. "Tess and Dot have been hounding me to death about that."

"You don't suppose Dot could have started out to hunt for the circus to get that pony, do you?" suggested Ruth, almost at her wits' end to imagine what had happened to her little sister and her friend.

"We'll know about that shortly," Neale declared.

Suddenly Luke Shepard exclaimed:

"Hullo, what's afire, Neale? See yonder?"

"At the canal," cried his sister, seeing the smoke too.

"Is it a house?" asked Agnes.

"A straw stack!" cried Neale. "Must be. Some farmer is losing the winter's bedding for his cattle."

"It is on the canal," Luke put in. "Don't you see? There's one of those old barges there—and the smoke is coming from it."

"There are the flames. The fire's burst out," Agnes cried.

Suddenly Ruth startled them all by demanding:

"How do we know it isn't the Nancy Hanks?"

"Crickey! We don't," acknowledged Neale, and immediately touched the accelerator. The car leaped ahead. They went roaring on toward the circus grounds and the canal, and people on the road stepped hastily aside at the "Honk! Honk!" of the automobile horn.

Fortunately there were not many vehicles in the road, for most of the farmers' wagons had already reached the grounds, and their mules and horses were hitched beside the right of way. But there was quite a crowd upon the tented field. This crowd had not, however, as Louise Quigg feared "seen everything all up" before the canalboat girl and her father reached the tents.

Louise wanted to see everything to be seen outside before paying over their good money to get into the big show. So they wandered among the tents for some time, without a thought of the old canalboat. Indeed, they were out of sight of it when the mule kicked over the stove on the Nancy Hanks and that pirate craft (according to the first hopes of Sammy Pinkney) caught fire.

Indeed, nobody on the circus grounds was looking canalward. Torches were beginning to flare up here and there in the darkening field. There were all kinds of sideshows and "penny pops"—lifting machines, hammer-throws, a shooting gallery, a baseball alley with a grinning black man dodging the ball at the end—"certainly should like to try to hit that nigger," Pap declared—taffy booths, popcorn machines, soft drink booths, and a dozen other interesting things.

Of course, Louise and her father could only look. They had no money to spend on side issues—or sideshows. But they looked their fill. For once Cap'n Bill appeared to be awake. He was as interested in what there was to be seen as the child clinging to his hairy hand.

They went back of the big tent and there was one with the canvas raised so that they could see the horses and ponies stabled within. Some of the fattest and sleekest horses were being harnessed and trimmed for the "grand entrance," and such a shaking of heads to hear the tiny bells ring, and stamping of oiled hoofs as there was—all the airs of a vain girl before her looking-glass!

Louise was stricken dumb before a pony, all patches of brown and cream color, and with pink like a seashell inside its ears and on its muzzle. The pony's mane was all "crinkly" and its bang was parted and braided with blue ribbons.

"Oh, Pap!" gasped the little girl, breathlessly, "isn't he a dear? I never did see so harnsome a pony."

A short, stout man, with a very red face and a long-lashed whip in his hand who was standing by, heard the canalboat girl and smiled kindly upon her. He was dressed for the ring—shiny top hat, varnished boots, and all, and Louise thought him a most wonderful looking man indeed. If anybody had told her Mr. Bill Sorber was the president of the United States she would have believed it.

"So you like that pony, do you?" asked the ringmaster. "He's some pony. I reckon the little girls he belongs to will like him, too."

"Oh, isn't he a circus pony?" asked Louise, wide-eyed.

"He was. But I'm just going to send him to Milton to live with some little girls I know, and I bet Scalawag will have a lazy time of it for the rest of his natural life. And he'll like that," chuckled Mr. Sorber, deep in his chest, "for Scalawag's the laziest pony I ever tried to handle."

"Oh," murmured Louise, "he seems too nice a horse to be called by such a bad name."

"Bless you! he don't mind it at all," declared the ringmaster. "And it fits him right down to the ground! He's as full of tricks as an egg is of meat—yes ma'am! Ain't you, Scalawag?"

He touched the pony lightly with his whip upon his round rump and the pony flung out his pretty heels and whinnied. Then at a touch under his belly Scalawag stood up on his hind legs and pawed the air to keep his balance.

"Oh!" gasped Louise Quigg, with clasped hands.

"Just as graceful as a barrel, Scalawag," chuckled Mr. Sorber. "He's too fat. But I just can't help feedin' critters well. I like to feed well myself. And I know where he's going to live in Milton he'll be well tended. Hullo! what's going on?"

For suddenly a shout was heard beyond the main tent. Somebody cried, "Fire! Fire!" and there was a roaring of an automobile approaching the circus grounds at a rapid rate.

"What's goin' on?" repeated Mr. Sorber, and started upon an elephantine trot for the canal side of the field.

"Come on, Pap! We don't want to miss nothin'," gasped Louise, seizing the gaping Quigg's hand. She left the calico pony, however, with a backward glance of longing.

The crowd broke for the canal bank. When the captain and his daughter came in sight of the fire the flames were shooting ten feet high out of the cabin roof.

The boat was moored across the canal. Neale, driving down to the bank, saw that the water was between them and the fire, so he halted the car. A heavy man, bearing two empty pails in each hand, and followed closely by another man and a little girl likewise bearing buckets, came gaspingly to the automobile.

"Hi, Mister!" puffed Mr. Bill Sorber, "ast your party to git out and take us over the bridge in that there machine of yours, will you? That canalboat belongs to this here man and his little gal—why, Neale!"

"Hullo, Uncle Bill! Hop in—you and your friends," cried Neale.

"Come in—hurry, Mr. Sorber!" Ruth added her plea. "Oh!" she said to Louise, "is that the Nancy Hanks?"

"Sure as ever was," gulped Louise. "Come on, Pap! John and Jerry will be burnt to a cinder, so they will."

"Tell me, child," Luke said, lifting the girl into his lap as he sat in front with Neale, and crowding over to give the lanky Cap'n Quigg room to sit. "Tell me, are there others aboard the boat?"

"John and Jerry," sobbed Louise.

"Well, well!" Luke soothed. "Don't cry. They can open the door of the cabin and walk out, can't they?"

"Nop. They're chained to stanchions."

"Chained?" gasped the excitable Agnes from the rear. "How awful! Have you got children—"

"Aw, who said anything about children?" demanded Louise snappily. "Only John and Jerry."

"Well?"

"Them's mules," said the child, as Neale drove the car on at increasing speed.

"Tell us," Ruth begged, quite as anxious now as her sister, "have you seen two children—a boy and a girl—this afternoon?"

"Lots of 'em," replied Louise, succinctly.

Here Cap'n Bill put in a word. "If there's anything to see, children, or what not, Lowise seen 'em. She's got the brightest eyes!"

"We are looking for a little girl with a doll in her arms and a boy about ten years old. They were carrying a big paper bag and a basket of fruit, and maybe were near the canal at Milton—right there at the blacksmith shop where you had your mules shod to-day."

This was Luke's speech, and despite the jarring and bouncing of the car he made his earnest words audible to the captain of the canalboat and to his daughter.

"Did they come aboard your boat? Or did you see them?" he added.

"Ain't been nobody aboard our boat but our ownselfs and Beauty," declared Louise.

"And you did not see two children—"

"Holt on!" cried the girl. "I guess I seen 'em when we was waitin' to get the mules shod. They went by."

"Which way were they going?"

"Toward the canal—they was. And our boat was in sight. But I didn't see 'em after."

"Oh, my dear!" cried Ruth, from the tonneau, "they could not possibly be shut up anywhere on your boat?"

"Why, they wasn't in the cabin, of course—nor the mules' stable," drawled the captain. "Warn't nowhere else."

The automobile roared down toward the burning canalboat. The crowd from the circus field lined up along the other bank; but the towpath was deserted where the Nancy Hanks lay. The flames were rapidly destroying the boat amidships.

CHAPTER XVII

"Oe-ee!" gasped Dot, sitting up. "What's happened? Is the chimney leaking?"

"There's something afire. Hear that pounding! And the dog!"

It was the desperate kicking of the mules, John and Jerry, they heard. And the kicking and the barking of Beauty, the hound, continued until the Corner House automobile, with the bucket brigade aboard, roared down to the canalboat and stopped.

The fire was under great headway, and every person in the party helped to quench it. The girls, as well as the men and boys, rushed to the work. To see the old boat burn when it was the whole living of the Quiggs, gained the sympathy of all.

Neale leaped right down into the water and filled buckets and handed them up as fast as possible. Luke and the girls carried the full pails and either threw the contents on the flames or set the pails down for Mr. Sorber to handle.

The ringmaster was in his element, for he loved to direct. His shouted commands would have made an impression upon an organized fire department. And he let it be known, in true showman's style, that the Twomley & Sorber's Herculean Circus and Menagerie was doing all in its power to put out the fire.

Cap'n Bill Quigg and Louise ran to loosen the mules. It was a wonder the canalboat girl was not kicked to death she was so fearless. And the mules by this time were wildly excited.

Fortunately the fire had burned an outlet through the roof of the cabin and had not spread to the stable. But the heat was growing in intensity and the smoke was blinding. Especially after Mr. Sorber began to throw on water to smother the blaze.

The mules were released without either the girl or her father being hurt. But John and Jerry could not be held. Immediately they tore away, raced over the narrow gangplank, and started across somebody's ploughed field at full gallop. They never had shown such speed since they had become known on the towpath.

Then Louise and her father could help put out the fire. Cap'n Bill, as well as the mules, actually showed some speed. He handed up buckets of water with Neale, and amid the encouraging shouts of the crowd across the canal, the fire was finally quenched. Mr. Sorber immediately seized the occasion as a good showman, or "ballyhoo," should.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he shouted, standing at the rail and bowing, flourishing his arm as though he were snapping the long whip lash he took into the ring with him, "this little exciting episode—this epicurean taste of the thrills to follow in the big tent—although of an impromptu nature, merely goes to show the versatility of Twomley and Sorber's Herculean Circus and Menagerie, and our ability, when the unexpected happens, to grapple with circumstances and throw them, sir—throw them! That is what we did in this present thrilling happening. The fire is out. Every spark is smothered. The Fire Demon no longer seeks to devour its prey. Ahem! Another and a more quenching element has driven the Fire Demon back to its last spark and cinder—and then quenched the spark and cinder! Now, ladies and gentlemen, having viewed this entirely impromptu and nevertheless exciting manifestation of Fire and Water, we hope that your attention will be recalled to the glories of the Twomley and Sorber Herculean Circus and Menagerie. The big show will begin in exactly twenty-two minutes, ladies and gentlemen. At that time I shall be happy to see you all in your places in our comfortable seats as I enter the ring for the grand entrance. I thank you, one and all!"

He bowed gracefully and retired a step just as Cap'n Bill Quigg kicked off the forward hatch-cover to let the smoke out of the hold. He let out something else—and so surprised was the canalboatman, that he actually sprang back.

Two childish voices were shouting as loud as possible: "Let us out! Oh, let—us—o-o-out!"

"Come on, Dot!" Sammy Pinkney cried, seeing the opening above their heads. "We can get out now."

"And we'll get right off this horrid boat, Sammy," declared Dot. "I don't ever mean to go off and be pirates with you again—never. Me and my Alice-doll don't like it at all."

There was a rush for the open hatchway and a chorus of excited voices.

"Oh, Dot, Dot! Are you there, dear?" cried Ruth.

"You little plague, Sammy Pinkney!" gasped Agnes. "I've a mind to box your ears for you!"

"Easy, easy," advised Neale, who was dripping wet from his waist down. "Let us see if they are whole and hearty before we turn on the punishment works. Give us your hands, Dottie."

He lifted the little girl, still hugging her Alice-doll, out of the hold and kissed her himself before he put her into Ruth's arms.

"Come on up, now, Sammy, and take your medicine," Neale urged, stooping over the hatchway.

"Huh! Don't you kiss me, Neale O'Neil," growled Sammy, trying to bring the potatoes and the basket of fruit both up the ladder with him. "I'll get slobbered over enough when I get home—first."

"And what second?" asked Luke, vastly amused as well as relieved.

But Sammy was silent on that score. Nor did he ever reveal to the Corner House girls and their friends just what happened to him when he got back to his own home.

Mr. Sorber was shaking hands with them all in congratulatory mood. Cap'n Bill Quigg was lighting his pipe and settling down against the scorched side of the cabin to smoke. Dot was passed around like a doll, from hand to hand. Louise looked on in mild amazement.

"If I'd knowed that little girl was down in the hold, I sure would have had her out," she said to Neale. "My! ain't she pretty. And what a scrumptious doll!"

Dot saw the canalboat girl in her faded dress, and the lanky boatman, and she had to express her curiosity.

"Oh, please!" she cried. "Are you and that man pirates, like Sammy and me!"

"No," said Louise, wonderingly. "Pap's a Lutheran and I went to a 'piscopalean Sunday-school last winter."

The laugh raised by the excited party from the Corner House quenched any further curiosity on Dot's part. And just here Mr. Sorber suggested a most delightful thing.

"Now, Neale wants to come over to the dressing tent and put on something dry," said the ringmaster. "And on the way you can stop at that house yonder by the bridge and telephone home that you are all right and the young'uns have been found. Then you'll all be my guests at Twomley and Sorber's Herculean Circus and Menagerie. The big show will commence in just fourteen minutes. Besides Scalawag wants to see his little mistress."

"Who is Scalawag?" was the chorused question.

"That pony, Uncle Bill?" asked Neale.

"Oh!" gasped Sammy Pinkney, quite himself once more. "The calico pony with pink on him! Je-ru-sa-lem!"

"Exactly," agreed Mr. Sorber, answering all the queries with one word. Then he turned to little Louise Quigg, to add:

"That means you and your dad. You will be guests of the circus, too. Come on, now, Neale, turn your car around and hurry. I'm due to get into another ring suit—I always keep a fresh one handy in case of accident—and walk out before the audience in just—le's see—eleven minutes, now!"

That was surely a busy eleven minutes for all concerned. The Quiggs had to be urged a little to leave their canal boat again; but Beauty had faithfully remained aboard, even if she had gone to sleep at her post; so they shut her into the partly burned cabin to guard the few possessions that remained to them.

"We never did have much, and we ain't likely to ever have much," said the philosophical Louise. "We can bunk to-night in the hold, Pap. We couldn't find John and Jerry till morning, anyway. We might's well celebrate 'cause the old Nancy Hanks didn't all go up in smoke."

Luke telephoned the good news to the old Corner House that Dot and Sammy were found, safe and sound, and that they were all going to the circus. Poor Tess had to be satisfied with the promise that the long-expected pony would be at Milton in a few days. News of the runaways' safety was carried quickly to the Pinkney cottage across Willow Street.

"It strikes me that these kids are getting rewarded instead of punished for running away," Luke observed to Ruth, when he returned from telephoning.

"But what can we do?" the girl asked him. "I am so glad to get Dot back that I could not possibly punish her. And I don't know that she did anything so very wrong. Nor do I believe she will do anything like it again."

"How about Sammy?" the collegian asked.

"To tell the truth," said honest Ruth, "from what they both say I fancy Dot urged Sammy to run away. I can't blame him if I don't blame her, can I?"

"They've got enough, I guess," chuckled Luke. "Two reformed pirates! Goodness! aren't kids the greatest ever?"

The escapade of Sammy and Dot had carried its own punishment with it. Ruth was right when she said that Dot would never yield to such a temptation again. She had learned something about running away. As for Sammy, he was more subdued than the Corner House girls had ever seen him before.

That is, he was subdued until they were in what Mr. Sorber called "a private box" at the ringside of the circus and things began to happen. Then, what small boy could remain subdued with the joys and wonders of a real circus evolving before his eyes?

If the tents were dusty and patched, and some of the costumes as frayed and tarnished as they could be after two-thirds of a season's wear, all the glamour of the famous entertainment was here—the smell of the animals, the dancing dust in the lamplight, the flaring torches, the blaring of the band, the distant roaring of the lions being fed for the amusement of the spectators.

The grand entrance was a marvel to the children. The curveting horses, the gaily decked chariots, the daring drivers in pink and blue tights and the very pink-cheeked women in the wonderful, glittering clothes—all these things delighted Sammy and Dot as well as Louise Quigg, who had never in her cramped life seen such a show.

When Mr. Sorber entered in his fresh suit and cracked his whip, and the band began to play, Louise became absorbed. When the clowns leaped into the ring with a chorused: "Here we are again!" Dot and Sammy and Louise clutched hands without knowing it, and just "held on" to themselves and each other during most of the entertainment that followed.

But the greatest excitement for the smaller people in the private box occurred toward the end of the evening when a squad of ponies came in to do their tricks. There were black ponies and white, and dappled and red ponies; but the prettiest of all (both Dot and the gasping Louise declared it) was the brown and cream colored Scalawag, with the pink nose and ears.

Sammy, feeling his superiority as a boy in most instances, even at the circus, dropped every appearance of calm when Neale pointed out Scalawag as the calico pony promised Tess and Dot by Uncle Bill Sorber.

"Oh, my granny!" gasped the youngster, his eyes fairly bulging, "you don't mean that's the pony I thought was like a Teddy bear?"

"That's the one the girls are going to have for their very own. Uncle Rufus has been building a stall in the far shed for it—next to Billy Bumps," Neale assured him.

"And it is chocolate and cream and pink!" exclaimed Sammy. He turned suddenly to Agnes. "Oh, I say, Aggie!" he shouted. "You did know all about what a calico pony was like, didn't you?"

Agnes herself was delighted with the pretty creature. Of course, he was awfully round and fat; but he appeared so funny and cute when he looked out at the audience from under his braided bang, that Scalawag quite endeared himself to all their hearts.

He was something of a clown in the troupe of ponies. He always started last when an order was given and when he had anything to do by himself he appeared "to really hate" to do it. Mr. Sorber seemed to get very angry, and he lashed at the pony quite furiously and shouted at him, so that the little girls squealed.

But the whiplash only wound about Scalawag's neck and did not hurt him, while he put his head around and looked at the ringmaster when he shouted, as though to ask Uncle Bill Sorber: "What's your hurry?"

"He's almost the oldest live thing in the show," chuckled Neale to Luke. "I can remember him when I was a little fellow and was first taken into the ring as the 'Infantile Wonder of the Ages'. I rode Scalawag. He was so fat then that I couldn't have rolled off his back very easily.

"Nothing older with the show, I guess, except Monolith, the moth-eaten old elephant, and the big tortoise in the sideshow. They say the elephant's over a hundred, and some think the tortoise is two hundred years old. So they go Scalawag a little better in age."

At the end of the pony act Mr. Sorber made Scalawag do something that thrilled Dot so that she whispered to Agnes she thought she "should faint!" The ringmaster led the old pony right over in front of the private box, and while all the people looked on, he presented Scalawag to Dot and her absent sister, whom Mr. Sorber spoke of as "T'ressa."

"Ladies and gentlemen, and all friends," began the ringmaster. "Twomley and Sorber's Herculean Circus and Menagerie never does things by halves. Even when we find ourselves obliged to get rid of one of our faithful pufformers we make provision for that pufformer's happy old age.

"Scalawag has always been a trial; but we have borne with him. We have stood his tricks and his laziness for these many moons—many moons, ladies and gentlemen. Now he is going to a good home for the rest of his lazy life where all the work, privations, et cetera of circus life will be but a memory in his equine mind. Scalawag! Salute your new mistress!"

The fat pony rose on his hind legs and pawed the air, seemingly looking straight at Dot. It was then the smallest Corner House girl thought surely she would faint.

CHAPTER XVIII

"Old Scalawag has done his last tricks in the ring to-night," the showman said. "I'd made my mind up to that before you young people appeared. And now we had a chance to make a little fancy business of it. I believe in advertising the circus in season and out. The papers will give us half a column at least to-morrow, what with the fire on that barge and the presentation of Scalawag to this little girlie here," and he shook hands again with Dot.

Dot was sound asleep before the car was off the circus field. She and Sammy slept most of the way home and, it was so late, when they arrived most of the congratulations and all the punishment due the youngsters was postponed.

To tell the truth, Dot rose the next morning with a vague feeling that the venture in piracy, as Luke Shepard for a long time called it, was something that had happened to her and Sammy in a dream. And the adults were all so glad that the affair had turned out happily that even scoldings were mild.

Sammy, however, had an interview with his father that next evening that made a deep impression upon the boy's mind.

For the first time Sammy began to understand that he had an influence upon other people—especially small people—that must be for good rather than ill. He was the older, and he should not have allowed Dot to lead him astray. Besides, it was not manly for a boy to encourage a little girl to do things that might bring her to harm.

"When I go off to be a real pirate," Sammy confessed later to Neale, "I ain't goin' to take a girl anyway. No more. My father says pirates that carried off women with 'em never came to a good end."

The flurry of excitement and anxiety regarding Dot and Sammy blew over as all similar things did. With Mrs. MacCall, one may believe that there was seldom a day passed at the old Corner House that did not bring its own experiences of a startling nature. Aunt Sarah declared she was kept "in a fidgit" all the time by the children.

"I don't know what a fidgit is," Tess confessed; "but we've got to be careful what we do now for a while, Dottie."

"Why?" asked the little girl.

"'Cause Aunt Sarah seems awfully uncomfortable when she's in one of those fidgits. Yesterday, when you were lost, she was walking up and down stairs and all over the house. She must have walked miles! I guess fidgits are wearing on her."

The older Corner House girls did not mean that their guests should feel neglected because of the excitement about the lost children. One day's planned amusement for Cecile and Luke Shepard was lost. The latter declared, however, that pursuing embryo pirates and saving burning canalboats, to say nothing of attending the circus, seemed to him to have made up a more or less interesting and exciting day.

Luke was making himself much liked by every member of the Corner House family. Even Aunt Sarah endured his presence with more than usual complacency. Agnes found him a most cheerful philosopher and friend. The little girls considered him, next to Neale O'Neil, to be the nicest boy they had ever known.

Mrs. MacCall had her say regarding Luke Shepard, too. It was to Ruth, and the outburst came after the Scotch woman had ample time to consider and form her opinion of the young man.

"Hech, ma lassie! there's a time coming when all o' ye will be thinkin' o' young men, an' bringin' them to the hoose. Forbye it's natural ye should. But 'tis in ma mind, Ruthie, ye'll never find one more suited to ye than yon bonnie lad."

"Oh, Mrs. Mac!" gasped Ruth, blushing furiously, and she actually ran out of the room to escape the keen scrutiny of the old housekeeper.

The oldest Corner House girl was growing up. One could not doubt it. Agnes exclaimed one morning as she and Ruth were dressing:

"Why, Ruthie! you really are as big as the old girls now. Of course you are. You are just as much grown up as Carrie Poole—and she's engaged. And so is Elizabeth Forbes. And Annie Dudley will be married before Christmas. Oh, Ruthie! did you ever think of being married?"

"For goodness' sake, child!" ejaculated Ruth, hiding her face quickly from her pretty sister, "where is your sense?"

"My cents are where my dollars are," laughed Agnes. "I am talking just as good sense as you ever heard, Ruth Kenway. Of course, some day you will marry."

"What for?" snapped her sister, inclined to be a little piqued because of Agnes' insistence.

"To please yourself, I hope," Agnes said slyly. "But surely to please some man, my dear."

"I don't know any man I'd want to please—"

"Hush!" warned Agnes, who was looking out of the open window, and she said it with mischief dancing in her eyes. "There's Luke Shepard."

"What do you mean?" demanded Ruth, flaring up in haste, not at all like her usual placid self.

"Why—on the lawn. Luke is on the lawn, I was going to say," declared Agnes, making innocent eyes again. "Why so touchy?"

But her sister did not answer her. To tell the truth she was being worried a good deal by the family's interest in a matter which she considered should interest herself alone—and one other.

Of course she had gone out with boys before, had been brought home from parties, had been escorted from evening meetings. Boys had carried her books home from school, and invited her to entertainments, and all that. But Ruth had always been so busy—there were such a multitude of things she was interested in—that never a sentimental thought had entered her head about any of these young swains.

If any of them had been inclined to have what the slangy Agnes called a "crush" on Ruth, they had quickly discovered that she had no use for that sort of thing. She made friends of boys as she made friends of girls—and that was all. And, really, she had never cared greatly to go out much or be with boys. She only had endured Neale about the house—or so she believed—because he was useful and really was a remarkably domestic boy.

Ruth's mental attitude toward men was rapidly changing. She had never in her life before thought so much about boys, or young men, as she had during this week that Luke Shepard remained at the house with his sister. He seemed quite unlike any other person that Ruth had ever known before.

They were much together. Not, seemingly, by any plan on either side. But if Ruth took her sewing to the front porch, like enough she would find Luke there reading. Cecile and Agnes were clattering off at all hours to shop, or go to the motion picture shows, or visit Agnes' friends.

If Luke had anything to do at all, usually it was more convenient to do it in the company of the eldest Corner House girl. And wherever they met, or whatever they did, Ruth and Luke found plenty of subjects for conversation.

Never out of topics for small talk, were they, no indeed! And the most interesting things to say to each other! Of course, each was deeply interested in whatever seemed of moment to the other.

Not having known each other for very long, Ruth and Luke had to learn many things about each other which they would have known as a matter of course had they been brought up as neighbors. They wanted to learn each other's likes and dislikes on a multitude of questions. Then they deferred to each other's tastes in a way that at first amazed the other people in the house and then secretly amused them.

That is, Mrs. MacCall, Agnes, and Neale were amused. Tess merely said seemingly apropos of nothing at all:

"Our Ruthie never did like boys before. But I guess Mr. Luke must be different."

"He isn't as nice as Neale," Dot proclaimed, loyal to the older friend, "but I like him."

Mr. Howbridge chanced to call—or was it chance! At any rate, he met Luke Shepard and his sister and seemed to approve of both of them.

"Your young friends are remarkably attractive, I am sure, Ruth," the lawyer said, with twinkling eyes as he was going. "Let me see, there's no danger yet of a dowry being wanted out of that idle money we are going to have—for Agnes, for instance?"

Ruth blushed furiously. She was getting that habit, it seemed, of late.

"I do wish, Mr. Howbridge, that you wouldn't joke so—"

"On such very serious subjects?" he interposed.

"It would be very serious indeed if our Agnes thought of such things. At her age!"

"True. And, of course, nobody else in this house could possibly bear such a thing in mind. Good-bye, my dear. Of course, if anything should happen, let me know at once."

"Oh, everything is all right now, Mr. Howbridge," said Ruth, ignoring his insinuations. "I am sure the roof will not leak now that the roofers have been here. And, as you say, the painting of the house would better go until late in the fall."

He shook his finger at her as he went out of the door.

"You are a very bright young lady, Ruth Kenway."

"Boy," said Cecile to her brother, "you are getting in deep."

"And glad of it," growled Luke, knowing full well what she meant.

"But what about Neighbor?"

"I am going to see Neighbor," declared the young man, looking very uncomfortable but decisive. "I'm not going to be a cad."

"You couldn't be that, Luke," she told him.

"Oh, yes, I could. I have been tempted," Luke said.

"Tempted to do what—to say what?"

"To try and make Ruth Kenway like me and let me tell her how very fond I am of her without a thought for the future, Sis."

"Oh, Luke! You are looking so very far ahead."

"I know it. And with the prospect I have without Neighbor's help, it would be looking very, very far indeed. I would be wrong to try to tie up any girl so long. I've fought that all out. I won't do it."

"But what will you do?" asked his sister, grieving for him in both voice and look.

"See Neighbor the moment we get home. I'll put it to him straight. I'll be no man's slave and for no amount of money. If he will see it in the right light I shall stop off here at Milton on my way to college, and just tell Ruth all about it."

"And if Neighbor will not listen to reason?"

"Then I must not speak to Ruth," the young man said bitterly, and turned abruptly away from her.

"Yes. But," murmured Cecile, "will that be kind to Ruth? I wonder!"

CHAPTER XIX

"Oh, you beautiful!" cried Tess, and hugged Scalawag around the neck.

The entire Corner House family—and some of the neighbors—gathered to greet the little girls' new pet. Scalawag stood very placidly and accepted all the petting that they wished to shower upon him.

"He eats it up!" laughed Neale, poking the pony in his fat side. "You old villain! you've certainly struck a soft snap now."

Scalawag brushed flies and wagged his ears knowingly. Tom Jonah came up to him and they companionably "snuffed noses," as Sammy said. But Billy Bumps had to be kept at a distance, for he showed a marked desire to butt the new member of the Corner House family of pets.

Louise and her father were entertained very nicely by the little girls and Sammy. Cap'n Bill Quigg was a simple-minded man, after all; he did not seem to deserve the bad name that the crabbed old lock-keeper had given him. He might have been slow and shiftless; but he was scarcely any more grown up than little Louise herself.

Ruth Kenway, now that her mind was less disturbed than it had been the evening when they had been searching for Sammy and Dot, gave more of her attention to the neglected canalboat girl. She planned then and there to do something worth while for Louise Quigg; and in time these plans of the oldest Corner House girl bore fruit.

On Saturday the Shepards went back to Grantham, for the next week Cecile and Luke would go to their respective schools. Luke bade Ruth good-bye in public. He sought no opportunity of speaking to her alone. If the girl felt any surprise at this she did not show her feeling—or anything save kindly comradery—while speeding the parting guests.

Again on Saturday night the young folks gathered for study in the Corner House sitting-room. There had been very little time during this last week of the long vacation to look at school books.

It is pretty hard to settle down to study after so long an absence from textbooks. Agnes actually wrinkled her pretty forehead in a scowl when she opened her school books.

"What does the doctor say is mostly the matter with you, Aggie?" demanded Neale O'Neil, chuckling at her somber expression of countenance.

"I don't know," growled Agnes—if a girl with such a sweet voice could be said to growl. "It must be something awful. He asked to see my tongue and then he said, 'Overworked!'"

"He was perfectly correct, dear child," Ruth said. "Do give it a rest."

"And we'll all rest if you do," Neale added.

"You're all so smart!" cried Agnes. "And Neale O'Neil never did appreciate me. He is going to grow up to be a woman-hater—like that man Cecile Shepard told us about, who lives next door to them in Grantham."

"Oh, yes—Neighbor," Ruth murmured.

"I know," said Dot cheerfully. "The misogynist."

"What?" gasped Tess, staring at her little sister who had mouthed the word so deftly. "I never, Dot! What is that? It—it sounds—Why, Dot!"

The astonishment of the whole family at the way in which the smallest girl had said the word had pleased Dot greatly. She quite preened and tossed her head.

"Oh, Mr. Luke taught it to me," she admitted. "He said it was such a jaw-breaker that he was afraid I'd have a bad accident if I tried to say it without being told just how. It's a real nice word, I think. Much nicer than efficatacious. That's another word I've learned to say."

They laughed at her then and Dot's sudden pride was quenched.

Sammy was almost the only earnest student on this evening. He had met some of his boy schoolmates during the past week and he found that he desired very much to be with them in the grade they were making.

"I bet I can make it if they do," he said. "Anyway, my head's just empty of studying now, so it ought to hold a lot. I'll cram it chock full of the stuff in these books and then I won't have to work so hard by and by," he added, evidently with the hope that he might obtain education by the occasional cart-load, instead of by driblets.

Neale and Agnes were still "scrapping" in their own peculiar way. The beauty accused Neale again of being a harsh critic.

"You never do say a good word about any of my friends," she declared.

"He's wise in not doing so," laughed Ruth. "Then there will be no starting point for jealousy."

"Now you've said something!" declared Neale.

"Humph! He wouldn't know a real sweet girl if he met one," Agnes said.

"Oh, yes. I know a sweet girl," the ex-circus boy said with twinkling eyes.

"Who is she!"

"Carrie Mel," returned Neale quietly.

"Carrie Who?" demanded Agnes, while the little folks, too, pricked up their ears.

"And there's that very pleasant girl—Jenny Rosity," the boy said with a perfectly serious face. "And I'm sure that Ella Gant is one of the very best of girls—"

Agnes giggled.

"What do you mean? Who are you talking about?" asked Dot, much puzzled. "Are they friends of Aggie and Ruthie? I never heard of that Carrie— What did you say her name was?"

"The sweet girl? Oh! Carrie Mel," said Neale.

"And Jenny Rosity and Ella Gant. Who are they?"

"Then there's that very lively girl, Annie Mation," pursued Neale, racking his brain to discover other punning words. "And despite her superabundance of avoirdupois, Ellie Phant cannot be overlooked."

"Well, I never! Elephant!" gasped Tess. "And caramel!"

"And elegant and generosity," added Agnes.

"Don't forget Annie Mation," said Neale, grinning. "She's a lively one. But Annie Mosity is one of the most disagreeable girls I ever met."

From that they began making out lists of such punning names, including Amelia Eation, E. Lucy Date, Polly Gon, Hettie Rodoxy, Jessie Mine, Sarah Nade, and dozens of others, even searching out "Mr. Dick" to help them in this remarkably erudite task.

Finally Ruth called them to time and warned them that the evening was supposed to be spent in serious study.

"Monday we must all go to school," she said, for even she was to take several studies during the coming term, although she did not mean to attend recitations full time at the Milton high school.

"Let us be able to answer a few questions intelligently."

"I guess," said Tess, "we won't any of us be as ignorant as one of the boys was in my class last term. It wasn't Sammy, for he was home sick, you know," she hastened to add, fearful that Sammy Pinkney might suspect her of "telling on him."

"Who was it then?" asked Sammy.

"No. I'll only tell you what he said," Tess declared, shaking her head. "'Cause I guess he knows more now. The teacher read us a lot about hist'ry. You know, things that happened to folks away back, and what they did. You know about the Pilgrims, don't you, Sammy?"

"Sure," said Sammy. "They brought over from England all that old furniture Mrs. Adams has got in her parlor. She told me so."

"Were—were the Pilgrims furniture movers?" asked Dot, as usual in search of exact information. "I know a little girl whose father owns a moving van."

Tess tried to continue her story after the laughter subsided. "Anyway, teacher told us how the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock and how it looked and what they engraved on a plate and put there; but this little boy wasn't paying much attention I guess."

"Why? What did he do, Tess?" asked Sammy.

"She told us all to draw a picture of Plymouth Rock, just as she had described it; and while we were all trying to that boy didn't draw a thing. Teacher asked him why he didn't draw Plymouth Rock, and he said:

"'Teacher, I don't know whether you want us to draw a hen or a rooster.' Now, wouldn't you think he was ignorant?" she demanded amid the laughter of the family.

They settled down at last to work, and before Neale and Sammy went home each of the party was prepared in some measure, at least, to face the teachers' first grilling regarding the previous term's work.

Ruth busied herself more and more about the domestic affairs of the big house. Mrs. MacCall could not do it all, nor did Ruth wish her to.