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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Moving Picture Girls Snowbound, by Laura
+Lee Hope
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Moving Picture Girls Snowbound
+       Or, The Proof on the Film
+
+
+Author: Laura Lee Hope
+
+
+
+Release Date: January 12, 2007  [eBook #20347]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS
+SNOWBOUND***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, J. P. W. Fraser, Emmy, and
+the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+(https://www.pgdp.net/c/)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustration.
+      See 20347-h.htm or 20347-h.zip:
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/0/3/4/20347/20347-h/20347-h.htm)
+      or
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/0/3/4/20347/20347-h.zip)
+
+
+
+
+
+THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS SNOWBOUND
+
+Or
+
+The Proof on the Film
+
+by
+
+LAURA LEE HOPE
+
+Author of "The Moving Picture Girls," "The Moving Picture
+Girls at Oak Farm," "The Outdoor Girls
+Series," "The Bobbsey Twins Series," Etc.
+
+Illustrated
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+The World Syndicate Publishing Co.
+Cleveland                New York
+Made in U.S.A.
+Copyright, 1914, by
+Grosset & Dunlap
+
+Press of
+The Commercial Bookbinding Co.
+Cleveland
+
+
+
+[Illustration: THE MOVING PICTURE RACE WAS ON.
+
+_The Moving Girls Snowbound._--_Page_ 113.]
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+          CHAPTER                         PAGE
+
+              I TROUBLE                      1
+
+             II AN UNPLEASANT VISITOR       10
+
+            III RUSS TO THE RESCUE          20
+
+             IV A FUNNY FILM                27
+
+              V A QUEER ACCIDENT            36
+
+             VI NEW PLANS                   46
+
+            VII OFF TO THE WOODS            56
+
+           VIII A BREAKDOWN                 63
+
+             IX THE BLIZZARD                73
+
+              X AT ELK LODGE                79
+
+             XI THROUGH THE ICE             89
+
+            XII THE CURIOUS DEER            99
+
+           XIII THE COASTING RACE          106
+
+            XIV ON SNOWSHOES               114
+
+             XV A TIMELY SHOT              124
+
+            XVI IN THE ICE CAVE            132
+
+           XVII THE RESCUE                 139
+
+          XVIII SNOWBOUND                  148
+
+            XIX ON SHORT RATIONS           158
+
+             XX THE THAW                   166
+
+            XXI IN THE STORM               174
+
+           XXII THE THREE MEN              181
+
+          XXIII THE PLAN OF RUSS           191
+
+           XXIV THE PROOF ON THE FILM      199
+
+            XXV THE MOVING PICTURE         207
+
+
+
+
+THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS SNOWBOUND
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+TROUBLE
+
+
+"Daddy is late; isn't he, Ruth?" asked Alice DeVere of her sister, as
+she looked up from her sewing.
+
+"A little," answered the girl addressed, a tall, fair maid, with deep
+blue eyes, in the depths of which hidden meaning seemed to lie, awaiting
+discovery by someone.
+
+"A little!" exclaimed Alice, who was rather plump, and whose dark brown
+hair and eyes were in pleasing contrast to her sister's fairness. "Why,
+he's more than an hour late, and he's seldom that! He promised to be
+back from the moving picture studio at four, and now it's after five."
+
+"I know, dear, but you remember he said he had many things to talk over
+with Mr. Pertell, and perhaps it has taken him longer than he
+anticipated.
+
+"Besides you know there are some new plans to be considered," went on
+Ruth. "Mr. Pertell wants to get some different kinds of moving
+pictures--snow scenes, I believe--and perhaps he has kept daddy to talk
+about them. But why are you so impatient? Are you afraid something has
+happened to him?"
+
+"Gracious, no! What put that idea into your head?"
+
+"Well, I didn't know whether you had noticed it or not, but poor daddy
+hasn't been quite himself since we came back from Oak Farm. I am afraid
+something is bothering him--or worrying him."
+
+"Perhaps it is his voice, though it has seemed better of late."
+
+"I think not," said Ruth, slowly, as she bent her head in a listening
+attitude, for a step was coming along the hallway in the Fenmore
+Apartment, where the DeVere girls and their father had their rather
+limited quarters.
+
+"That isn't he," said Ruth, with a little sigh of disappointment. "I
+thought at first it was. No, I don't mean that it was his voice, Alice.
+That really seems better since he so suddenly became hoarse, and had to
+take up moving picture work instead of the legitimate drama he loves so
+much. It is some other trouble, Alice."
+
+"I hadn't noticed it, I confess. But I suppose you'll say that I'm so
+flighty I never notice anything."
+
+"I never called you flighty, dear. You are of a lively disposition,
+that's all."
+
+"And you are a wee bit too much the other way, sister mine!" And then,
+to take any sting out of the words, Alice rose from her chair with a
+bound, crossed the room in a rush, and flung her arms about her sister,
+embracing her heartily and kissing her.
+
+"Oh, Alice!" protested the other. "You are crushing me!"
+
+"I'm a regular bear, I suppose. Hark, is that daddy?"
+
+They both listened, but the footsteps died away as before.
+
+"Why are you so anxious?"
+
+"I want some money, sister mine, and daddy promised to bring my moving
+picture salary up with him. I wanted to do a little shopping before the
+stores close. But I'm afraid it's too late now," the girl added,
+ruefully. "Daddy said he'd be here in plenty of time, and he never
+disappointed me before."
+
+"Oh, if that's all you're worrying about, I'll lend you some money."
+
+"Will you, really? Then I'll get ready and go. There's that little
+French shop just around the corner. They keep open after the others.
+Madame Morey is so thrifty, and there was the sweetest shirt waist in
+the window the other day. I hope it isn't gone! I'll get ready at once.
+You be getting out the money, Ruth, dear. Is there anything I can get
+for you? It's awfully kind of you. Shall I bring back anything for
+supper?"
+
+"Gracious, what a rattlebox you're getting to be, Alice," spoke Ruth,
+soberly, as she laid aside her sewing and went to the bureau for her
+pocketbook.
+
+"That's half of life!" laughed the younger girl. "Quick, Ruth, I want to
+get out and get back, and be here when daddy comes. I want to hear all
+about the new plans for taking moving picture plays. Is that the money?
+Thanks! I'm off!" and the girl fairly rushed down the hall of the
+apartment. Ruth heard her call a greeting to Mrs. Dalwood, who lived
+across the corridor--a cheery greeting, in her fresh, joyous voice.
+
+"Dear little sister!" murmured Ruth, as she sat with folded hands,
+looking off into space and meditating. "She enjoys life!"
+
+And certainly Alice DeVere did. Not that Ruth did not also; but it was
+in a different way. Alice was of a more lively disposition, and her
+father said she reminded him every day more and more of her dead
+mother. Ruth had an element of romanticism in her character, which
+perhaps accounted for her dreaminess at times. In the work of acting and
+posing for moving pictures, which was what the two girls, and their
+father, a veteran actor, were engaged in, Ruth always played the
+romantic parts, while nothing so rejoiced Alice as to have a hoydenish
+part to enact.
+
+Alice hastened along the streets, now covered with a film of newly
+fallen snow. It was sifting down from a leaden sky, and the clouds had
+added to the darkness which was already coming that November evening.
+
+"Oh, it's good to be alive, such weather as this!" Alice exulted as she
+hastened along, the crisp air and the exercise bringing to her cheeks a
+deeper bloom. Her eyes shone, and there was so much of life and youth
+and vitality in her that, as she hastened along through the falling
+snow, which dusted itself on her furs, more than one passerby turned to
+look at her in admiration. She was a "moving picture" in herself.
+
+She lingered long in the quaint little French shop, there were so many
+bargains in the way of lingerie. Alice looked at many longingly, and
+turned some over more longingly, but she thought of her purse, and knew
+it would not stand the strain to which she contemplated putting it.
+
+"I'll just have to wait about the others, Madame," she said, with a
+sigh. "I've really bought more now than I intended."
+
+"I hope zat Mademoiselle will come often!" laughed the French woman.
+
+Back through the streets, now covered with snow, hastened Alice,
+tripping lightly, and now and then, when she thought no one was watching
+her, she took a little run and slide, as in the days of her childhood.
+Not that she was much more than a child still, being only a little over
+fifteen. Ruth was two years her senior, but Ruth considered herself
+quite "grown up."
+
+"I wonder if daddy has come back yet?" Alice mused, as she hastened on
+to the apartment. "That looks like Russ Dalwood ahead of me," she went
+on, referring to the son of the neighbor across the hall. Russ "filmed,"
+or made the moving pictures for the company by whom Mr. DeVere and his
+daughters were engaged. "Yes, it is Russ!" the girl exclaimed. "He has
+probably come right from the studio, and he'll know about daddy. Russ!
+Russ!" she called, as she came nearer to the young man.
+
+He turned, and a welcoming smile lighted his face.
+
+"Oh, hello, Alice!" he greeted, genially. "Where's Ruth?"
+
+"Just for that I shan't tell you! Don't you want to walk with _me_?" she
+asked, archly. "Why must you always ask for Ruth when I meet you alone?"
+
+"I didn't! I mean--I--er----"
+
+"Oh, don't try to make it any worse!" she laughed at his discomfiture.
+"Let it go at that! Did you just come from the studio?"
+
+"Yes, and we had a hard day of it. I forget how many thousand feet of
+film I reeled off."
+
+"Was my father there?"
+
+"Yes, he was with Mr. Pertell when I came out."
+
+"I wonder what makes him so late?"
+
+"Oh, there's a rush of work on. But I think he'll be along soon, for I
+heard Mr. Pertell say he wouldn't keep him five minutes."
+
+"That's good. Oh, dear! Isn't it slippery!" she cried, as she barely
+saved herself from falling.
+
+"Take my arm," invited Russ.
+
+"Thanks, I will. I came out in a hurry to do a little shopping. Ruth is
+at home. There, I told you after all. I'm of a forgiving spirit, you
+see."
+
+"I see," he laughed.
+
+They stepped along lightly together, laughing and talking, for Russ was
+almost like a brother to the DeVere girls, though the two families had
+only known each other since both had come to the Fenmore Apartment,
+about a year before.
+
+"Did they film any big plays to-day?" asked Alice. "I know Mr. Pertell
+said he wouldn't need Ruth and myself, so of course they didn't do
+anything really good. Not at all conceited; am I?" she asked, with a
+rippling laugh.
+
+"Well, you're right this time--there wasn't much of importance doing,"
+Russ replied. "Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon had some pretty good
+parts, but the stuff was mostly comic to-day."
+
+"That suited Mr. Switzer, then. I think he is the nicest German comedian
+I ever knew, and I met quite a number when father was appearing in real
+plays."
+
+"Yes, Switzer is a good sort. But you should have seen Mr. Sneed
+to-day!"
+
+"Found fault with everything; eh?"
+
+"I should say so, and then some, as the boys say. He said something was
+sure to happen before the day was over, and it did--a stone wall fell on
+him."
+
+"Really?"
+
+"Really, but not real stone. It was one of Pop Snooks's scenic
+creations. One of the pieces of wood hit Mr. Sneed on the head, so
+something happened. And what a fuss he made! He's the real grouch of
+the company, all right. Well, here we are!" and the young man guided his
+companion into the hallway of the Fenmore.
+
+"See you again!" called Alice, as she went into her door and Russ into
+his.
+
+"Is that you, Alice?" called Ruth, from an inner room.
+
+"Yes, dear. Has daddy come home?"
+
+"Not yet. I wonder if we'd better telephone?"
+
+"No, I just met Russ, and he said daddy would be right along. He's
+planning something with Mr. Pertell."
+
+The table was nearly prepared when a step was heard in the hall.
+
+"There he is now!" cried Alice, as she flew to open the door before her
+father could get out his key. But as he entered, and Alice reached up to
+kiss him, she cried out in amazement at the look on his face.
+
+"Why, Daddy! Has anything happened?" she asked.
+
+"Yes," he said in his hoarse voice--a hoarseness caused by a throat
+affection. "Yes, something has happened, or is going to. I'm in serious
+trouble!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+AN UNPLEASANT VISITOR
+
+
+Ruth overheard the question asked by Alice, and her father's answer. She
+came in swiftly, and put her arms about him, as her sister had done.
+
+"Oh, Daddy dear, what is it?" she asked, anxiously.
+
+"I--I'll tell you--presently," he replied, chokingly. "I am a little out
+of breath. I am getting too--too stout. And my throat has bothered me a
+good deal of late. Would you mind getting me that throat spray and
+medicine Dr. Rathby left? That always helps me."
+
+"I'll get it," offered Alice, quickly, as her father sank into a chair,
+and while she searched in the medicine closet for it, there was a dull
+ache in her heart. More trouble! And there had been so much of it of
+late. The sun had seemed to break through the clouds, and now it had
+gone behind again.
+
+And while the girls are thus preparing to minister to their father, I
+will tell my new readers something of the previous books of this series,
+and a little about the main characters.
+
+In the initial volume, entitled "The Moving Picture Girls; Or, First
+Appearances in Photo Dramas," I related how Mr. Hosmer DeVere, a
+talented actor, suddenly lost his voice, by the return of an old throat
+affection. He had just been "cast" for an important part in a new play,
+but had to give it up, as he could not speak distinctly enough to be
+heard across the footlights.
+
+The DeVere family fortunes were at low ebb, and money was much needed.
+By accident Russ Dalwood, a moving picture operator, suggested to one of
+the girls that their father might act for a moving picture film company,
+as he would not have to use his voice in such employment.
+
+How Mr. DeVere took the engagement, and how Ruth and Alice followed him,
+as well as their part in helping Russ to save a valuable camera
+patent--all this you will find set down in the first book.
+
+In the second volume, entitled "The Moving Picture Girls at Oak Farm;
+Or, Queer Happenings While Taking Rural Plays," the scene was shifted to
+the country. There you may read of many strange occurrences, as well as
+funny ones--how Alice fell into the water--but there! I must save my
+space in this book for the happenings of it. I might add that,
+incidentally, the girls helped to solve a strange mystery concerning Oak
+Farm, and solved it in a way that made glad the hearts of Mr. and Mrs.
+Felix Apgar, the parents of Sandy, and of the heart of Sandy himself.
+
+Mr. Frank Pertell was the manager of the Comet Film Company, with whom
+Mr. DeVere and his daughters had an engagement, and the entire company,
+including the DeVeres, spent a whole summer at Oak Farm, in New Jersey,
+making rural plays.
+
+The company had just returned to New York City, to finish some dramas
+there, and Mr. Pertell was working on new plans, which were not, as yet,
+fully developed.
+
+The Comet Film Company included a number of people, and you will meet
+some of them from time to time as this story advances. You have already
+heard of a few members. In addition there was Wellington Bunn, a former
+Shakespearean actor, who could never seem to get away from an ambition
+to do Hamlet. Pepper Sneed was the "grouch" of the company, always
+finding fault, or worrying lest something happen. Paul Ardite was the
+"leading juvenile," the father of the moving picture girls being the
+leading man. The girls themselves, though comparatively new to the
+business, had made wonderful strides, for they had the advantage of
+private "coaching" at home from Mr. DeVere.
+
+Miss Pearl Pennington and Miss Laura Dixon were former vaudeville
+actresses, who had gone into the "movies," and between them and the
+DeVeres there was not the best of feeling; caused by the jealousy of the
+former.
+
+Carl Switzer, a German with a marked accent, generally did "comics."
+Then there was Mrs. Maguire, who did "old woman" parts. She had two
+grandchildren, Tommy and Nellie, who frequently played minor roles.
+
+"Do you feel any better, Daddy?" asked Ruth, as she took from her
+father's hand the atomizer he had been using on his throat.
+
+"Yes, the pain is much less. Dr. Rathby's medicine is a wonderful help."
+
+"Do you feel like--talking?" inquired Alice gently, for she saw that the
+worried look had not left her father's face.
+
+"Yes," he answered, with a smile, "but I do not want to burden you girls
+with all of my troubles."
+
+"Why shouldn't you?" asked Ruth, quickly. "Who would you share your
+troubles with, if not with us? We must help each other!"
+
+"Yes, I suppose so," returned Mr. DeVere, in a low voice. "And yet,
+after all, I suppose this is not such a terrible trouble. It will not
+kill any of us. But it will make a hard pull for me if I cannot prove my
+contention."
+
+"What is that?" asked Alice. "Is there some trouble with the film
+company? You haven't lost your engagement; have you, Daddy?"
+
+"Oh, no, it isn't that," he answered. "I'll tell you. Just a little more
+of that spray, please, Alice. I will then be better able to talk."
+
+In a few moments he resumed:
+
+"Did you ever hear me speak of a Dan Merley?"
+
+"You mean that man who came to see you when we lived in the other
+apartment--the nicer one?" asked Ruth, for the Fenmore was not one of
+the high-class residences of New York. The DeVeres had not been able to
+afford a better home in the time of their poverty. And when better days
+came they had still remained, as they liked their neighbors, the
+Dalwoods. Then, too, they had been away all summer at Oak Farm.
+
+"Yes, that was the man," replied Mr. DeVere. "Well, in my hard luck days
+I borrowed five hundred dollars from him to meet some pressing needs. I
+gave him my note for it. By hard work, later, I was able to scrape the
+five hundred dollars together, and I paid him back.
+
+"Unfortunately Dan Merley was a bit under the influence of drink when I
+gave him the cash, and he could not find my promissory note to return to
+me.
+
+"He promised to send it around to me the next day, and, very foolishly,
+as I see it now, I let him keep the money, not even getting a receipt
+for it. I am not a business man--never was one. I trusted Dan Merley,
+and I should not have done so."
+
+"Why?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Because he came to me to-day, for the first time in several months, and
+demanded his five hundred dollars. I told him I had paid it, and tried
+to recall to him the circumstances. But, as I said, he was slightly
+intoxicated when I gave him the bills, and his mind was not clear. He
+declares positively that I never paid him, and he says he will make
+trouble for me if I do not hand him over the money in a short time."
+
+"But you did give it to him, Daddy!" exclaimed Alice.
+
+"Of course I did; but I have no proof."
+
+"Did you pay him by check?" asked Ruth, who was quite a business woman,
+and keeper of the house.
+
+"Unfortunately I was not prosperous enough in those days to have a bank
+account," answered Mr. DeVere. "A check would be a receipt; but I
+haven't that. In fact, I haven't a particle of evidence to show that I
+paid the money. And Dan Merley has my note. He could sue me on it, and
+any court would give him a judgment against me, so he could collect."
+
+"But that would be paying him twice!" exclaimed Alice.
+
+"I know it, and that is the injustice of it. It would be out of the
+question for me to raise five hundred dollars now. My throat treatment
+has been expensive, and though we are making good money at the moving
+picture business, I have not enough to pay this debt twice."
+
+"He is a wicked man!" burst out Alice.
+
+"My dear!" Ruth gently reproved.
+
+"I don't care! He is, to make daddy pay twice!"
+
+"Yes, it is hard lines," sighed the veteran actor. "I have begged and
+pleaded with Merley, imploring him to try and remember that I paid him,
+but he is positive that I did not do so."
+
+"Do you suppose he really thinks so--that he is honest in his belief
+that you never paid him?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Well, it is a hard thing to say against a man, when I have no proof,"
+replied Mr. DeVere, "but I believe, in his heart, Dan Merley knows I
+paid him. I think he is just trying to make me pay him over again to
+cheat me."
+
+"Oh, how can he be so cruel?" cried Alice.
+
+"He is a hard man to deal with," went on her father. "A very hard man.
+This has been bothering me all day. I simply cannot pay that five
+hundred dollars; and yet, if I don't----"
+
+"Can they lock you up, Daddy?" Alice questioned, fearfully.
+
+"Oh, no, dear, not that. But he can make it very unpleasant for me. He
+can force me to go to court, and that would take me away from the film
+studio. I might even lose my engagement there if I had to spend too much
+time over a lawsuit.
+
+"But, worst of all, my reputation will suffer. I have always been
+honest, and I have paid every debt I owed, though sometimes it took a
+little while to do it. Now if this comes to smirch my character, I don't
+know what I shall do."
+
+"Poor Daddy!" said Ruth, softly, as she smoothed his rumpled hair.
+
+"There, girls, don't let me bother you," he said, as gaily as he could.
+"Perhaps there may come a way out."
+
+"Why don't you ask the advice of Mr. Pertell?" suggested Ruth.
+
+"I believe I will," agreed her father. "He is a good business man. I
+wish I was. If I had been I would have insisted on getting either a
+receipt from Merley, or my note back. But I trusted him. I thought he
+was a friend of mine."
+
+"Well, let's have supper," suggested Alice. "Matters may look brighter
+then."
+
+"And I'll go see Mr. Pertell this evening," promised Mr. DeVere. "He may
+be able to advise and help me."
+
+The meal was not a very jolly one at first, but gradually the feeling of
+gloom passed as the supper progressed. Mr. DeVere told of what had
+happened that day at the film studio where the moving pictures were
+made.
+
+"Now I think I'll go see Mr. Pertell," the actor announced, as he rose
+from the table. "He said he would be in his office late to-night, as he
+is working on some new plans."
+
+"What are they, Daddy?" asked Alice. "Are we to go off to some farm
+again?"
+
+"Not this time. I believe there are to be some winter scenes taken,
+though just where we will go for them has not been announced. Well, I'm
+off," and, kissing the girls good-bye, Mr. DeVere went out.
+
+Ruth and Alice, in his absence, discussed the new source of trouble that
+had come to them. They had been so happy all summer, that the blow fell
+doubly heavy.
+
+"Isn't it just horrid!" exclaimed Ruth.
+
+"Too mean for anything!" agreed Alice. "I wish I had that Dan Merley
+here. I--I'd----"
+
+But Alice did not finish. Ruth had looked at her, to stop her rather
+impulsive sister from the use of too violent an expression. But there
+was no need of this. An interruption came in the form of a knock at the
+door.
+
+"Who is it?" asked Ruth, and there came a little note of fear into her
+voice, for she was timid, and she realized at once that it was not one
+of their kind neighbors from across the hall. Russ, his mother, and his
+brother Billy always rapped in a characteristic manner.
+
+"It's me--Dan Merley, and I want to see the old man!" was the answer.
+The girls drew together in fright, for they recognized by the thickness
+of the voice that the owner was not altogether himself.
+
+"Oh!" gasped Alice, and then the door was pushed open, for the catch had
+been left off, and a man came unsteadily into the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+RUSS TO THE RESCUE
+
+
+"Where's the boss?" asked the man, as he leaned heavily against the
+table. "I want to see the boss."
+
+"Do you--do you mean my--my father?" faltered Ruth, as she stepped
+protectingly in front of Alice.
+
+"That's jest who I mean, young lady," and the new-comer leered at her.
+"Is he in? If he isn't I won't mind an awful lot. I'll wait for him.
+This is a nice place," and, without being invited he slouched into a
+chair.
+
+"My--my father is----"
+
+"He'll be back in just a little while!" interrupted Alice, briskly. "Did
+he tell you to come here?"
+
+"Nope! I told myself!" replied the man. "I'm glad I did, too. This is
+nice place and you're nice girls, too. Sisters, I take it?"
+
+"You need not discuss us!" exclaimed Ruth with dignity. "If you will
+leave word what your business with my father is I will have him call on
+you."
+
+"What, leave? Me leave? Nothin' doin', sister. I'm too comfortable
+here," and he leaned back in the chair and laughed foolishly.
+
+"What--what did you want to see Mr. DeVere about?" inquired Ruth, though
+she could well guess.
+
+"I'll tell you what it's about," said Dan Merley, confidentially. "It's
+about money. I want five hundred dollars from your father, and I want it
+quick--with interest, too. Don't forget that."
+
+"My father paid you that money!" Ruth declared, with boldness.
+
+"He did not!" denied the unpleasant visitor. "He owes it to me yet, and
+I want it. And, what's more I'm going to have it!"
+
+"That is unfair--unjust!" said Ruth, and there was a trace of tears in
+her voice. "My father paid you the money, and you promised to give him
+back the note--the paper that showed you had loaned it to him. But you
+never did."
+
+"How do you know all this?" he asked.
+
+"Because my father was just telling us about it--a little while ago. He
+said you had--forgotten."
+
+"Yes, I know! He said I'd been drinking too much; didn't he?"
+
+Ruth and Alice drew further back, offended by his coarse language.
+
+"He--he said you were not--quite yourself," spoke Alice gently.
+
+"Oh ho! Another one! So there's two of you here!" laughed the man.
+"Well, this certainly is a nice place. I guess I'll stay until the boss
+comes back. That is, unless you have the five hundred dollars here, and
+want to pay me," he added, with a sickly grin.
+
+"You have been paid once," Ruth insisted.
+
+"I have not--I never was paid!" Dan Merley cried. "I want my money and
+I'm going to have it! Do you hear? I'm going to have it, and have it
+soon! You tell your father that from me!" and he banged his fist on the
+table.
+
+Ruth and Alice looked at each other. The same thought was in both their
+minds, and it shone from their eyes. They must leave at once--the door
+was slightly open.
+
+"No more monkey business!" cried the unwelcome caller. "I lent your
+father that money and he never paid me back. He may say he did; but he
+can't prove it. I hold his note, and if he doesn't pay me I'll----"
+
+"What will you do?" interrupted a new voice, and with relief Ruth and
+Alice looked up, to see Russ Dalwood entering the room.
+
+"Excuse me," he said to the girls, "I knocked, but you did not seem to
+hear. Possibly there was too much noise," and he looked at the man
+significantly. "Is there any trouble here?" the young moving picture
+operator asked.
+
+"Oh, Russ, make him--make him go!" begged Alice, half sobbing. "He wants
+to see my father--it's some sort of unjust money claim--and he wants to
+enforce it. Father has gone out----"
+
+"And that's just where this person is going!" announced Russ, advancing
+toward the man.
+
+"What's that?" demanded Merley in an ugly tone.
+
+"I said you were going out. It's your cue to move!"
+
+"I don't move until I get my five hundred dollars," answered the
+visitor. "I've waited for it long enough."
+
+"My father paid you!" protested Ruth.
+
+"I say he did not!" and again the man banged the table with his fist.
+
+"Well, whether he did or not is a question for you and Mr. DeVere to
+settle," said Russ, in firm tones. "You will kindly leave these young
+ladies alone."
+
+"I will; eh? Who says so?"
+
+"I do!"
+
+"And who are you?"
+
+"A friend. I must ask you to leave."
+
+"Not until I get my five hundred dollars!"
+
+"Look here!" exclaimed Russ, and, though he spoke in low tones, there
+was that in his voice which made it very determined. "You may have a
+valid claim against Mr. DeVere, or you may not. I will not go into that.
+But he is not at home, and you will have to come again. You have no
+right in here. I must ask you to leave."
+
+"Huh! You haven't any right here either. You can't give _me_ orders."
+
+"They are not my orders. This is a request from the young ladies
+themselves, and I am merely seeing that it is carried out. You don't
+want him here; do you?" he asked, of the two girls.
+
+"Oh, no! Please go!" begged Ruth.
+
+"I want my money!" cried the man.
+
+"Look here!" exclaimed Russ, taking hold of Merley's shoulder. "You will
+either leave quietly, or I'll summon a policeman and have you arrested.
+Even if you have a claim against Mr. DeVere, and I don't believe you
+have, that gives you no right to trespass here. Take your claim to
+court!"
+
+"I tell you I want my money now!"
+
+"Well, you'll not get it. You have your remedy at law. Now leave at
+once, do you hear?"
+
+"Yes, I hear all right, and you'll hear from me later. I will go to law,
+and I'll have my five hundred dollars. I'll bring suit against Mr.
+DeVere, and then he'll wish he'd paid me, for he'll have to settle my
+claim and costs besides. Oh, I'll sue all right!"
+
+"I don't care what you do, as long as you get out of here!" cried Russ,
+sharply, for he saw that the strain was telling on Ruth and Alice.
+"Leave at once!"
+
+"Suppose I don't go?"
+
+"Then I'll put you out!"
+
+Russ looked very brave as he said this. Ruth glanced at him, and thought
+he had never appeared to better advantage. And between Russ and Ruth
+there was--but there, I am getting ahead of my story.
+
+"Are you going?" asked the young moving picture operator, again.
+
+"Well, rather than have a row, I will. But I warn you I'll sue DeVere
+and I'll get my money, too. It's all nonsense for him to say he paid me.
+Where's his proof? I ask you that. Where's his proof?"
+
+"Never mind about that," returned Russ, calmly. "It's your move, as I
+said before. And you can give a good imitation of a moving picture film
+showing a man getting out of a room."
+
+With no good grace the man arose clumsily from his chair, and with leers
+at Ruth and Alice, who were clinging to each other on the far side of
+the room, the visitor started for the door.
+
+"I'll see you again!" he called, coarsely. "Then maybe the laugh will be
+on my side. I'm going to have my money, I tell you!"
+
+Russ kept after the man, and walked behind him to the door. There Dan
+Merley paused to exclaim, in loud tones:
+
+"You wait--I'll get my money out of DeVere--you'll see!"
+
+Then he stumbled on down the hallway, and Russ quickly closed and locked
+the door.
+
+"Oh, Russ!" exclaimed Ruth. Then she sank into a chair, and bent forward
+with her head pillowed in her arms on the table.
+
+"There, there," said the young man gently, as he put his hand on her
+head. "It's all right--he's gone. Don't be afraid."
+
+"Oh, but what a dreadful man!" cried Alice. "I could----"
+
+"Don't, dear," begged her sister gently, as she raised her head. There
+were tears in her eyes. Russ gently slipped his hand over her little
+rosy palm.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+A FUNNY FILM
+
+
+For a moment Ruth remained thus, while, Alice, with flashing eyes, stood
+looking at the door leading into the hall, as if anticipating the return
+of that unpleasant visitor. Then Ruth lifted her head, and with a rosy
+blush, and a shy look at Russ, disengaged her hand.
+
+"I--I feel better now," she said.
+
+"That's good," and he smiled. "I don't believe that fellow will come
+back. I'll stay here. Is your father out?"
+
+"Yes, and all on account of that horrid man," answered Alice. "Oh, it
+was so good of you to come in Russ!"
+
+"I happened to be coming here anyhow," he answered. "When I saw the door
+open, and heard what was said, which I could not help doing, I did not
+stand on ceremony."
+
+"It was awfully good of you," murmured Ruth, who now seemed quite
+herself again. "I suppose you heard what that man said?"
+
+"Not all," he made reply. "It was something about money though, I
+gathered. He was demanding it."
+
+"Yes, and after father has already paid it," put in Alice. "That's where
+daddy has gone now--to consult Mr. Pertell as to the best course of
+action."
+
+Between them, Ruth and Alice told about Dan Merley's claim, and the
+injustice of it. Russ was duly sympathetic.
+
+"If I were your father I would pay no attention to his demand," the
+young moving picture operator said.
+
+"But suppose he sues, as he threatened?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Let him, and fight the case in court when it comes up. Merley may be
+only 'bluffing', to use a common expression."
+
+"But it annoys daddy almost as much as if the case were real, you see,"
+said Ruth. "Won't you sit down, Russ? Excuse our impoliteness, but
+really we've been quite upset."
+
+"Thanks," he laughed as he took a chair. "You need cheering up. You come
+to the studio to-morrow and forget your troubles in a good laugh."
+
+"Why?" asked Alice. "Ruth and I are not down for any parts to-morrow."
+
+"No, but Mr. Switzer is going to do some comic stunts, and Mr. Bunn and
+Mr. Sneed are in them with him. There are to be some trick films, I
+believe."
+
+"Then we'll go," decided Alice. "I think a laugh would do me good."
+
+Gradually the little fright wore off, and when Mr. DeVere returned
+shortly afterward the girls were themselves again, under the happy
+influence of Russ.
+
+"What luck, Daddy?" asked Alice, as her father came in. He shook his
+head, as she added: "Russ knows all about it," for she gathered that he
+might not like to speak before the young man. "What did Mr. Pertell
+say?"
+
+"He advised me to wait until Merley made the next move, and then come
+and see him again. He said he would then send me to the attorney for the
+film company, who would handle my case without charge."
+
+"How good of him!" cried Ruth, impulsively.
+
+"Mr. Pertell gave daddy the same advice Russ gave us," added Alice. "Oh,
+it was so good to have him here when that dreadful man came in," she
+went on.
+
+"What man?" asked Mr. DeVere, in surprise. "Was someone in here while I
+was gone--those camera scoundrels, Russ?"
+
+"No, it was Dan Merley himself!" exclaimed Ruth, "and he was so horrid,
+Daddy!" There was a hint of tears in her voice.
+
+"The impertinent scoundrel!" exclaimed Mr. DeVere, in the manner that
+had won him such success on the stage. "I shall go to the police
+and----"
+
+"No, don't Daddy dear," begged Ruth laying a detaining hand on his arm,
+as he turned to the door. "That would only make it more unpleasant for
+us. We would have to go to court and testify, if you had him arrested.
+And, besides, I don't know on what charge you could cause his arrest. He
+really did nothing to us, except to hurt our feelings and scare us. But
+I fancy Russ scared him in turn. Don't go to the police, Daddy."
+
+"All right," he agreed. "But tell me all about it."
+
+They did so, by turns, and Mr. DeVere's anger waxed hot against Merley
+as he listened. But he realized that it was best to take no rash step,
+much as he desired to. So he finally calmed down.
+
+"If I could only prove that I had paid that money," he murmured, "all
+would be well. I must make it a point, after this, to be more
+business-like. It is like locking the stable door after the automobile
+is gone, though, in this case," he added, with a whimsical smile.
+
+Russ remained a little longer, and then took his leave. Ruth saw to it,
+even getting up out of bed to do it, that the chain was on the hall
+door. For she was in nervous doubt as to whether or not she had taken
+that precaution. But she found the portal secure.
+
+"That man might come back in the night," she thought. But she did not
+confide her fear to Alice.
+
+Morning revealed a new and wonderful scene. For in the night there had
+been a heavy storm, and the ground of Central Park was white with snow.
+A little rain had fallen, and then had frozen, and the trees were
+encased in ice. Then as the sun shone brightly, it flashed as on
+millions of diamonds, dazzling and glittering. Winter had come early,
+and with more severity than usual in the vicinity of New York.
+
+"Oh, how lovely!" cried Alice, as she looked out. "I must have a slide,
+if I can find a place! Ruth, I'm going to wash your face!"
+
+"Don't you dare!"
+
+But Alice raised the window, and from the sill took a handful of snow.
+She rushed over to her sister with it.
+
+"Stop it! Stop it! Don't you dare!" screamed Ruth. Then she squealed as
+she felt the cold snow on her cheeks.
+
+"What's the matter with you girls in there?" called Mr. DeVere from his
+apartment. "You seem merry enough."
+
+"We are," answered Alice. "I've washed Ruth's face, and I'm going to
+wash yours in a minute."
+
+"Just as you like," he laughed. And then he sighed, for he recalled a
+time when his girlish wife had once challenged him the same way, when
+they were on their honeymoon. For Mrs. DeVere had been vivacious like
+Alice, and the younger daughter was a constant reminder to her father of
+his dead wife--a happy and yet a sad reminder.
+
+Alice came rushing in with more snow, and there was a merry little scene
+before breakfast. Then Mr. DeVere hurried to the film studio, for he was
+to take part in several dramas that day.
+
+"I know I'll be late," he said, "for the travel will be slow this
+morning, on account of the snow. And I have to go part way by surface
+car, as I have an errand on the way down town."
+
+"We're coming down, also," Ruth informed him.
+
+"Why, you're not in anything to-day," he remarked, pausing in the act of
+putting on his overcoat. "You're not cast for anything until 'The Price
+of Honor,' to-morrow."
+
+"But we're going down, just the same," Alice laughed. "We want to see
+some of the funny films."
+
+"Come ahead then," invited Mr. DeVere. "Better use the subway all you
+can. Even the elevated will have trouble with all this sleet. Good-bye,"
+and he kissed them as he hurried out.
+
+The girls made short shrift of the housework, and then left for the
+place where the moving pictures were made.
+
+As I have described in the first book of this series how moving pictures
+are taken, I will not repeat it here, except to say that in a special
+camera, made for the purpose, there is a long narrow strip of celluloid
+film, of the same nature as in the ordinary camera. The pictures are
+taken on this strip, at the rate of sixteen a second. Later this film is
+developed, and from that "negative" a "positive" is made. This
+"positive" is then run through a specially made projecting lantern which
+magnifies the pictures for the screen.
+
+As Alice and Ruth got out at the floor where most of the scenes were
+made they heard laughter.
+
+"Something's going on," remarked the younger girl.
+
+"And it doesn't sound like Mr. Sneed, our cheerful 'grouch,' either,"
+answered Ruth.
+
+As they went in they saw Carl Switzer, the German comedian, climbing a
+high step-ladder with a pail of paste in one hand, and a roll of wall
+paper in the other. He was in a scene representing a room, which he was
+to decorate.
+
+"Is diss der right vay to do it?" Mr. Switzer asked, as he paused half
+way up the ladder, and looked at Mr. Pertell.
+
+"That's it. Now you've got the idea," replied the manager. "Begin over
+again, and Russ, I guess you can begin to run the film now," for the
+young moving picture operator was in readiness with his camera.
+
+"You must tremble, and shake the ladder," advised the manager, who was
+also, in this case, the stage director. "You want to register fear, you
+see, because you are an amateur paper hanger."
+
+"Yah. Dot's right. I know so leedle about der papering business alretty
+yet dot I could write a big book on vot I don't know," confessed Mr.
+Switzer.
+
+"All ready now--tremble and shake!" ordered the manager.
+
+The comic film that was being made was a reproduction of a scene often
+played in vaudeville theaters, where an amateur paper hanger gets into
+all sorts of ludicrous mishaps with a bucket of paste, rolls of paper
+and the step ladder. It was not very new, but had not been done for
+moving pictures before.
+
+"Here I goes!" called Mr. Switzer. "I am shaking!"
+
+"Good!" encouraged Mr. Pertell. "Now, Mr. Bunn, you come in, as the
+owner of the house, to see if the paper hanger is doing his work
+properly. You find he is not, for he is going to put the wrong sort of
+paper on the ceiling. Then you try to show him yourself."
+
+"Do I wear my tall hat?"
+
+"Oh, yes, of course, and I think Mr. Switzer, you had better let----"
+
+But the directions were never completed, for at that moment, in the
+excess of his zeal, Mr. Switzer shook the step ladder to such good
+effect that it toppled over and with him on it.
+
+Down he came on top of Wellington Bunn, in all his dignity and the glory
+of the tall hat, and paste flew all over, liberally spattering both
+actors.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+A QUEER ACCIDENT
+
+
+"Get that Russ! Every motion of it!" cried the manager. "That will make
+it better than when we rehearsed it. Spatter that paste all over Mr.
+Bunn while you're at it, Mr. Switzer."
+
+"Stop! Stop, I say! I protest. I will not have it!"
+
+"Vell, you goin' to git it, all right!" cried the German, and with the
+brush he liberally daubed the Shakespearean actor with the white and
+sticky stuff. All the other players were laughing at the ridiculous
+scene.
+
+"More paste!" ordered Mr. Pertell. "More paste there, Mr. Switzer. Don't
+be afraid of it, Mr. Bunn! It's clean!"
+
+"Oh, this is awful--this is terrible!" groaned the tragic actor. "My hat
+is ruined."
+
+And such did seem to be the case, for the shining silk tile was filled
+with paste, the outside also being well covered.
+
+Mr. Bunn tried to get away from the slapping brush of Mr. Switzer, but
+the German was not to be outwitted. The two had fallen to the floor
+under the impact of the comic player, and were now tangled up in the
+ladder.
+
+"That's good! That's good!" laughed Mr. Pertell. "Get all of that, Russ!
+Every bit!"
+
+"I'm getting it!" cried the operator, as he continued to grind away at
+the crank of the moving picture camera.
+
+Again Mr. Bunn tried to get up and away, but the ladder, through which
+his legs had slipped, hampered him. Then a roll of the paper got under
+the feet of both players. It unreeled, and some paste got on it. The
+next instant part of it was plastered over Mr. Switzer's face, and,
+being unable to see, he pawed about wildly, spattering more paste all
+over, much of it getting on Mr. Bunn.
+
+"Better than ever. Use some more of that paper!" ordered the manager.
+"Paste some on Mr. Switzer, if you can, Mr. Bunn."
+
+"Oh, I can all right!" cried the older actor. "Here is where I have my
+revenge!"
+
+He scooped up a hand full of paste, spread it on a piece of paper, and
+clapped it over the face of the German, for that player had removed the
+first piece that was stuck on. And thus they capered about in the scenic
+room, making a chaos of it.
+
+Russ took all the pictures for the future amusement of thousands who
+attended the darkened theaters.
+
+Of course it was horseplay, pure and simple, and yet audiences go into
+paroxysms of mirth over much the same things. The love of slap-stick
+comedy has not all died out, and the managers realize this.
+
+"I don't know when I've laughed so much," confessed Alice, holding her
+aching sides as she sat down near Ruth, when the little comedy was over.
+
+"Nor I, my dear. I think the old saying is true, after all, that 'a
+little nonsense, now and then, is relished by the best of men.'"
+
+"This was certainly nonsense," admitted Alice. "Oh, come over and let's
+see Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon in that new play--'Parlor Magic.'
+It's very interesting, and rather funny."
+
+The two older actresses were to play in a little scene where a young
+man--in this case Paul Ardite--attempted to do some tricks he had been
+studying. He was supposed to come to grief in making an omelet in a silk
+hat, and have other troubles when he tried to take rabbits out of parlor
+vases, and such like nonsense.
+
+This was one of the trick films--that is, it was not a straight piece of
+work. It depended for its success on the manipulation of the camera, on
+substituting dummies for real persons or animals at certain points, the
+interposition of films and many other things too technical to put into a
+book that is only intended to amuse you.
+
+"How are you?" asked Miss Pennington, as Ruth and Alice came over to
+their side of the studio. "You are looking quite well."
+
+"And we are well," answered Alice. "We want to see you act," for the
+filming had not yet begun.
+
+"For instruction or amusement?" asked Miss Dixon, and her voice had
+something of a sneer in it. She and her chum were not on the most
+friendly terms with Ruth and Alice.
+
+"Both amusement and instruction," responded Alice, sweetly--in a doubly
+sweet voice under the circumstances. "One can learn from anyone, you
+know," and she pretended to be interested in one of the tricks Paul was
+practicing while getting ready for the camera.
+
+Alice could say things with a double meaning at times, and probably this
+was one of them.
+
+"Oh!" was all Miss Dixon said, and then she called: "Paul, come here;
+won't you? I want you to fasten my glove."
+
+"Certainly," he agreed, with a look at Alice which was meant to say: "I
+don't want to do this, but I can't very well get out of it."
+
+Paul, I might add, had been quite interested in Miss Dixon before the
+advent of Alice, and the vaudeville actress rather resented the change.
+She took advantage of every opportunity to make Paul fetch and carry for
+her as he had been wont to do.
+
+The parlor magic play was successfully filmed and then, as Alice and
+Ruth had some shopping to do, to get their costumes ready for their
+appearance before the camera next day, they prepared to leave. They
+stopped for a moment, however, to watch their father in his play--"A
+Heart's Cavalier." This was rather a pretentious drama, and called for
+really good acting, the nature of which appealed to the veteran player.
+
+It was really a delight to watch him, for he gave a finished
+performance, and the loss of his voice was no handicap here. He could
+whisper the words, or utter them in a low tone, so that the motion of
+his lips might be seen by the audience.
+
+If you have ever seen motion pictures, and I am sure you all have, you
+know that often you can tell exactly what the characters are saying by
+watching the form of their lips.
+
+Deaf persons, who have learned to know what other persons are saying,
+merely by watching their lips, are able to "hear" much more than can the
+ordinary individual what goes on in moving pictures. In this they have a
+distinct advantage.
+
+But of course the story the celluloid film tells is mostly conveyed by
+the action of the characters, and Mr. DeVere was an expert in this.
+
+"Good-bye, Daddy," called Alice, when he was out of the scene for a
+moment. "We'll be back, and you can take us out to lunch."
+
+"All right," he laughed. "Make your poor old daddy spend his hard-earned
+money, will you?"
+
+"You know you're just crazy to do it," said Ruth. "Come on Alice."
+
+The next day called for hard work for both the moving picture girls, and
+there were a number of outdoor scenes to do. They were glad of this
+change, however.
+
+Some of the scenes Ruth and Alice had parts in, as well as Paul Ardite,
+were filmed out in Bronx Park, with the still natural wildness of that
+beauty spot as background. One scene was down near the beaver pond, and
+with the snow on the ground, and the sleet still on the trees, the
+pictures afterward turned out to be most effective. Special permission
+had to be obtained to use the camera in the park, there being a rule
+against it.
+
+Alice had one part which called for feeding the birds with crumbs
+scattered over the snow. And, just when they wanted this not a
+bird--even a sparrow--was in sight. In vain they went to different parts
+of the park, looking for some, and scattered many crumbs.
+
+"I guess we'll have to give it up, and come back some other time," Russ
+said finally. "I don't want to make another trip, either," he went on.
+"It wastes so much time, and we're going to be be very busy soon."
+
+"What about those new plans?" asked Ruth.
+
+"They are to be announced to-morrow, I believe," was the answer. "A lot
+of snow dramas are to be filmed."
+
+"Good!" cried Alice. "I love the snow."
+
+"Oh, quick! There are some birds!" called Ruth. "See, over there, Alice.
+Scatter the crumbs!"
+
+Russ had them in his pocket in readiness, and soon the snow was covered.
+The birds did their part well, and as Alice stood near them, throwing
+crumbs to the hungry sparrows and starlings, they fluttered about her,
+and flocked at her feet.
+
+"Good!" cried Russ, who was busy with the camera. "It couldn't be
+better. This will make a fine film."
+
+Alice presented a pretty picture as she stood there in her furs,
+scattering crumbs to the birds, and the little feathered creatures
+proved the best sort of actors, for they were not self-conscious, and
+did not stop to peer at the camera, the clicking of which they did not
+mind in the least.
+
+"Well, that's done; now I think we'll go back," Russ said, when he had
+ascertained, by looking at the register on the side of the camera, that
+enough feet of the film had been used on that scene. For, in order to
+have each scene get its proper amount of space, both as regards time and
+length of film a strict watch is kept on how much celluloid is used.
+
+A manager, or director, will decide on the importance of the various
+scenes, and then divide up the film, giving so many feet to each act.
+
+The standard length of film is a thousand feet. It comes in thousand
+foot reels, but some plays are so elaborate that two, three or even
+seven reels have been given up to them. Great scenic productions, such
+as "Quo Vadis?" use up many thousand feet of film.
+
+Russ and the two girls, with Paul, started back from the Bronx. They
+were to stop in at the studio, but on reaching there the girls found
+that their father had gone home, leaving a note saying he was going to
+see the doctor about his throat.
+
+"Poor daddy!" murmured Ruth. "He does have such trouble!"
+
+"Has Merley bothered him again?" asked Russ.
+
+"No, he has heard nothing from him," answered Alice. "But daddy worries
+about it. Five hundred dollars means more to him now than five thousand
+may later. For I hope daddy will get rich some day," she finished, with
+a laugh.
+
+The three walked on together to the subway, and got out at the station
+nearest their house. On the way they had to cross one of the surface car
+lines, and, just as they reached the corner, they heard a shout of alarm
+or warning, evidently directed at someone in danger from an approaching
+electric car.
+
+"What is it?" cried Ruth, clinging to Alice.
+
+"I don't know," answered the younger girl. "Oh, yes, there it is!" she
+cried, pointing.
+
+Three men were on the car tracks, and two of them seemed to be trying to
+pull one away, out of the path of an approaching car. The shouts came
+from a number of pedestrians who had seen the danger of the man.
+
+The latter seemed to be caught by the foot on the rail, though how this
+was possible was difficult to understand, as the rail was flat.
+
+The motorman was doing his best to stop the car, but the rails were
+slippery and it was easily seen that he could not do it. Then he added
+his shouts to those of the others.
+
+"Oh, he'll be killed!" cried Alice, covering her face with her hands.
+Ruth had also turned aside.
+
+"No, he won't!" cried Russ, with conviction. "They'll get him off, I
+think. There! He's free! I guess they took off his shoe."
+
+As he spoke the girls looked, and they saw the man fall in a peculiar
+way, to one side, so as to be out of the path of the car, which swept
+past him. The vehicle, however, seemed to hit him, but of this neither
+Russ nor the girls could be sure.
+
+"That's a queer accident," murmured Russ, as he started toward the scene
+of it. "Come on, girls."
+
+Ruth and Alice went with him. There was a little crowd about the fallen
+man, and at the sight of the fellow's face Alice suddenly cried:
+
+"Look! That is Dan Merley!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+NEW PLANS
+
+
+Alice's announcement caused her sister to start in surprise. Ruth looked
+as if she could not understand, and Alice repeated:
+
+"See, the man who fell is Dan Merley--the one who says daddy owes him
+five hundred dollars."
+
+"I believe you're right!" agreed Russ, who had had a good look at the
+impudent fellow the night he invaded the DeVere rooms. "And I know one
+of those other men--at least by sight. His name is Jagle. Let's see what
+is going on here."
+
+Fortunately no very large crowd gathered, so the girls felt it would be
+proper for them to remain, particularly as the accident was not of a
+distressing nature.
+
+The motorman had stopped his car and had run back to the scene with the
+conductor.
+
+"What's the matter here? What did you want to get in the way of the car
+for, anyhow?" demanded the motorman. He was nervously excited, and the
+reaction at finding, after all, he had not killed a man, made him rather
+angry.
+
+"Matter? Matter enough, I should say!" replied one of the men with
+Merley. "My friend is badly hurt. Someone get an ambulance! Fripp, you
+call one."
+
+"That was Jagle who spoke," Russ whispered to the girls. "But I don't
+know the other one."
+
+"He doesn't seem to be badly hurt," remarked the motorman. The
+conductor, with a little pad and pencil, was getting the names of
+witnesses to be used in case suit was brought. This is always done by
+street car companies, in order to protect themselves.
+
+"Hurt? Of course he's hurt!" exclaimed the man Russ called Jagle. "See
+that cut on his head!"
+
+There was a slight abrasion on Merley's forehead, but it did not seem at
+all serious.
+
+"Aren't you hurt, Dan?" asked Jagle.
+
+"Of course I am!" was the answer. "I'm hurt bad, too. Get me home, Jim."
+
+"If he's hurt the best place for him is a hospital," remarked the
+motorman. "But I can't see where he's hurt."
+
+"I can't walk, I tell you," whined Merley, and he attempted to get up,
+but fell back. One of his friends caught him in his arms.
+
+"There, you see! Of course he's hurt!" declared Jagle. "Go call an
+ambulance, Fripp."
+
+"I'll get an ambulance if he really needs one," spoke a policeman, who
+had just come up on seeing the crowd. "Where are you hurt?"
+
+"Something's the matter with my legs," declared Merley. "I can't use my
+right one, and the left one is hurt, too. My foot got caught between the
+rail and a piece of ice, and I couldn't get loose. My friends tried to
+help me, but they couldn't get me away in time. I'm hurt, and I'm hurt
+bad, I tell you! I think one of my legs must be run over."
+
+"Nothing like that!" declared the motorman. "There's been no legs run
+over by my car!"
+
+That was very evident.
+
+"Get me away from here," groaned Merley.
+
+"Well, if you're really hurt I'll call an ambulance and have you taken
+to the hospital," offered the policeman as he went to turn in a call.
+
+"I sure am hurt," insisted Merley. "Why, I can hardly move now," and he
+seemed to stiffen all over, though there was no visible sign of injury.
+
+"Why doesn't someone get a doctor?" a boy in the crowd asked.
+
+"There'll be one in de hurry-up wagon!" exclaimed another urchin. "A
+feller in a white suit--dem's doctors. I know, cause me fadder was in de
+'ospital onct."
+
+Merley's two friends carried him to a drug store not far from the scene
+of the accident. Ruth and Alice shrank back as he was borne past them,
+for they feared he might recognize them, and cause a scene. But if he
+saw them, which is doubtful, he gave no sign.
+
+"Here comes de hurry-up wagon!" cried the lad who had thus designated
+the ambulance. "Let's see 'em shove him on de stretcher! Say dis is
+great!"
+
+"I think we had better be going, Alice, dear," said Ruth. "Daddy
+wouldn't like us to be in this crowd."
+
+"Oh, I want to stay and see what happens. Besides, it might be
+important," Alice objected. "This is Dan Merley, who might make trouble
+for papa. We ought to see what happens to him. I think that whole
+accident was queer. He didn't seem to be hit at all, and yet he says he
+can't move. We ought to stay."
+
+"If you want to go, I'll stay and let you know what happens," offered
+Russ. "I don't mind."
+
+"Perhaps that would be best," said Ruth.
+
+"All right," agreed Alice, and she and her sister, with a last look at
+the crowd around the ambulance, started for their apartment.
+
+Russ came along a little later.
+
+"What happened?" asked Ruth, when he had knocked on the door of their
+hall and had been admitted.
+
+"Not much," he replied. "They took Merley home, instead of to a
+hospital. He wouldn't go to an institution, he said."
+
+"Did those other two men go with him?" asked Alice.
+
+"Who, Fripp and Jagle? No, they wouldn't be allowed to ride on the
+ambulance. But they got a taxicab and went off in that. I heard Jagle
+say to the ambulance surgeon, that he was a doctor, and that he'd attend
+his friend when he got him home."
+
+"Is Jagle a doctor?" asked Alice. "He didn't look like one."
+
+"He's a _sort_ of doctor," Russ replied. "I think he's a quack, myself.
+I wouldn't have him for a sick cat. But he calls himself a doctor and
+surgeon. So that's all that happened."
+
+"It was enough, anyhow," remarked Ruth. "I don't like to see anybody
+hurt."
+
+"I'm not so sure that fellow _was_ hurt," said Russ, slowly.
+
+"What do you mean?" Alice asked, curiously.
+
+"Well, he might have _imagined_ he was. I guess he was pretty well
+scared at seeing that car come down on him. But I watched when he was
+put in the ambulance and he seemed as well as either of his friends.
+Only he kept insisting that he could not walk."
+
+"It was certainly a queer accident," said Alice. "But, in spite of the
+fact that he is a bad man, and wants to make trouble for daddy, I hope
+he isn't seriously hurt."
+
+"I don't believe it is serious," said Russ. "But it might easily have
+been, though, if he had fallen in front of the car instead of away from
+it."
+
+"Well, there is nothing that hasn't its good side," remarked Ruth.
+"Emerson's idea of the law of compensation works out very nicely in this
+case."
+
+"Kindly translate, sister mine," invited Alice, laughingly.
+
+"Why, you know Emerson holds that one advantage makes up for each
+defect. In this case Merley has had an accident--a defect. That may
+cause him to stop annoying daddy--a distinct advantage to us."
+
+"Oh, Ruth, how queer you are!" exclaimed Alice with a laugh. "I never
+heard of such an idea."
+
+"Who was this Emerson--a moving picture fellow?" asked Russ.
+
+"No, he was a great writer," explained Ruth. "I'll let you take one of
+his books."
+
+"I wish you would," said Russ, seriously. "I never had much of a chance
+to get an education, but I like to know things."
+
+"So do I," agreed Ruth. "I never tire of Emerson."
+
+Mr. DeVere was surprised when he heard about the accident to Merley.
+
+"I can't understand it," said the girls' father. "He must have been
+hurt, and yet--er--was he in a sensible condition, Russ?"
+
+"Oh, yes, he seemed to be himself, all right," the young moving picture
+operator replied, thoughtfully. "I haven't gotten to the bottom of it
+myself."
+
+And indeed it developed that there was a strange plot back of the
+accident--a plot which involved the moving picture girls in an amazing
+way, as will soon appear.
+
+But puzzle over the odd accident as they might, neither Mr. DeVere, his
+daughters, nor Russ could understand what it involved.
+
+"At any rate, as you say, Ruth," the actor remarked with a smile, "there
+is some compensation. He may not annoy me for some time; and,
+meanwhile, I may think of a plan to prove I really paid that money."
+
+"I hope so, Daddy!" she exclaimed. "Is your throat any better?"
+
+"Yes, much," he replied with a smile. "Dr. Rathby is going to try a new
+kind of spray treatment, and I had the first one this afternoon. It
+helped me wonderfully."
+
+"That's good!" exclaimed Alice.
+
+The next day's papers contained a slight reference to the accident. It
+was not important enough to warrant much space, and about all that was
+said was that Merley claimed to have received an injury that made him
+helpless, though its nature was a puzzle to the physician sent around by
+the street car company.
+
+"Well, if he's helpless, and the Lord knows I wish that to no man," said
+Mr. DeVere, reverently, "he will not come here bothering you girls
+again. If he confines his attacks to me I do not so much mind, but he
+must leave you alone."
+
+"That's what I say!" cried Russ.
+
+When Mr. DeVere and his daughters arrived at the moving picture studio
+that afternoon, for they were not to report until then, they found
+notices posted, requesting all members of the company to remain after
+rehearsal to hear an "important announcement."
+
+"I wonder what it can be?" said Ruth.
+
+"Probably it's about the new plans Mr. Pertell has been working on,"
+suggested Alice.
+
+"I think so," Russ said. He knew something of them, but had not
+permission to reveal them.
+
+And this proved to be the case. After the day's work was ended, and it
+included the filming of several scenes for important dramas, Mr. Pertell
+called his players together, and said:
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen--also Tommy and Nellie, for you will be in on
+this, I hope--we are going to leave New York City again, and be together
+in a new place to make a series of plays."
+
+"Leave New York!" gasped Miss Pennington.
+
+"I hope we don't go to Oak Farm again!" cried Miss Dixon. "I want to be
+in some place where I can get a lobster now and then."
+
+"There will be no lobsters at Deerfield!" said Mr. Pertell, with a
+smile, "unless there are some of the canned variety."
+
+"How horrid!" complained Miss Pennington.
+
+"Will there be deers there?" asked Tommy, with big eyes.
+
+"I think there will, sonny," answered the manager.
+
+"Reindeers--like Santa Claus has?" little Nellie wanted to know.
+
+"Well, I guess so!" laughed Mr. Pertell. "At any rate, I plan to take
+you all there."
+
+"Where is Deerfield, if one may ask?" inquired Miss Dixon, pertly.
+
+"Deerfield is a sort of backwoods settlement, in one of our New England
+States," explained the manager. "It is rather isolated, but I want to go
+there to get some scenes for moving pictures with good snow, and ice
+effects as backgrounds."
+
+"Are there good hotels there?" Miss Pennington demanded.
+
+"We are going to stop in a big hunting lodge, that I have hired for the
+occasion," Mr. Pertell replied. "I think you will like it very much."
+
+"Hold on! One moment!" exclaimed Mr. Sneed, the grouchy actor. "You may
+count me out of this! I shall go to no backwoods, in the middle of
+winter, and freeze. I cannot stand the cold. I shall resign at once!"
+
+"One moment. Before you decide that, I have something else to say to
+you," said Mr. Pertell, and there was a smile on his face.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+OFF TO THE WOODS
+
+
+The moving picture players looked curiously at the manager, and then at
+Mr. Sneed. They were used to this action on his part, and also on the
+part of Mr. Bunn--that of resigning when anything did not suit them. But
+matters with either of them seldom went farther than the mere threat.
+
+"I know it will not be as pleasant, as regards weather conditions, at
+Elk Lodge, Deerfield, as it was at Oak Farm," said Mr. Pertell. "But the
+lodge is a big building, very quaint and picturesque, I have been told,
+and it has all the comforts, and many of the conveniences, of life.
+There are big, open fireplaces, and plenty of logs to burn. So you will
+not freeze."
+
+"Open fires are always cold," complained Mr. Sneed. "You roast on one
+side, and freeze on the other."
+
+"Oh, I think it won't be quite as bad as that," laughed the manager.
+"But that is not all I have to say. In consideration of the fact that
+there will be some inconveniences, in spite of all I can do, I am
+willing to make an increase of ten per cent. in the salaries of all of
+you, including Tommy and Nellie," and he smiled at the two children.
+
+"Oh, goodie! I'm going!" cried the small lad.
+
+"So'm I," voiced his sister.
+
+There was a moment of silence, while all the members of the company
+looked at Mr. Sneed, who had raised the first contention. He seemed to
+think that it was necessary for him to say something.
+
+"Ah--ahem!" he began.
+
+"Yes?" spoke Mr. Pertell, questioningly.
+
+"In view of all the facts, and er--that I would have to give two weeks'
+notice, and under all the circumstances, I think--er--I will withdraw my
+resignation, if you will allow me," the grouchy actor went on, in a
+lofty manner.
+
+"Ah!" laughed Mr. Pertell. "Then we will consider it settled, and you
+may all begin to pack up for Elk Lodge as soon as you please."
+
+"When are we to leave?" asked Mr. DeVere.
+
+"In a few days now. I have one more play I want to stage in New York,
+and then we will leave for the country where we can study snow and ice
+effects to better advantage than here. We want to get out into the open.
+Russ, I must have a talk with you about films. I think, in view of the
+fact that the lights out in the open, reflected by the snow, will be
+very intense and high, a little change in the film and the stop of the
+camera will be necessary."
+
+"I think so myself," agreed the young moving picture operator. "In fact,
+I have been working on a little device that I can attach to our cameras
+to cut down the amount of light automatically. It consists of a selenium
+plate with a battery attachment----"
+
+"Oh, spare us the dreadful details!" interrupted Miss Pennington, who
+was of a rather frivolous nature.
+
+"Well, there is no longer need of detaining you," spoke Mr. Pertell.
+"Work for the day is over. We will meet again to-morrow and film 'A
+Mother's Sorrow,' and that will be the last New York play for some time.
+I presume it will take a week to get ready to go to Deerfield, as there
+are many details to look after."
+
+"Oh, I just can't wait until it's time to go to the backwoods!" cried
+Alice, as she and Ruth were on their way home that evening. "Aren't you
+crazy about it, sister mine?"
+
+"Well, not exactly _crazy_, Alice. You do use such--er--such strong
+expressions!"
+
+"Well, I have strong feelings, I suppose."
+
+"I know, but you must be more--more conservative."
+
+"I know you were going to say 'lady-like,' but you didn't dare," laughed
+Alice.
+
+"Well, consider it said, my dear," went on Ruth, in all seriousness, for
+she felt that she must, in a measure, play the part of a mother to her
+younger sister.
+
+"I don't want to consider anything!" laughed Alice, "except the glorious
+fun we are going to have. Oh, Ruth, even the prospect of that dreadful
+Dan Merley making daddy pay the debt over again can't dampen my spirits
+now. I'm so happy!"
+
+She threw her arms about Ruth and attempted a few turns of the one-step
+glide.
+
+"Oh, stop! I'm slipping!" cried Ruth, for the sidewalk was icy. "Alice,
+let me go!"
+
+"Not until you take a few more steps! Now dip!"
+
+"But, Alice! I'm going to fall! I know I am! There! I told you----"
+
+But Ruth did not get a chance to use the favorite expression of Mr.
+Sneed, if such was her intention. For she really was about to fall when
+a young man, who was passing, caught her, and saved her from a tumble.
+
+"Oh!" she gasped, in confusion, as she recovered her balance.
+
+"I beg your pardon," laughed the young fellow, with sparkling eyes.
+
+"I should beg yours!" faltered Ruth, with a blush.
+
+"It was all my fault--I wanted her to dance!" cried Alice, willing to
+accept her share of the blame.
+
+"Yes, this weather makes one feel like dancing," the young fellow
+agreed, and then with a bow he passed on.
+
+"Alice how could you?" cried Ruth.
+
+"How could I what?"
+
+"Make me do that."
+
+"I didn't mean to. Really, he was nice; wasn't he? And say, did you
+notice his eyes?"
+
+"Oh, Alice, you are hopeless!" and Ruth had to laugh.
+
+The two moving picture girls reached home without further mishap, if
+mishap that could be called, though all the way Alice insisted on
+waltzing about happily, and trying in vain to get Ruth to join in, and
+try the new steps. Passersby more than once turned to look at the two
+pretty girls, who made a most attractive picture.
+
+The drama next day was successfully filmed and then followed a sort of
+week's vacation, while the picture players prepared for the trip to the
+woods.
+
+They were to go by train to Hampton Junction, the nearest station to
+Deerfield. This last was only a small settlement once the center of an
+important lumber industry, but now turned into a hunting preserve, owned
+by a number of rich men. As the Lodge was not in use this season, Mr.
+Pertell had engaged it for his company.
+
+In due time the baggage was all packed, the various "properties" had
+been shipped by Pop Snooks and everything was ready for the trip. The
+journey from the railroad station at Hampton Junction to Elk Lodge, in
+Deerfield, was to be made in big four-horse sleds, several of them
+having been engaged, for it was reported that the snow was deep in the
+woods. Winter had set in with all its severity there.
+
+Finally all the members of the company were gathered at the Grand
+Central Terminal, New York. The players attracted considerable
+attention, for there was that air of the theater about them which always
+seems so fascinating to the outsider, who knows so little of the really
+hard work that goes on behind the footlights. Most of the glitter is in
+front, in spite of appearances.
+
+"Why, it's like setting off for Oak Farm!" remarked Alice, as she stood
+beside her sister, Paul and Russ.
+
+"Only there isn't any mystery in prospect," spoke Paul. "I wonder how
+the Apgars are getting on, now that their farm is safe?"
+
+"They're probably sitting about a warm fire, talking about it," Russ
+said.
+
+"There may be just as much of a mystery in the backwoods as there was at
+Oak Farm, if we can only come across it," suggested Alice. "I wish we
+could discover something queer."
+
+"Oh, Alice!" protested Ruth.
+
+Mr. Sneed was observed to be walking about, peering at the various sign
+boards on which the destination of trains was given.
+
+"What are you looking for?" asked Russ.
+
+"I want to see that we don't start out on track thirteen as we did when
+we went to Oak Farm, and had the wreck," the actor answered. "I've had
+enough of hoodoos."
+
+"You're all right this time--we leave from track twenty-seven," called
+Mr. Pertell. "All aboard for Deerfield and Elk Lodge!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+A BREAKDOWN
+
+
+There was snow everywhere. Never could Ruth, Alice, and the other
+members of the Comet Film Company remember so much at one time. They
+seemed to have entered the Polar regions.
+
+Along the tracks of the railroad the white flakes were piled in deep
+drifts, and when they swept out from a patch of woodland, and had a view
+across the fields, or down into some valley, they could see a long,
+unbroken stretch of white.
+
+"It sure is some snow," observed Russ, who sat in the seat with Ruth,
+while Paul had pre-empted a place beside Alice. This last in spite of
+the fact that Miss Dixon invitingly had a seat ready for the young actor
+beside herself. But she was forced to be content with a novel for
+companionship.
+
+"Yes, and we're going to get more snow," remarked Mr. Sneed, who sat
+behind Russ. "We'll get so much that the train will be delayed, and
+we'll have to stay on it all night; that's what will happen."
+
+"Und ve vill starf den; ain't dot so?" inquired Mr. Switzer, with a
+jolly laugh from across the aisle. "Ve vill starf alretty; vill ve not,
+mine gloomy friendt?"
+
+"We sure will," predicted the grouch of the company. "They took the
+dining car off at the last station, and I understand there isn't another
+one to be had until we get to Hampton Junction. We sure will starve!"
+
+"Ha! Dot is vot ve vill _not_ do!" laughed Mr. Switzer, with conviction.
+"See, I haf alretty t'ought of dot, und I haf provided. Here are
+pretzels!" and he produced a large bag of them from his grip. "Ve vill
+not starf!"
+
+"Ha! Pretzels!" scoffed Mr. Sneed. "I never eat them!"
+
+"Maybe you vill before you starf!" chuckled Mr. Switzer, as he replaced
+them. "I like dem much!"
+
+The other members of the company laughed--all but Mr. Sneed and
+Wellington Bunn. The former went forward to consult a brakeman as to the
+prospects of the train becoming snowbound, while Mr. Bunn, who wore his
+tall hat, and was bundled up in a fur coat, huddled close to the window,
+and doubtless dreamed of the days when he had played Shakespearean
+roles; and wondered if he would play them again.
+
+The train went on, not that any great speed was attained, for the grade
+was up hill, and there had been heavy storms. There was also the
+prospect of more snow, and this, amid the rugged hills of New England,
+was not reassuring.
+
+"But we expect hard weather up here," said Mr. Pertell to his company.
+"The more snow and ice we have, the better pictures we can get."
+
+"That's right!" agreed Russ.
+
+"Humph! I'm beginning to wish I hadn't come," growled Mr. Sneed, who had
+received information from a brakeman to the effect that trains were
+often snowbound in that part of the State.
+
+A few feathery flakes began falling now, and there was the promise of
+more in the clouds overhead, and in the sighing of the North wind.
+
+"Does your throat hurt you much, Daddy?" asked Ruth, as she noticed her
+father wrapping a silk handkerchief closer about his neck.
+
+"Just a little; I think it is the unusual cold," he replied. "But I do
+not mind it. The air is sharper here than in New York; but it is drier.
+Perhaps it may do me good. I think I will use my spray," and he got out
+his atomizer.
+
+There were not many passengers beside the members of the film
+theatrical company in the car in which Ruth and her sister rode. Among
+them, however, were two young ladies, about the age of Alice, and as
+Ruth went down the aisle once, to get a drink of water, she noted that
+one of the strangers appeared to be ill.
+
+"Pardon me," spoke Ruth, with ready sympathy, "but can I do anything to
+help you?"
+
+"She has a bad headache," replied the other. "My sister always gets one
+when she travels. Fortunately we have not much farther to go."
+
+"Oh, Helen, I shall be so glad when we get there," said the suffering
+one.
+
+"Never mind, Mabel, we will soon be there," soothed the other.
+
+"If you don't mind--I'd like to give you my smelling salts," offered
+Ruth. "They always help me when I have a headache, which is seldom, I'm
+glad to say."
+
+"I wish I could say that," murmured the afflicted one.
+
+"Suppose you let me give the bottle to you," suggested Ruth. "I'll have
+my sister bring some spirits of cologne, too. Then you can bathe your
+head."
+
+"You are very kind," responded the other.
+
+Soon the four girls were in the ladies' compartment of the parlor car in
+which the picture company was traveling. There was a lounge there, and
+on this the girl called Mabel was soon receiving the ministrations of
+the others.
+
+Her head was bathed in the fragrant cologne, and the use of the smelling
+salts relieved the slight feeling of indisposition that accompanied the
+headache.
+
+"I feel so much better now," she declared, after a little. "I--I think I
+could sleep."
+
+"That would be the best thing for you, my dear," said Ruth, as she
+smoothed her hair. "Come," she whispered to the others, "we will sit
+back here and let her rest," and she motioned them to come into the
+curtained-off recess of the compartment.
+
+There the other girl said that she and her sister were on their way to
+visit relatives over the holidays. They were Mabel and Helen Madison, of
+New York.
+
+"And right after Christmas we're going to Florida," Helen confided to
+Ruth and Alice.
+
+"Oh, it must be lovely there, under the palms!" exclaimed the latter. "I
+do so want to go."
+
+"It is quite a contrast to this, I should imagine," remarked Ruth, as
+she gazed out of the window on the snowy scene.
+
+"Does your company ever get as far as Florida?" asked Helen, for Ruth
+and Alice had told her their profession.
+
+"We haven't yet," replied Ruth, "though once, when we were small, daddy
+played in St. Augustine, and we were there. But I don't remember
+anything about it."
+
+"We are going to a little resort on Lake Kissimmee," said Helen Madison.
+"Perhaps we may see you there, if you ever make pictures in Florida."
+
+"I hardly think we are going that far," observed Ruth. "But if we do we
+shall look for you."
+
+Ruth little realized then how prophetic her words were, nor how she and
+Alice would actually "look" for the two girls.
+
+A little later Mabel awakened from a doze, and announced that her head
+felt much better. Then, as it would soon be time for her and her sister
+to get off, for they were nearing their destination, they went back to
+their seats to get their luggage in readiness.
+
+"I like them; don't you?" asked Alice, as she and Ruth rejoined their
+friends.
+
+"Indeed I do! They seem very sweet girls. I would like to meet them
+again."
+
+"So would I. Perhaps we shall. It would be lovely if we could go to
+Florida, after our winter work is over. I'm going to ask Mr. Pertell if
+there's any likelihood of our doing so."
+
+But Alice did not get the opportunity just then, as she and Ruth went to
+the door to bid their new girl acquaintances good-bye. Then came the
+announcement that in a short time Hampton Junction would be reached.
+
+"Better be getting your possessions together," advised Mr. Pertell to
+his company. "It is getting late and I don't want to have you travel too
+much after dark."
+
+The train came to a stop at Hampton Junction, and from the car emerged
+the picture players. Ranged alongside the small building that served as
+the depot were several large sleighs, known in that country as "pungs,"
+the bodies being filled with clean straw. There were four horses to
+each, and the jingle of their bells made music on the wintry air.
+
+"Oh, we're going to have a regular straw ride!" cried Alice, clapping
+her hands at the sight of the comfortable-looking sleighs. "Isn't this
+jolly, Ruth?"
+
+"I'm sure it will be, yes. Come now, have you everything?"
+
+"Everything, and more too!"
+
+"Daddy, are you all right?" went on Ruth, for she had gotten into the
+habit, of late, of looking after her father, who seemed to lean on her
+more and more as she grew older.
+
+"Everything, daughter," he replied. "And my throat feels much better. I
+think the cold air is doing it good."
+
+"That's fine!" she laughed, happily. "Now I wonder which of these
+sleighs is ours?"
+
+"I'll tell you in a minute," said Mr. Pertell. "I want to see the
+lodge-keeper. Oh, there he is! Hello, Jake Macksey!" he called to the
+sturdy man, in big boots, who was stalking about among the sleds, "is
+everything all right for us?"
+
+"Everything, Mr. Pertell," was the hearty answer. "We'll have you out to
+Elk Lodge in a jiffy. My wife has got a lot of stuff cooked up, for she
+thought you'd be hungry."
+
+"Indeed we are!" grumbled Mr. Sneed.
+
+"But if dere iss stuff cooked I can safe mine pretzels!" chuckled Mr.
+Switzer.
+
+The baggage was stowed in one sled, and in the others the members of the
+picture company distributed themselves.
+
+"All right?" asked Jake Macksey, who was a veteran guide and hunter, and
+in charge of Elk Lodge.
+
+"All ready!" answered Mr. Pertell.
+
+"Drive lively now, boys!" called the hunter. "It's getting late, and
+will soon be dark, and the roads aren't any too good."
+
+"Oh my!" groaned Mr. Sneed. "I'm sure something will happen!"
+
+With cracks of the whips, and a jingling of sleighbells, the little
+cavalcade started off. The gloom settled slowly down, but Ruth and Alice
+helped dispel it by singing lively songs. Over the snow-covered road
+they went, now on a comparatively level place, and again down into some
+hollow where the drifts were deep. The horses pulled nobly.
+
+They came to a narrow place in the road, where the snow was piled high
+on either side. There was room for but one sled at a time.
+
+"I hope we don't meet anyone here," said Mr. Macksey. "If they do we'll
+have a hard job passing. G'lang there!" he called to his horses.
+
+They were half-way through the snow defile, when the leading sleigh, in
+which rode Ruth and Alice, swerved to one side. There was a crashing
+sound, a splintering of wood, and the two forward horses went down in a
+heap.
+
+"Whoa! Whoa!" called Mr. Macksey, as he reined in the others.
+
+"What's happened?" asked Mr. DeVere.
+
+"Some sort of a breakdown," answered the hunter.
+
+"Serious?" the actor wanted to know, trying to peer ahead in the gloom.
+
+"I can't tell yet," was the answer. "Here, can someone hold the reins
+while I get out?" he asked.
+
+"I will," offered Russ, and he held the rear team. The horses who had
+fallen had struggled to their feet and were quiet now. But the front
+part of the sled seemed to have sagged into the snow.
+
+"I thought so!" exclaimed Mr. Macksey, as he got up after peering under
+the vehicle. "No going on like this."
+
+"What happened?" asked Alice.
+
+"One of the forward runners has broken. There must have been a defect in
+it I didn't notice."
+
+"Can't we go on?" asked Mr. Sneed.
+
+"Not very well," was the answer. "We've broken down, and unfortunately
+we're the leading sleigh. I don't know how to get the others past it."
+
+"Well, I knew something would happen," sighed the human grouch. And he
+seemed quite gratified that his prediction had been verified.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE BLIZZARD
+
+
+The two other sleds had, as a matter of necessity, come to a halt behind
+the first one. The defile in the snow was so narrow that there could be
+no passing. Those who had broken the road through the drifts had not
+been wise enough to make a wide path, and now the consequences must be
+taken.
+
+In fact it would have been a little difficult to make at this point a
+path wide enough for two sleighs. The road went between two rocky walls,
+and though in the summer, when there was no snow, two vehicles could
+squeeze past, in the winter the piling up of the snow on either side
+made an almost impassable barrier.
+
+To turn out to right or left was out of the question, for the snow was
+so deep that the horses would have floundered helplessly in it.
+
+"Well, what's to be done?" asked Mr. DeVere, as he buttoned his coat
+collar up around his neck, and looked at his two daughters.
+
+"I'm afraid I'll have to ask you all to get out," said Mr. Macksey. "I
+want to get a better look at that broken runner, and see if it's
+possible to mend it. Bring up a lantern," he called to one of the
+drivers of the other sleds. "We'll soon need it."
+
+The moving picture players in the broken-down sled piled out into the
+snow. Fortunately they had come prepared for rough weather, and wore
+stout shoes. Ruth and Alice, as well as Russ and Paul, laughed at the
+plight, and Mr. Switzer, with a chuckle, exclaimed:
+
+"Ha! Maybe mine pretzels vill come in useful after all!"
+
+"That's no joke--maybe they will," observed Mr. Sneed, gloomily. "We may
+have to stay here all night."
+
+"Oh, we could walk to Elk Lodge if we had to," put in Mr. Macksey, as he
+took the lantern which the other driver brought up.
+
+"It wouldn't be very pleasant," replied Mr. Sneed, "with darkness soon
+to be here, and a storm coming up."
+
+"You're right about the storm, I'm afraid," answered the veteran hunter.
+"I don't like the looks of the weather a bit. And it sure will be dark
+soon. But we'll have a look at this sled," he went on. "Give me a hand
+here, Tom and Dick," he called to the other drivers, who had left their
+teams.
+
+They managed to prop up the sled, so a better view could be had of the
+forward runner. Then the extent of the damage was made plain. One whole
+side had given way, and was useless. It could not even be patched up.
+
+"Too bad!" declared the hunter. "Now, if it had only been the rear sled
+it wouldn't worry me so.
+
+"For then we could pile the stuff from the back sled into the others,
+and go on, even if we were a bit crowded. But with the front sled
+blocking this narrow road, I don't see how we are to go on."
+
+"If we could only jump the two rear sleds over this broken one, it would
+be all right," said Alice. "It's like one of those moving block puzzles,
+where you try to get the squares in a certain order without lifting any
+of them out."
+
+"That's it," agreed Mr. Macksey. "But it's no easy matter to jump two
+big sleds, and eight horses, over another sled and four horses. I've
+played checkers, but never like that," he added.
+
+"But we must do something," insisted Mr. Pertell. "I can't have my
+company out like this all night. We must get on to Elk Lodge, somehow."
+
+"Well, I don't see how you're going to do it," responded the hunter.
+"You could walk, of course; but you couldn't take your baggage, and you
+wouldn't like that."
+
+"Walk? Never! I protest against that!" exclaimed Mr. Bunn.
+
+"'He doth protest too much!'" quoted Paul, in a low voice. "Come on,
+Ruth--Alice--shall we walk?"
+
+"I'd like to do it--I'm getting cold standing here," cried Alice,
+stamping her feet on the edge of the road. "Will you, Ruth?"
+
+"I'm afraid we'd better not--at least until we talk to daddy, my dear,"
+was the low-voiced answer. "Perhaps they can get the sled fixed."
+
+But it did not seem so, for Mr. Macksey, with a puzzled look on his
+face, was talking earnestly to the two drivers. The accident had
+happened at a most unfortunate time and place.
+
+"We can't even turn around and go back a different road, the way it is,"
+said the hunter. "There isn't room to turn, and everybody knows you
+can't back a pung very far before getting stuck."
+
+"Then what are we to do?" asked Mr. Pertell.
+
+The hunter did not answer for a minute. Then he said:
+
+"Well, we've got twelve horses here, and I can manage to squeeze the two
+rear teams past the stalled sled. Then if you'd like to take chances
+riding them to Elk Lodge----"
+
+"Never!" cried Mr. Bunn, with lively recollections of a time he had
+ridden a mule at Oak Farm. "I shall stay here forever, first!"
+
+"Well, if you don't want to do that," said Mr. Macksey, and to tell the
+truth few members of the company seemed in favor of the idea, "if you
+don't want to do that I might ride on ahead and get a spare sleigh I
+have at the Lodge. I could get back here before very late, and we'd get
+home sooner or later."
+
+"And we would have to stay here?" asked Mr. DeVere.
+
+"I see no help for it. There are plenty of blankets in the sleds, and
+you can huddle down in the straw and keep warm. I'll get back as soon as
+I can."
+
+There really seemed nothing else to do, and, after talking it over, this
+plan was practically decided on. But something happened to change it.
+The wind had been rising constantly, and the snow was ever falling
+thicker and faster. The players could see only a little way ahead now
+from the place where they were stalled.
+
+"This would make a good film, if you could get it," remarked Paul to
+Russ.
+
+"Too dark," replied the camera operator. "Do you know, I don't like
+this," he went on in a low voice to the young actor.
+
+"You don't like what?" Paul wanted to know.
+
+"The way this weather is acting. I think there's going to be a big
+storm, and here we are, stalled out in the open. It will be hard for the
+girls and the women, to say nothing of Tommy and Nellie."
+
+"That's what it will, Russ; but what can be done?"
+
+As he spoke there came a sudden fierce rush of wind and a flurry of
+snow. It took the breaths of all, and instinctively they turned from it,
+for the snow stung their faces. The horses, too, disliked to face the
+stinging blast, and shifted their places.
+
+"Get behind such shelter as you can!" cried Mr. Macksey, above the roar
+of the storm. "This is a genuine blizzard and it's death to be
+unprotected. Get into the sleds, and cover up with the blankets. I'll
+have to go for help!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+AT ELK LODGE
+
+
+The warning by Mr. Macksey, no less than the sudden blast of the storm,
+struck terror to the hearts of not only the moving picture girls, but to
+all the other players. For it was something to which they were not
+used--that terrible sweep of wind and blinding snow.
+
+There had been heavy storms in New York, but there the big buildings cut
+off the force of the wind, except perhaps in some street canyon. But in
+the backwoods, on this stretch of open fields, there was no protection
+except that furnished by nature; or, in this case, by the sleds.
+
+For a moment after the veteran hunter had called his warning no one
+moved. They all seemed paralyzed by fear. Then Mr. Macksey called again:
+
+"Into shelter, every one of you! What do you mean; standing there in
+this storm? Get under the blankets--crouch down at the side of the
+sleds. I'll go for help."
+
+"But you--you'll freeze to death--I can't permit you to go!" protested
+Mr. Pertell, yelling the words into the other's ear, to make himself
+heard above the storm.
+
+"No, I'm used to this sort of thing!" the hunter replied. "I know a
+short cut to the lodge, and I can protect myself against the wind. I'll
+go."
+
+"I don't like it!" repeated Mr. Pertell, while Mr. Macksey was forcing
+him back toward the protecting sled.
+
+Meanwhile the others, now, if never before, feeling the need of shelter,
+were struggling through the blinding snow toward the broken sled, from
+which they had wandered a short time before while listening to the
+attempts made at solving the problem of getting on.
+
+"Isn't this awful!" gasped Ruth, as she clung to Alice.
+
+"Awful? It's just glorious!" cried the young girl. "I wouldn't have
+missed it for worlds."
+
+"Oh, Alice, how can you say so? We may all die in this terrible storm!"
+
+"I'm not going to think anything of the kind!" returned the other.
+"We'll get out of it, somehow, and laugh at ourselves afterward for
+being so silly as to be afraid. Oh, this is great!"
+
+She was really glorying in the fierce outburst of nature. Perhaps she
+did not understand, or appreciate, it, for she had never seen anything
+like it before, and in this case ignorance might have been akin to
+bliss.
+
+But the others, especially the drivers of the two sleds, with anxious
+looks on their cold faces, were trying to seek the shelter they so much
+needed, and also look to the restless horses. For the animals were now
+almost frantic with their desire to get away from that cutting wind and
+stinging snow.
+
+"Unhitch 'em all!" roared Mr. Macksey to his men. "Take the horses from
+the sleds and get 'em back of as much shelter as you can find. Otherwise
+they may bolt and upset something. I'll take old Bald-face, and see if I
+can't get some kind of help."
+
+Though what sort of aid he could bring to the picture actors in this
+time of storm and stress he hardly knew. But he was not going to give up
+without trying.
+
+Ruth and Alice were trying to struggle back through the snow to their
+sled, and not making very successful work of it, when they felt arms at
+their sides helping them, and Russ and Paul came along.
+
+"Fierce; isn't it!" cried Russ in Ruth's ear.
+
+"Awful, and yet this sister of mine pretends that she likes it."
+
+"I do!" declared Alice. "It's glorious. I can't really believe it's a
+blizzard."
+
+"It's the beginning of one, though," Paul assured her. "I hear the
+drivers saying so. Their blizzards up here start in with a squall like
+this, and soon develop into a bad storm. This isn't at its worst yet."
+
+"Well, I hope I see the worst of it!" said Alice.
+
+"Oh, how can you so tempt fate?" asked Ruth, seriously.
+
+"I'm not tempting fate, but I mean I do like to see a great storm--that
+is, if I'm protected, as I am now," and Alice laughed through the
+whirling snow into Paul's face, for he had wrapped a fold of his big
+ulster about her.
+
+"Oh, dear!" sighed Ruth.
+
+"What's the matter?" asked Russ, anxiously.
+
+"I'm so worried."
+
+"Don't be--yet," he said, reassuringly.
+
+"But we may be snowed in here for a week!"
+
+"Never mind--Mr. Switzer still has his pretzels, I believe."
+
+She could not help laughing, in spite of their distress.
+
+"Oh, poor daddy!" cried Alice, as she reached the sled, and Paul
+prepared to help her in, "he is trying to protect his poor throat." Mr.
+DeVere wore a heavy coat, the collar of which he had turned up, but even
+this seemed little protection, and he was now tying a silk handkerchief
+about his collar.
+
+"I have the very thing for him!" cried Paul, taking off a muffler he
+wore.
+
+"Oh, but you'll need that!" protested Alice, quickly.
+
+"Not a bit of it--I'm as warm as toast," he answered. "Here you are,
+sir!" he called to Mr. DeVere, and when the latter, after a weak
+resistance, had accepted it (for he was really suffering from the cold),
+Alice thanked Paul with a look that more than repaid him for his
+knightly self-sacrifice.
+
+The players were by now in the sled, which, in its damaged condition,
+had been let down as nearly level as possible. The blankets were pulled
+up over the side, and Mr. Macksey was preparing to unhitch one of the
+horses, and set off for help. Then one of the drivers gave a sudden cry,
+and came running up to his employer.
+
+"Look!" he shouted. "The wind's shifted. It's blowing right across the
+top of this cut now. We'll be protected down here!"
+
+This was indeed true. At the beginning of the squall, which was working
+up to a blizzard, the wind had swept up the canyon-like defile between
+the hills of earth and snow. But now the direction of the gale had
+shifted and was sweeping across the top of the depression. Thus those at
+the bottom were, in a measure, protected from the blast.
+
+"By hickory!" exclaimed Mr. Macksey, "that's right. The wind has
+changed. Folks, you'll be all right for a while down here, until I can
+get help."
+
+"Must you go?" asked Ruth, for now they could talk with more ease.
+Indeed, so fiercely was the snow sweeping across the top of the gulch
+that little of it fell into the depression.
+
+"Oh, sure, I've got to get help," the hunter said. "You folks can't stay
+here all night, even if the wind continues to blow across the top, which
+makes it much better."
+
+"Indeed and I will not stay here all night!" protested Mr. Bunn. "I most
+strenuously object to it."
+
+"And so do I!" growled Mr. Sneed. "There is no need of it. I might have
+known something unpleasant would happen. I had a feeling in my bones
+that it would."
+
+"Well, you'll have a freezing feeling in your bones if I don't get
+help," observed Mr. Macksey, grimly.
+
+"And I am hungry, too," went on Mr. Sneed. "Why was not food brought
+with us in anticipation of this emergency?"
+
+"Haf a pretzel!" offered Mr. Switzer, holding one out.
+
+"Away with the vile thing!" snapped Mr. Sneed.
+
+Mr. Macksey was about to leap on the back of the horse and start off,
+when the same driver who had noticed the change in the wind called out:
+
+"I say, Mr. Macksey, I have a plan."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Maybe you won't have to go for help, after all. Why can't we take the
+forward bob from under the rear sled and put it in place of the broken
+one on the first sled? We can easily pass the bob by the second sled
+even if the place is narrow."
+
+"By hickory! Why didn't you think of that before?" demanded the hunter.
+"Of course we can do it! Lively now, and we'll make the change. Got to
+be quick, or it'll be pitch dark."
+
+It would have been very dark long ago had it not been for the snow,
+which gave a sort of reflected light.
+
+"Come on!" cried Mr. Macksey. "We'll make the change. I guess I'll have
+to ask you folks to get out again," he said to the players in the first
+sled. "But it won't be for long. We'll have a good runner in place of
+the broken one, and then we can pile into two sleds and get into Elk
+Lodge. We'll leave the last sled until to-morrow."
+
+"But what about our baggage?" asked Miss Pennington. "That is in the
+rear sled. Can we take that with us?"
+
+"Not all of it," answered the hunter, "but you can crowd in as much as
+possible. The rest can wait."
+
+"I want _all_ of mine," declared the former vaudeville actress.
+
+"So do I!" cried Miss Dixon.
+
+"You'll be lucky if you get in out of this storm," said Mr. Pertell
+reprovingly, "to say nothing about baggage. Do the best you can, Mr.
+Macksey."
+
+"I will. Come now, men, lively!"
+
+It took some little time to make the change, but finally the work was
+done.
+
+The broken runner was cast aside, and there were now two good sleds,
+one ahead of the other in the snowy defile. As much of the needed
+baggage as possible was transferred, and the four horses that had been
+on the rear sled were brought up and hitched to the remaining sleds--two
+to each so that each conveyance now had six animals attached to it.
+
+"And by hickory!" exclaimed Mr. Macksey, that appearing to be his
+favorite expression, "By hickory, we'll need 'em all!"
+
+They were now ready to set forth, and all rather dreaded going out into
+the open again, for the defile offered a good shelter from the storm.
+But it had to be done, for it was out of the question to stay there all
+night.
+
+"Go 'long!" called the hunter, as he shook the long reins of his six
+horses, and cracked the whip with a report like a pistol. But the lash
+did not fall on the backs of the ready animals. Mr. Macksey never beat
+his horses--they were willing enough without that.
+
+Lanterns had been lighted and hung on the sleds, to shed their warning
+rays through the storm. They now gleamed fitfully through the
+fast-falling snow.
+
+"Are you feeling better now, Daddy?" asked Ruth of her father, as she
+glanced anxiously at him.
+
+"Much better, yes. I am afraid I ought to give you back your muffler,
+Paul," he added.
+
+"No indeed--please keep it," begged the young actor.
+
+Alice reached beneath the blanket and pressed his hand in appreciation.
+
+"Thanks," he laughed.
+
+"It is I who thank you," she returned, softly.
+
+They were now out in the open road, and the fury of the blast struck
+them with all its cruel force.
+
+"Keep covered up!" shouted Mr. Macksey, through the visor of his cap,
+which was pulled down over his face. "We'll be there pretty soon."
+
+On through the drifts plunged the straining horses. It was all six of
+them could do, pull as they might, to make their way. How cruelly the
+wind cut, and how the snow flakes stung! Soft as they really were, the
+wind gave them the feeling of pieces of sand and stone.
+
+On through the storm went the delayed party. And then, when each one, in
+spite of his or her fortitude, was almost giving up in despair at the
+cold and the anxiety Mr. Macksey shouted out;
+
+"Whoa! Here we are! All out for Elk Lodge!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THROUGH THE ICE
+
+
+Warming, comforting beams of light shone from a large, low building set
+back from the road in a little clearing of the woods. It was too dark to
+see more than this--that the structure offered shelter, warmth and
+light. Yes, and something else, for there was borne on the wings of the
+wind the most delicious odor--the odor of supper.
+
+"Pile out, folks! Pile out!" cried the genial old hunter. "Here we are!
+At Elk Lodge! No more storm! No more cold! Get inside to the blaze. I
+reckon mother's about given us up; but we're here, and we won't do a
+thing to her cooking! Pile out!"
+
+It was an invitation that needed no repetition. It was greeted with a
+merry shout, even Mr. Sneed, the grouch, condescending to say:
+
+"Ah, that sounds good!"
+
+"Ha! Den if dere iss food to eat I dinks me dot I don't need to eat my
+pretzels. I can safe dem for annoder time!" cried Mr. Switzer, as he
+got out.
+
+There was a laugh at this, and it was added to when Mr. Bunn called out
+in his deepest tragic voice:
+
+"Ha! Someone has my silk hat!"
+
+For he had persisted in wearing that in the storm, though it was most
+uncomfortable.
+
+"It is gone!" he added. "Stolen, mayhap. Has anyone seen it?"
+
+"Probably blew off," said Russ. "We'll find it--when the snow melts!"
+
+Wellington Bunn groaned--again tragically.
+
+"I'll get you another," offered Mr. Pertell, generously.
+
+"Come on, folks! Pile out!" cried Mr. Macksey again.
+
+"I'm so stiff I can hardly move!" declared Ruth.
+
+"So am I," added Alice. "Oh, but it's good to be here!"
+
+"I thought you liked the storm so," observed Ruth.
+
+"I do, but I like supper too, and I think it must be ready."
+
+Out of the sleds climbed the cold and cramped picture players, all
+thought of the fierce storm now forgotten.
+
+"Go right in," invited Mr. Macksey. "Supper's waiting!"
+
+"Welcome to Elk Lodge!" called a motherly voice, and Mrs. Macksey
+appeared in the open door of the main corridor. "Come right in!"
+
+They were glad enough to do it.
+
+"I don't know any of you, except Russ and Mr. Pertell," she said, for
+the manager and his helper had paid a visit to the place sometime before
+to make arrangements about using it.
+
+"You'll soon know all of 'em," declared Mr. Pertell with a laugh. "I'll
+introduce you," which he quickly did.
+
+"Now then, I expect you'll want to wash up," went on the hunter's wife.
+"I'll have the girl show you to your different rooms, and then you can
+come down to supper. It's been waiting. What kept you? I'll have to ask
+you folks because it's like pulling teeth to get any news out of my
+husband. What happened?"
+
+"A breakdown," explained Ruth, who took an instant liking to motherly
+Mrs. Macksey. "Oh, we had such a time!"
+
+"Such a glorious time!" supplemented Alice.
+
+"Here's a girl who evidently likes outdoors," laughed the hunter's wife.
+
+"Indeed I do!" cried Alice.
+
+There was some little confusion, getting the players to their rooms,
+because of the lateness of the arrival, but finally each one was in his
+or her appointed apartment, and trying to get settled. The rooms were
+small but comfortable, and the hunters who had built the lodge for
+themselves had provided many comforts.
+
+"There ought to be a private bath for each one," declared Miss
+Pennington, as she surveyed her room.
+
+"Indeed there ought," agreed her friend Miss Dixon. "I think this place
+is horrid!"
+
+"How thoughtless and selfish they are," said Ruth, who shared a room
+with Alice.
+
+"Aren't they! I think it's lovely here. Oh, but I am so hungry!"
+
+"So am I, dear."
+
+"Glad to hear it for once, Ruth. Usually you have so little appetite
+that one would think you were in love."
+
+"Silly! I'm going to eat to-night anyhow."
+
+"Does that mean you are _not_ in love?"
+
+"Silly!" cried Ruth again, but that was all she answered.
+
+What a glorious and home-like place Elk Lodge was! Yes, even better than
+the best home the moving picture girls had known most of their lives,
+for they had spent part of the time boarding, as their father traveled
+about with his theatrical company, and who can compare a home to a
+boarding house?
+
+Down in the big living room a fire burned and crackled, and gave out
+spicy odors on the great hearth that took in logs six feet long. And how
+cheerfully and ruddily the blaze shone out! It mellowed and cheered
+everyone. Even Mr. Sneed smiled, and stretched out his hands to the
+leaping flames.
+
+As Ruth and Alice were about to go down, having called to their father
+across the hall that they were ready for him, there came a knock on
+their door.
+
+"Come in!" invited Ruth.
+
+"Sorry to trouble you," spoke Miss Pennington, "but have you any cold
+cream and--er--powder? Our things were left in the other sled--I mean
+all of those things, and Laura and I can't--we simply can't get along
+without them."
+
+"I have cold cream," said Alice. "But powder--that is unless it's talcum
+or rice----"
+
+"That will have to do I guess," sighed the vaudeville actress. "But I
+did hope you had a bit of rouge, I'm so pale!"
+
+"Never use it!" said Alice quickly. Too quickly, hospitable Ruth
+thought, for, though she decried the use of "paint," she would not be
+rude to a guest, and, under these circumstances Miss Pennington was a
+guest.
+
+"You don't need it," the caller said, with a glance at Alice's glowing
+cheeks, to whom the wind and snow had presented two damask spots that
+were most becoming.
+
+"The weather is very chapping to my face," the former vaudeville actress
+went on. "I really must have something," and she departed with the cold
+cream and some harmless rice powder, which Ruth and Alice used
+judiciously and sparingly, and only when needed.
+
+The fine supper, late as it was, necessarily, was enjoyed to the utmost.
+It was bountiful and good, and though at first Miss Pennington and Miss
+Dixon were inclined to sniff at the lack of "courses," and the absence
+of lobster, it was noticed that they ate heartily.
+
+"There is only one thing more I want," sighed Paul, as he leaned back in
+his chair.
+
+"What, pray? It seems to me, and I have been watching you, that you have
+had about all that is good for you," laughed Alice. "I have seen you get
+three separate and distinct helpings of fried chicken."
+
+"Oh, I didn't mean anything more to eat," he said, quickly, "and if you
+are going to watch me so closely I shall have to cut down my rations, I
+fear. What I meant was that I would like a moving picture of this
+supper. It has memories that long will linger, but I fain would have a
+souvenir of it."
+
+"Be careful that you don't get indigestion as a souvenir," laughed
+Alice, as he followed her sister from the table.
+
+The dining room opened off the great living apartment with that
+wonderful fire, and following the meal all the members of the company
+gathered about the hearth.
+
+Outside the storm still raged, and Mr. Macksey, who came in from having
+with his men, put away the horses, reported that the blizzard was
+growing worse.
+
+"It's a good thing we thought of changing the bobs and coming on," he
+said. "Otherwise we might be there yet."
+
+"What really happened?" asked his wife. "I was telling one of the young
+ladies that it was like pulling teeth to get any news out of you."
+
+"Oh, we just had a little breakdown," he said. "Now, folks, just make
+yourselves at home. Go to bed when you like, get up when you please.
+I'll try and get the rest of your baggage here some time to-morrow, if
+this storm lets up."
+
+"I hope you do get it," complained Miss Pennington.
+
+"Selfish thing!" whispered Alice. "All she wants is her paint!"
+
+"Hush," cautioned Ruth. "She'll hear you!"
+
+"I don't care," voiced her sister.
+
+They talked of many things as they sat about the fire, and then Mr.
+Pertell said:
+
+"We will film no dramas while the storm continues, but as soon as we can
+get out on the ice I want to start one."
+
+"Is there skating about here?" asked Alice, who was very fond of the
+sport.
+
+"There's a fine lake back of the lodge," replied Mr. Macksey, "and as
+soon as the storm lets up I'll have the men clear a place of snow, and
+you can have all the fun you want."
+
+"Oh, joy!" cried Alice.
+
+"Save me the first skate," whispered Paul to her, and she nodded
+acquiescence.
+
+Mr. Pertell briefly outlined the drama he expected to film on the ice,
+and then, after a little more talk, every one voted that bed was the
+best place in the world. For the wind had made them all sleepy, and they
+were tired out from the storm and their long journey.
+
+Alice and Ruth went up to their room. Alice pulled aside the curtain
+from the window and looked out on a scene of swirling whiteness. The
+flakes dashed against the pane as though knocking for admission.
+
+"It's a terrible night," said Ruth, with a little shiver.
+
+"Well, much as I like weather, I wouldn't want to be out in it long,"
+Alice confessed. "Elk Lodge is a very good place in a blizzard."
+
+"Suppose we got snowed in?" asked Ruth, apprehensively.
+
+"Then we'll dig our way out--simple answer. Oh dear!" and Alice yawned
+luxuriously, if not politely, showing her pretty teeth.
+
+In spite of the portentous nature of the storm, it was not fully borne
+out, and morning saw the sun shining on the piles of snow that had
+fallen. There had been a considerable quantity sifted down on what was
+already about Elk Lodge, but there was not enough to hinder traffic for
+the sturdy lumbermen and hunters of that region.
+
+The wind had died down, and it was not cold, so when Mr. Macksey
+announced that he was going back after the broken-down sleigh, Ruth and
+Alice asked permission to accompany him.
+
+Before starting off Mr. Macksey had set a gang of men, hired for the
+occasion, to scraping the snow off the frozen lake, and when Ruth and
+Alice came back they found several of the picture players skating,
+while Russ was getting ready to film one of the first scenes of the
+drama.
+
+"You're in this, Mr. Sneed," said the manager. "You are supposed to be
+skating along, when you trip and fall breaking your leg----"
+
+"Hold on--stop--break my leg! Never!" cried the grouchy actor.
+
+"Of course you don't really injure yourself!" exclaimed the manager,
+testily.
+
+"Oh, why did I ever come to this miserable place!" sighed Mr. Sneed. "I
+despise cold weather!"
+
+But there was no help for it. Soon he was on the steel runners gliding
+about, while Russ filmed him. Mr. Sneed was a good skater, and was not
+averse to "showing off."
+
+"All ready, now!" called the manager to him. "Get that fall in right
+there. Russ, be ready for him!"
+
+"Oh!" groaned the actor. "Here I go!"
+
+And, as luck would have it, he, at that moment, tripped on a stick, and
+fell in earnest. It was much better done than if he had simulated it.
+
+But something else happened. He fell so heavily, and at a spot where
+there was a treacherous air hole, that, the next instant Mr. Sneed broke
+through the ice, and was floundering in the chilly water.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE CURIOUS DEER
+
+
+"Quick! A rope!"
+
+"No, boards are better!"
+
+"Fence rails will do!"
+
+"Oh, get him out, someone!"
+
+These were only some of the cries uttered, following the accident to Mr.
+Sneed. Meanwhile he was doing his best to keep himself above water by
+grasping the edge of the ice.
+
+But it crumbled in his fingers, and he was so shocked by the sudden
+immersion, and by the cold, and his skates were so heavy on his feet,
+that he went down again and again. Fortunately the lake was not deep at
+that point, and as he went down his feet would touch bottom, and he
+could spring up again.
+
+"Don't go out there!" warned Mr. Pertell, as Paul started for the spot.
+
+"Why not?" asked the young actor.
+
+"Because the ice is probably thin all around that place. I don't want
+two of you in. Hold on, Mr. Sneed!" he cried to the desperate actor.
+"We'll have you out in no time!"
+
+"Shall I get this?" cried Russ, who had not deserted his camera, even as
+a gunner will not leave his cannon, nor a captain his ship. More than
+once brave moving picture operators have stood in the face of danger to
+get rare views.
+
+"Yes, get every motion of it!" cried the manager.
+
+"But it isn't in the play!"
+
+"I don't care! We'll write it in afterward. You get the pictures and
+we'll rescue Mr. Sneed. Hi, there, Mr. Bunn, you must help with this.
+Get some fence rails! We can slide them out on the ice and they will
+distribute the weight so that the ice will hold us."
+
+"But where will I get fence rails?" asked the actor.
+
+"Oh, gnaw them out of a tree!" cried Mr. Pertell, who was much disturbed
+and nervous. "Don't you see that fence?" he cried, pointing to one not
+far off. "Get some rails from that. And then get in the picture!"
+
+"Oh, such a life!" groaned Mr. Bunn.
+
+"This is to save a life!" the manager reminded him.
+
+And while Russ continued to make moving pictures of the unexpected
+scene, the others set about the work of rescue. Later this could be
+interpolated in the drama to make it appear as though it had all been
+arranged in advance.
+
+"Hurry with those rails!" called Mr. Pertell to Mr. Bunn. "He can't stay
+in that icy water forever."
+
+Some of the men who had been working at removing the snow now came up
+with ropes and trace chains. Then, when the rails were spread out on the
+ice, near the air hole, the rescuers were able to get near enough to
+throw the ends of several lines to Mr. Sneed. He managed to grasp one,
+and, a moment later was hauled out on the ice.
+
+"I--I--I'm c-c-c-cold!" he stammered, as he stood with the icy water
+dripping from him.
+
+"Shouldn't wonder but what you were," agreed Mr. Pertell. "Now the thing
+for you to do is to run to the Lodge as fast as you can. Here, Mr. Bunn,
+you and Paul run alongside him, with a hold on either arm. We'll call
+this film 'A Modern Pickwick,' instead of what we planned. In Dickens'
+story there's a scene somewhat like this. We'll change the whole thing
+about.
+
+"Russ, you go on ahead, and when Paul and Mr. Bunn come along with Mr.
+Sneed, you get them as they run."
+
+"All right," assented the young moving picture operator, as he kept on
+grinding away at the crank.
+
+Exercise was the best thing to restore the circulation of the actor who
+had fallen into the water, and he soon had plenty of it. With Paul on
+one side, and Mr. Bunn on the other, he was raced back to Elk Lodge, and
+there he was supplied plentifully with hot lemonade to ward off a cold.
+Russ got interior pictures of these scenes as well, and later the film
+made a great success.
+
+"In view of the accident, and the fact that you are all more or less
+upset," said Mr. Pertell, when some of the excitement had calmed down,
+"we will give up work for the rest of the day. You may do as you please
+until to-morrow."
+
+"Then I'm going for a walk," cried Alice.
+
+"I'm with you," spoke Paul, "only we ought to have snowshoes."
+
+"Oh, could we get any?" she cried.
+
+"I can arrange for some for you," promised Mr. Macksey, "but I haven't
+any now."
+
+"Good idea!" exclaimed the manager. "An idea for a new film--'The
+Snowshoe Rescue!' Here, Russ, make some notes of this for future use,"
+and he began to dictate to the young operator, who with his employer
+frequently thus improvised dramas out of a mere suggestion.
+
+"If you want to walk," said Mr. Macksey to Alice, "you'd better stick
+to the road. The men have been out with homemade snowplows breaking a
+trail. That's what we do around here after a storm. You'd better stick
+to the road."
+
+"We will!" cried Alice. "Will you come, Ruth?"
+
+"Later perhaps--not now. I want to study a new part I have."
+
+"I suppose you're waiting for Russ," whispered Alice.
+
+"Don't be silly!" flashed Ruth. But she did not go out with her sister.
+
+Alice and Paul had a glorious walk in the snow, and saw a beautiful
+country, even though it was hidden under a mantle of white. For
+Deerfield was a lovely place.
+
+"Aren't you cold?" asked Ruth, when her sister returned.
+
+"Not a bit. It's glorious. What did you do, and how is Mr. Sneed?"
+
+"He's doing nicely, I believe. As for me, I stayed in. I had some
+mending to do."
+
+"Is that why Russ has threads on his coat sleeve--was it his coat you
+were mending?"
+
+"Oh, Alice--you are hopeless!" protested Ruth, but she blushed vividly.
+
+That afternoon, as Mrs. Macksey was overseeing the getting of supper,
+Alice, who went to the kitchen for something, heard the veteran hunter
+and his wife in conversation.
+
+"You say they are strangers about here?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, three men. I saw them after you had gone to the station to get the
+moving picture folks. There were three men, and I think they were after
+deer."
+
+"After deer, eh? Don't they know that this is a private preserve?"
+
+"They didn't seem to care. They came to ask their direction. They all
+had guns, and I'm sure they were after deer."
+
+"And you never saw them before?"
+
+"No, I never did."
+
+"And you have no idea where they came from?"
+
+"I couldn't tell--no. I heard one of them ask the other if he thought it
+was safe."
+
+"If what was safe?"
+
+"He didn't say. Maybe he meant to hunt deer around here."
+
+"It won't be safe if I catch them!" declared Mr. Macksey, as he went
+out. Alice wondered who the men could be.
+
+It was so quiet and peaceful at Elk Lodge that Mr. DeVere soon forgot
+all about the annoyance caused by the demand of Dan Merley for the five
+hundred dollars. At first he had expected some sort of legal summons in
+a suit, but when none came he breathed easier.
+
+Several days passed, and a few snow scenes were filmed to be used later,
+and worked into dramas. Mr. Sneed suffered a little cold from his
+unexpected bath, but that was all.
+
+Meanwhile the weather had remained about the same. There was plenty of
+snow, but no more storms. Elk Lodge was voted the finest place in the
+world, and even Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon condescended to say that
+they liked it.
+
+Then, one day, plans were made for filming a little drama in the snowy
+woods, and thither many members of the company went to act.
+
+Ruth was supposed to be lost in a dense thicket, and Paul was soon on
+his way to find her, in the guise of a woodman. He had sighted Ruth,
+over a clump of bushes, and was making his way to her, when he heard her
+scream. This was not in the play and he wondered what could have
+happened.
+
+"Quick!" he heard her cry. "He's going to jump at me!"
+
+Paul broke into a run, and the next moment saw a deer, with large,
+branching antlers, spring through the underbrush directly in front of
+Ruth, while Russ, at the camera, yelled to drive away the curious
+animal.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE COASTING RACE
+
+
+"Oh, I'm so frightened!" cried Ruth.
+
+"Don't be alarmed!" Russ called to her, while he continued to grind away
+at the camera. "He won't hurt you. This will make a dandy picture! I'm
+going to film the deer."
+
+"Oh, but suppose he jabs me with his horns?" wailed Ruth, who was not
+quite so alarmed now. "They are terribly sharp."
+
+"Don't worry!" Russ answered. "This is coming out great. The deer was
+just the one thing needed to make this film a success."
+
+"Then I won't spoil it by coming in now!" called Paul, who was keeping
+out of the focus of the camera by crouching down behind some bushes. He
+had heard what Russ said, and had given up his plan of rushing to rescue
+Ruth. Evidently there was no need.
+
+The deer, strange to say, did not seem at all alarmed, and stood gazing
+at Ruth with great brown eyes. She too, realizing that she was not to
+be harmed, acted more naturally now, and with an appreciation of what
+was needed to make the film a proper one.
+
+She first "registered" fear, and then delighted surprise, at seeing the
+animal.
+
+I might explain that in making moving pictures certain directions are
+given to the actors. As they can not depend on speaking words to let the
+audiences know what is going on, they must intimate, by appropriate
+gesture, or facial expression, the action of the play. This is called
+"registering," and when in the directions, or scenario, an actor or
+actress is told to "register" fear, surprise, anger, love, jealousy--in
+fact any of the emotions--he or she knows what is meant.
+
+In this case Ruth was without specific directions save those called out
+by Russ. And often, in an emergency a good moving picture camera
+operator can save a film from being spoiled by improvising some "stage
+directions," if I may call them such.
+
+"Shall I approach him, Russ?" Ruth asked, as she saw that the deer
+showed no intentions of fleeing.
+
+"Yes, if he'll let you. It will make a dandy scene."
+
+"Not too close," cautioned Paul, who was still out of sight behind the
+bushes, waiting until he could properly come into the scene. "He might
+accidentally hit you with a sweep of his horns."
+
+"I'll be careful," answered Ruth. "I believe the poor thing is hungry."
+
+"If we only had something to feed him!" exclaimed Russ. "That would work
+in fine."
+
+"I have some lumps of sugar," said Ruth, speaking with her head turned
+aside. The reason for this was that she did not want the movement of her
+lips to show on the film, and the camera will catch and fix even that
+slight motion.
+
+The reason Ruth spoke aside was because the little scene was being
+improvised, and she had no proper lines to speak. And, as I have already
+explained, often persons in the audience of a moving picture theatre are
+able to understand what is said, merely by watching the lips of the
+performers on the screen.
+
+"Sugar! Good!" cried Russ. "See if he'll take it. I don't know what deer
+like best, but if they're anything like horses they'll revel in sugar.
+Go ahead!"
+
+Ruth had in her pocket some lumps she had intended giving to the horses
+attached to the sleds in which they had come to the woods. She now took
+out some of these and held them out to the timid deer.
+
+The beautiful creature, made bold, perhaps, by hunger, came a step
+nearer.
+
+"Oh, that's fine!" cried Russ, squinting through the focusing tube to
+get clear, sharp impressions on the film. "Keep at it, Ruth."
+
+The deer came nearer, thrusting forth its velvet nose. It sniffed at the
+sugar Ruth held, and then put out its lips and tongue and picked up the
+lumps.
+
+"Fine!" cried Russ. "Maybe he'd like salt better, for I've read of
+salt-licks that animals visit, but sugar will do on a pinch; won't it,
+old fellow?"
+
+Perhaps it was the loud, laughing voice that Russ used, or it may have
+been because there was no more sugar, but, at any rate, the deer, after
+taking the sweet lumps gave a sudden turn, and rushed off through the
+bushes, going rather slowly because of the deep snow.
+
+Russ caught every motion of the graceful creature, however, and called
+out to Ruth to pose with her hand shaded over her eyes, as though she
+were looking after the deer. She did this, and that ended the little
+scene with the timid woodland creature, who, if he ever saw moving
+pictures, would doubtless be very much surprised to perceive a
+presentment of himself on the screen.
+
+"Come on now, Paul!" called Russ, indicating to the young actor to show
+himself so that he would get into the picture.
+
+The other players who had come up on hearing Ruth call out were now
+ready for their parts in the play. They had kept out of sight of the
+camera, however, so as not to spoil the picture.
+
+"Very well done!" declared Mr. Pertell, when Ruth had finished her part
+in the play. "That deer will make a very effective picture, I think."
+
+"It was a dear deer!" punned Alice, and the others laughed.
+
+On the way back to Elk Lodge the manager made an announcement that
+interested all in the company, the young people especially.
+
+"I have a drama," he said, "that calls for a coasting race in one scene.
+I wonder if we couldn't do that to-morrow."
+
+"Oh, riding down hill!" cried Alice, with girlish enthusiasm. "What fun!
+May I steer a bob?"
+
+"Alice, you never could!" cried Ruth.
+
+"Pooh! I've done it lots of times!" her sister answered.
+
+"Yes, when you were a little girl, perhaps, with two sleds held
+together," laughed Mr. Pertell. "This will be different. Mr. Macksey
+tells me he has two big, old-fashioned bobsleds in one of the barns.
+Now I think we can get up two parties and have a big coasting race. The
+play calls for it, and the young men who steer the bobs are rivals for
+the hand of the same girl. She has made a condition that whoever gets
+first to the bottom of the big hill may marry her. So you see the plan
+of the play."
+
+"Me for a bob!" cried Paul.
+
+"I wish I didn't have to film the play--I'd steer one, too!" exclaimed
+Russ, with a look at Ruth that made her blush.
+
+"Must I get into this silly coasting play?" asked Mr. Bunn.
+
+"You surely must," answered Mr. Pertell. "And I want to warn you of one
+thing--you are not to wear a high hat--it would only blow off and
+embarrass you."
+
+"Not wear my high hat? Then I refuse to take part!" cried the tragic
+actor.
+
+But Mr. Pertell paid no attention to him, for he had heard the same
+thing before.
+
+The details of the coasting race were discussed on the way to Elk Lodge,
+and it was arranged that a partial rehearsal should be held next day.
+
+That night, as Alice and Ruth were going to bed rather early, on account
+of the wearying work of the day, they heard voices out in the hall near
+their room.
+
+"Listen!" warned Alice, raising her finger, for Ruth was talking.
+
+"It's Mr. and Mrs. Macksey," said Ruth.
+
+"I know. But what are they saying? It's something about those strange
+hunters who were seen about here once before."
+
+Mr. Macksey, who had been summoned to the upper hall by his wife to fix
+a broken window, was speaking in his deep voice.
+
+"So those fellows were around again; eh?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, and I don't like it, Jake," Mrs. Macksey replied. "You know what
+it means if they kill any of the club deer. It may cost you your place
+here. The members of the club may say you were not careful enough."
+
+"That's so, wife. I reckon I'd better look after those chaps. If they're
+trespassing on Elk Lodge I can have them arrested anyhow."
+
+The next day was clear and calm, just right for taking pictures, and
+after breakfast the entire company went out on the hill where the
+bobsled race was to take place.
+
+The hill had been prepared in advance by men from Elk Lodge, so that the
+sleds would attain good speed. The snow had been packed down, and a
+place made for Russ to set up his camera.
+
+"Paul, you will steer one bob," said Mr. Pertell, as he was arranging
+the affair, "and Mr. Sneed will take the other."
+
+"What, me steer a bobsled down that hill?" cried the grouchy actor, as
+he looked at the steep slope.
+
+"Of course," said the manager.
+
+"Something is sure to happen," declared Mr. Sneed.
+
+"Nonsense!" exclaimed Mr. Pertell. "All you have to do is to keep the
+wheel steady."
+
+The company of players, with a number of men from Elk Lodge, added to
+fill the bobs, now divided themselves into two parties. Ruth was to go
+on the sled with Mr. Sneed, and sit directly behind him so as to show
+well in the camera. Alice was to ride next to Paul on the other sled.
+The bobs were long ones, with bells and large steering wheels in front.
+
+"All ready?" called Mr. Pertell, when the players were seated.
+
+"All ready!" cried Russ, indicating that the camera was prepared.
+
+"Go!" ordered the manager, and the men detailed to push the bobs shoved
+them ahead. The moving picture coasting race was on.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+ON SNOWSHOES
+
+
+"Here we go!"
+
+"Hold on tight, everybody!"
+
+"Let's see if we can't win!"
+
+With shouts and laughter the merry coasters thus enlivened the race down
+hill. In order to make the moving pictures appear as realistic as
+possible Mr. Pertell had told the players to forget, for the time being,
+that they were actors, and to imagine that they were just boys and
+girls, out for a real frolic.
+
+"And I'm sure I feel like one!" cried Alice, as she clung to the sides
+of the bob, where she sat behind Paul.
+
+"That's the way to talk!" he laughed. "Look out for yourself now, we're
+going to bump!"
+
+At that moment they came to a "thank-ye-ma'am," as they are called in
+the country.
+
+This is a ridge, or bump in the road, made to keep the rain water from
+rushing down the highway too fast. The ridge turns the water to one
+side.
+
+As Paul spoke the sled reached this place, rose into the air, and came
+down heavily.
+
+"Gracious!" cried Alice. "I was nearly bounced off!"
+
+"I warned you!" laughed Paul. "There's another one just below. Watch out
+for it."
+
+Paul's sled was a little ahead of the one steered by Mr. Sneed, and the
+latter was unaware of the treacherous nature of the road. So he did not
+warn his fellow coasters. The result was that two of those on the rear
+fell off, but as they landed in soft snow they were not hurt.
+
+"All the better!" cried Russ, who was making the pictures. "That will
+add to it. Keep going, Mr. Sneed!"
+
+"If I go much farther I'll fall off!" cried the grouchy actor. "I can't
+hold on much longer!"
+
+"You've got to!" ordered Mr. Pertell. "I'm not going to have this
+picture spoiled."
+
+"Please don't fall off, whatever you do!" cried Ruth, who was back of
+Mr. Sneed. "That would leave me to do the steering and I don't know the
+first thing about it."
+
+"Well, I'll do my best," he said, as graciously as he could. "Certainly
+I don't want to make trouble for you, Miss DeVere."
+
+"Thank you," she said, and then as she looked ahead and saw another bump
+in the road, she cried:
+
+"Look out! We're going to hit it."
+
+Now Mr. Sneed was still suffering from the effects of the first bump,
+and not wishing to repeat it he sought to avoid the second by steering
+to one side. But in steering a long and heavy bobsled, well-laden with
+coasters, there is one thing to be remembered. That is, it must not be
+steered too suddenly to one side, for it has a propensity to "skid"
+worse than an automobile.
+
+This was what happened in the case of Mr. Sneed. He turned the steering
+wheel suddenly, the bobsled slewed to one side, and, in another instant,
+had upset.
+
+"Oh, dear!"
+
+"We'll be killed!"
+
+These two expressions came respectively from Miss Pennington and Miss
+Dixon. Some of the men cried out and a number of the girls screamed;
+but, after all, no one was hurt, for the snow was soft and luckily the
+bob rolled to one side, not hitting anyone.
+
+The moment he realized that it was about to capsize Mr. Sneed let go of
+the steering wheel, and gave a jump which carried him out of harm's way,
+so the only mishap he suffered was a rather severe shaking up, and being
+covered with snow. Considerable of the white stuff got in his mouth.
+
+"Wuff!" he spluttered. "I--gurr--will
+never--burr--steer--another--whew--sled!"
+
+By this time he had cleared his mouth of snow, and repeated his
+determination, without the interruptions and stutterings.
+
+"Did you get that spill, Russ?" asked Mr. Pertell, who could not keep
+from laughing.
+
+"Every move of it; yes, sir!"
+
+"Good. I think we can make use of it, though it wasn't in the scenario.
+But we'll have to start over again. I want to get a good close finish."
+
+"What's that you said?" asked Mr. Sneed, as he dusted the snow from his
+clothes, and looked at the overturned bob.
+
+"I said," repeated the manager, "that we'd have to do the coasting scene
+over again, as I wanted to show a close finish of the two sleds at the
+foot of the hill, and now we can't, for one is down there, and the other
+is up here."
+
+This was true enough, since Paul had steered his sled properly, and had
+reached the foot of the slope, where he and the others waved to their
+less fortunate competitors.
+
+"Well, you can have the race over again if you like," said Mr. Sneed,
+with decision, "but I am not going to steer. I knew something would
+happen if I steered a bob."
+
+"Well, you were right--for once," conceded Mr. Pertell, with a smile.
+"And perhaps you are right not to want to steer again. It may not be
+safe."
+
+"I'll do it!" offered Mr. Switzer. "In der old country yet I haf steered
+sleds bigger yet as dis von."
+
+"All right, you may try," said Mr. Pertell. "Now then, is anyone hurt?"
+
+"I am not, I'm glad to say," laughed Ruth, who was brushing the snow
+from her garments. "But it was a narrow escape."
+
+"Indeed it was!" snapped Miss Dixon. "It was all your fault, too, Mr.
+Sneed!"
+
+"My fault, how?"
+
+"You steered to one side too quickly. Don't you try that, Mr. Switzer."
+
+"Indeed und I vill not. You can trust me!"
+
+"Get ready then," ordered Mr. Pertell. "Come on back!" he called to Paul
+and his companions at the foot of the hill.
+
+As the story in which the coasting race figured would have to be
+changed to make the accident fit in, Mr. Pertell had Russ get all the
+incidental scenes he could, showing the overturned bob being righted,
+the coasters getting ready for the new race, and the other bob being
+pulled up hill.
+
+Once more the rival coasters prepared to start off, with Mr. Switzer
+replacing Mr. Sneed. This time there was no upset, and the two sleds
+went down close together.
+
+Then something new developed. Mr. Switzer spoke truly when he said he
+had been used to steering bobs in Germany. He knew just how to do it to
+get the best results, and take advantage of every favorable spot on the
+hill.
+
+Paul, too, seeing that it was to be a real race, as well as one for the
+benefit of the moving picture audiences, exerted himself to get the best
+out of his sled. There is little a steersman on a bob can do except to
+take advantage of the easiest course. And this Paul did.
+
+On and on went the big bobs, nearing the foot of the hill.
+
+"This is great!" cried Mr. Pertell.
+
+"This will be some picture!" declared Russ, with enthusiasm. "Come on,
+Paul, he's going to win!"
+
+"Not if I know it!" avowed the young actor.
+
+"Oh, don't let them get ahead of us!" cried Alice in Paul's ear.
+
+"I'll do my best," he said, with a grim tightening of his lips.
+
+But it was not to be. Either a little more skillful steering on the part
+of Mr. Switzer, or a more favorable course enabled his sled to shoot
+ahead, just at the finish, and he won the race.
+
+And then a curious thing happened. The sled kept on going, and slid into
+a little clump of bushes, from which, a moment later, a man with a gun
+sprang.
+
+This man seemed as surprised at being thus driven from his shelter as
+were the coasters at seeing him.
+
+"Ha! Vot does dis mean?" demanded Mr. Switzer. "Vos you vaiting for us
+mit dot gun?"
+
+Really the man did look a little menacing as he stood there with poised
+weapon, looking at the coasters.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he managed to stammer, at length. "I did not see
+you coming."
+
+"I guess it's our part to beg your pardon," said Mr. Sneed, who, though
+he did not steer the bob, had been obliged to ride on it. "We did not
+mean to run into you."
+
+"No harm done; none at all," the man said. "I was hiding here, waiting
+for a chance to shoot at a fox that has a particularly fine pelt, but I
+guess I may as well give up. I heard the shouts of you folks, but I had
+no idea you would coast away down here."
+
+"I didn't haf no idea like dot myself," confessed Mr. Switzer. "But if
+dere iss no hart feelings ve vill let comeons be bygones."
+
+"That suits me," laughed the stranger, as he turned aside.
+
+And, as he went away Ruth had a queer feeling that she had seen him
+before and under odd circumstances.
+
+The coasting incident was over, the race had been successfully filmed,
+and the coasters were turning back up the hill, while Russ was
+demounting his camera, for there would be no more scenes taken at
+present.
+
+"Did you notice that man, Alice?" asked Ruth, as she went up the hill
+beside her sister.
+
+"You mean the hunter who looked as though he wanted to shoot some of
+us?"
+
+"Oh, what a way to talk! But that's the one I had reference to. Did you
+notice him particularly?"
+
+"Not very. Why?"
+
+"Do you think you ever saw him before?"
+
+Ruth put the question in such a peculiar way that Alice looked at her
+sharply.
+
+"You don't mean he was one of the men who tried to get Russ's patent; do
+you?"
+
+"No. I can't, for the life of me, though, think where I have seen that
+man before, but I'm sure I have. I thought you might remember."
+
+Alice tried to recall the face, but could not.
+
+"I don't believe I ever saw him before," she said, shaking her head. "He
+might be one of the many actors we have met on our travels, or in going
+around with daddy."
+
+"No, I'm sure he never was an actor," spoke Ruth. "Never mind, perhaps
+it will come to me later."
+
+And all the remainder of the day she tried in vain to recall where she
+had seen that face before.
+
+Mr. Macksey seemed a trifle disturbed when told of the man being on the
+hill with a gun.
+
+"One of those pesky hunters!" he exclaimed. "I've got notices posted all
+over the property of Elk Lodge, but they don't seem to do any good. I
+guess I'll have to get after those fellows and give 'em a piece of my
+mind. I'd like to find out where they are stopping."
+
+The next few days were busy ones for the picture actors, and a number
+of dramas were filmed. In one, two snow forts were built, and the
+company indulged in a snowball battle before the camera.
+
+"And now for something new," said Mr. Pertell one day, as he called the
+company together in the big living room of the lodge, and pointed to
+something piled in one corner. "You'll have to have a few days'
+practice, I think, so I give you fair notice."
+
+"More coasting?" asked Mr. Sneed, suspiciously.
+
+"No--snowshoes, this time," replied the manager. "I am going to have you
+all travel on them in one scene, and as they are rather awkward you had
+better take a few lessons."
+
+"Lessons on snowshoes!" cried Ruth. "Who can give them to us?"
+
+"I have a teacher," said the manager. "Russ, tell Billy Jack to come
+in," and there entered from the porch a tall Indian, dressed in modern
+garb.
+
+Miss Pennington screamed, as did Miss Dixon, but the Indian smiled,
+showing some very fine and white teeth, and said in a gentle voice:
+
+"Don't be alarmed, ladies, I have no scalping knife with me, and I
+assure you that you will soon be able to get about on snowshoes."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+A TIMELY SHOT
+
+
+Surprise, for the moment, made every member of the moving picture
+company silent. That an Indian should speak so correctly was a matter of
+amazement. Mr. Pertell smiled quizzically as he remarked.
+
+"Billy Jack is one of the last of his tribe. He is a full-blooded
+Indian, but he has been to Carlisle, which may account for some things."
+
+"I should say it would," murmured Paul Ardite. "I'm glad I didn't give a
+war whoop!"
+
+"I learned to use snowshoes when I was a boy," went on the Indian, who,
+though roughly dressed was cultured. "I have kept it up ever since," he
+went on. "I have charge of a gang of men getting out some lumber, not
+far from here, and when Mr. Macksey told me there was a company of
+moving picture actors and actresses at Elk Lodge I spoke of the
+snowshoes."
+
+"And when Mr. Macksey told me of it," put in the manager, "I saw at
+once that we could use a scene with some of you folks on the shoes. So I
+arranged with Billy Jack."
+
+"Is that your real name?" asked Alice, who had taken a sudden liking to
+the rugged son of the forest.
+
+"That's one of my real names, strange as it sounds," he answered. "I
+don't much fancy it; but what am I to do?"
+
+"I like it!" the girl announced, promptly. "It's better than being
+Running Bear or something like that."
+
+"I had one of those names--in fact, I have it yet," he said, "but I
+never use it. Flaming Arrow is my real Indian name."
+
+"Flaming Arrow! How romantic!" exclaimed Miss Dixon. "How did you come
+to get that?"
+
+"Oh, when I was a boy an Indian from a neighboring tribe shot an arrow,
+with some burning tow on it, over into our camp, just in a spirit of
+mischief, for we were friendly. I snatched the arrow out of a pile of
+dry bark that it might have set on fire, and so I got my name. I am a
+Western Indian," Billy Jack explained, "but of late I have made my home
+in New England. Now, if you like, I will show you how to use
+snowshoes."
+
+A number of the queer "tennis racquets," as Alice called them, had been
+obtained through the good offices of Billy Jack, he having arranged for
+them in the lumber camp. Snowshoes, as you all know, consist of a thin
+strip of wood, bent around in a curve, and shaped not unlike a lawn
+tennis racquet, except that the handle or heel part is shorter. The
+shoes are laced with thongs, and the feet are placed in the centre of
+the criss-crossed thongs, and held there by other thongs or straps.
+
+The idea of snowshoes is to enable travelers to make their way over deep
+drifts without sinking, the shoes distributing the weight over a larger
+area. They are not easy to use, and the novice is very apt to trip by
+putting one shoe down on top of the other, and then trying to step out.
+
+Billy Jack, or Flaming Arrow, as Ruth and Alice voted to call him, first
+showed the members of the company how to fasten the snowshoes on their
+feet, allowing for the play of the heel. He put a pair on himself,
+first, and stepped out over a stretch of unbroken snow. Instead of
+sinking down, as he would have done under ordinary circumstances, he
+slipped over the surface as lightly as a feather.
+
+"Now, you try," he told Mr. Sneed, who was near him.
+
+"Who, me? Oh, I can't walk on these things," protested the grouchy
+actor.
+
+"Try!" ordered Mr. Pertell. "I have a very important part for you in the
+new play."
+
+"All right, if you say so, I suppose I must. But I know something will
+happen," he sighed.
+
+It did, and within a few seconds after Mr. Sneed started out. He took
+three steps, and then, forgetting that the snowshoes were rather large,
+he tried to walk as though he did not have them on. The result was he
+tripped, and came down head first in a deep drift, and there he
+remained, buried to his shoulders while his feet were up in the air,
+wildly kicking about.
+
+He was probably saying things, but they could not be heard, for his head
+was under the snow.
+
+"Somebody help him out!" cried Mr. Pertell, trying to keep from laughing
+too hard.
+
+In fact everyone was so amused that, for the moment, no one rendered any
+aid to Mr. Sneed. But Flaming Arrow finally went over to him, and
+succeeded in righting him.
+
+"Take--take 'em off!" spluttered the actor, when he could speak. "I am
+through with snowshoes."
+
+He tried to unlace the thongs that bound his feet, but could not manage
+it.
+
+"Better try once more," advised Mr. Pertell. "I really need you in the
+scene, Mr. Sneed, and you will soon learn to get along on the
+snowshoes."
+
+"I never will!" cried the grouch. "Take 'em off, I say!"
+
+But no one would, and finally, after Flaming Arrow had given a few more
+demonstrations, Mr. Sneed consented to try again. This time he did a
+little better, but every once in a while he would trip. He did not again
+dive into a snow bank, however.
+
+Other members of the company had haps and mishaps, and Mr. Bunn stumbled
+about so that he lost his new tall hat in a drift, and he refused to go
+on with the act until the silk tile was dug out.
+
+But finally after two day's practice, the Indian declared that the
+company was sufficiently expert to allow the taking of pictures, and
+Russ began to work the camera.
+
+"Could we come over to your lumber camp some day?" asked Alice of
+Flaming Arrow, when the little drama was over.
+
+"I would be pleased to have you," he replied, with a smile. "There are a
+rough lot of men there, but they are always glad to see
+visitors--especially ladies. It is rather dull and lonesome in the
+backwoods. This has been quite a little vacation for me."
+
+"Then we'll come and see you; won't we Ruth?"
+
+"I don't know, dear. We'll have to ask daddy," responded Ruth, rather
+doubtfully.
+
+"Oh, he'll say yes!" Alice cried. "He likes us to see new sights, and
+I've never been in a lumber camp yet."
+
+"Bring your father along," invited Flaming Arrow. "I think he would be
+interested."
+
+Alice promised and then the Indian took his leave. He promised to come
+another day and bring a pair of skis, those long barrel-stave-like
+affairs, on which experts can slide down a steep hill, and make the most
+astonishing jumps.
+
+It was a few days after the snowshoe film had been made that Mr. Pertell
+decided on getting some scenes farther back in the woods than he had yet
+gone for views. Ruth and Alice, with Paul and Mr. Switzer, were alone
+needed for those particular acts, and as there was a good road part way
+it was decided to go as near as possible in a sled, and use snowshoes
+for the rest of the trip, since there had been quite a fall.
+
+Mr. Pertell went along to see that the proper posing and acting was
+carried out, and when he reached the place he had Ruth and Alice go on
+alone into the woods, Russ filming them as they advanced. Later Paul and
+Mr. Switzer were to come into the picture.
+
+"That's about right," said the manager when Ruth and Alice were in a
+dense thicket. They were attired as the daughters of lumbermen, and this
+particular scene was one in a drama to be called "The Fall of a Tree."
+
+"Begin now," ordered Mr. Pertell, and Ruth and Alice started the
+"business," or acting, called for. Russ was grinding away at the crank
+of the camera.
+
+Everything went off well and that part of the play came to an end. For
+the next act another background was to be selected, and Russ went to it
+with his camera, leaving Ruth and Alice standing together in the
+thicket.
+
+"We have to wait a few minutes, while Paul and Mr. Switzer go through
+their parts," said Ruth. "Then we'll go over."
+
+"All right," Alice said. "Oh, but isn't it perfectly heavenly out here?
+I just love it at Elk Lodge!"
+
+"So do I, dear! Hark! What was that?"
+
+A sound came from the bushes behind them--a growling, menacing sound,
+and as they heard it the girls drew together in fright.
+
+"It--it's some animal!" gasped Ruth. "Oh, Alice!"
+
+"Look. There it is! It's going to spring at us!" cried the younger girl
+and with trembling finger she pointed to a crouching beast not far away.
+Its eyes gleamed balefully, and with sharp switchings of its tail it
+glared at the girls, ready to spring.
+
+The moving picture girls were faint with fear, and too frightened to
+shout for help. But suddenly a voice behind them called:
+
+"Don't be afraid! Stand still. I'm going to shoot!"
+
+The next moment a shot rang out. The beast quivered and then whirled in
+its death struggle, while strong arms reached through the floating
+powder smoke, and pulled Ruth and Alice back, and out of danger.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+IN THE CAVE
+
+
+The animal, in its death struggle, bit and clawed at the snow and bushes
+about it, and actually came almost to the feet of the shrinking girls;
+but they were safe from harm, for the shot had come just in time.
+
+"I guess I'll have to give him another bullet," said the man who had
+ended the career of the beast. "I'll put it out of its misery," and he
+did so. The shot, so close at hand, caused Ruth and Alice to jump
+nervously, and then, for the first time, as the beast stretched out, and
+lay still, they took a look at their rescuer.
+
+"Why it's Flaming Arrow!" exclaimed Alice, in delight.
+
+"At your service!" he laughed. "I am glad I happened to be near here."
+
+"So are we!" exclaimed Ruth, with a nervous laugh. "What sort of a beast
+is that--a young bear?"
+
+"No, it's a wildcat, and a mean sort of animal, once it attacks you.
+This one must have felt that it was cornered, for they are not usually
+so bold. It's a big one, though, and the pelt will make a fine rug for
+your room. May I have the pleasure of sending it to you?" he asked.
+
+"Oh, can you make it into a rug?" asked Alice.
+
+"Yes, I know something of curing, and I have the materials at my shack
+in the lumber camp. I'll make a rug for you, only I'm afraid it isn't
+big enough for two," he said, ruefully.
+
+"Oh, Alice may have it!" exclaimed Ruth, generously.
+
+"Then I'll get another for you," offered Flaming Arrow. "They usually
+travel in pairs, and the mate of this one is sure to be around
+somewhere. I'll get him."
+
+Later the Indian did get another wildcat, whether or not the mate of the
+first one he shot could not be determined; but, at any rate, Ruth and
+Alice each received a handsome fur rug for their room.
+
+The sound of the shots brought up the others of the moving picture
+company, and Paul turned rather pale when he realized the danger Alice
+had been in.
+
+"Why didn't you call for help?" he asked.
+
+"We didn't need to. Flaming Arrow was right on the spot when he was
+needed," replied Alice.
+
+"I happened to be out on a little hunting trip," the Indian explained,
+"and I saw the wildcat sneak in this thicket. I did not see the girls,
+though, until just as it was about to jump on them. Then I fired."
+
+"And just in time, too," declared Ruth. "Oh, if that beast had ever
+jumped on me I don't know what I'd have done!"
+
+"They're pretty bad scratchers," said Flaming Arrow. "I was clawed by
+one once, and I carry the scars yet."
+
+"Will you be able to go on with the play?" asked Mr. Pertell of the
+girls, when he had heard the story.
+
+"Oh, yes," returned Alice. "My nerves are all right now. We are getting
+used to such experiences," she laughed.
+
+"I am all right too," Ruth agreed. "But it was a trying moment."
+
+Flaming Arrow stood to one side and looked on interestedly while the
+remainder of the drama was being filmed, and then he showed the players
+the road to his lumber camp. He invited them to come over to it, but as
+the hour was late and as Mr. Pertell wanted to get a few more scenes in
+a different locality, it was decided to defer the visit to some other
+time.
+
+Flaming Arrow said good-bye, and went off with the dead wild cat slung
+over his shoulder.
+
+"Isn't he just fine!" exclaimed Alice, as she watched him stalking over
+the drifts on his snowshoes.
+
+"I'm getting jealous!" laughed Paul, and there was more of meaning in
+his remark than his outward manner indicated.
+
+"Well, I do like him!" Alice went on. "He is so big and strong and
+manly. And he can shoot straight!"
+
+"Hereafter I'll bring along a gun every time we come out," vowed Paul.
+"And I'm going to take shooting lessons."
+
+"Yah! Dot vould be a goot t'ing," decided Mr. Switzer. "I gets me too a
+gun!"
+
+"Gracious! The game around here had better seek new quarters!" laughed
+Alice. "Next we'll be having Mr. Bunn and Mr. Sneed taking up the
+calling of Nimrod."
+
+Mr. DeVere was rather disturbed when he heard the story of the wildcat,
+and once more he spoke seriously of taking his daughters out of moving
+picture work.
+
+"I really am afraid something will happen to you," he said. "I think you
+had better resign. I can earn enough for all of us now, for Mr. Pertell
+has given me another advance in salary."
+
+"Oh, Daddy! We simply couldn't give it up!" cried Alice. "Could we,
+Ruth?"
+
+"I wouldn't like to give it up," responded Ruth, quietly. She was always
+less demonstrative than her sister. "And really, Daddy, we don't run
+into danger."
+
+"I know, my dear, but danger seems to have formed a habit, of late, of
+seeking you out," said the actor. "However, we will wait a few days. I
+suppose it would be too bad to disappoint Mr. Pertell now."
+
+The next day, owing to a slight indisposition on the part of Miss
+Pennington, a drama that included her as one of the cast had to be
+postponed, and as no other was ready to be filmed, the players had a
+little holiday.
+
+"Who wants to come for a trip to the ice cave?" asked Russ, when he
+found that he would not have to use his camera.
+
+"What's the ice cave?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Why, it's a cave made out of ice. There's one about two miles from
+here, and Mr. Pertell is thinking of having some scenes made there. I'm
+to go out and size up the situation. Want to come?"
+
+"It sounds interesting," observed Ruth. "I believe I would like to go.
+Shall we, Alice?"
+
+"Indeed, yes."
+
+"Count me in!" cried Paul.
+
+So a little later the four young people set off for the ice cave. This
+was a natural curiosity not far from Elk Lodge. Every year, at a
+waterfall in a local stream, the ice piled up in fantastic shapes. The
+flow of the water, and the effect of the wind, made a large hollow or
+cave at the cascade large enough to hold several persons. Mr. Pertell
+had heard of it and had laid one scene of a drama there.
+
+There was a fairly good road almost to the ice cave, and then came a
+trip across an unbroken expanse of snow, the snowshoes being used, they
+having been carried strapped to the backs of the four.
+
+"Oh, how beautiful!"
+
+"See how the sun sparkles on the ice."
+
+"And what big icicles!"
+
+"Oh, if we could only keep that until Summer!"
+
+Thus the young people cried as they saw the beautiful ice cave. It was
+indeed a pretty sight. Nature, unaided, had done more than man could
+ever hope to achieve.
+
+"Let's go inside," suggested Russ.
+
+"Will it be safe?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Oh, surely. Why, we have to go in it when we make the moving picture,
+so we might as well get used to it. They say this ice lasts nearly all
+summer. It's down in a deep hollow, you see. Come on in."
+
+"Go ahead! I'm game!" Paul said, grimly.
+
+The girls hesitated, but only for a moment. Then they followed the young
+men into the cavern.
+
+The entrance was rather small, and they had to stoop to get through it,
+but once inside the cave widened out until there was room for perhaps a
+dozen persons.
+
+"What a lovely place for a dance!" cried Alice, as she slid about. "It's
+so slippery that you'd need those new slippers with rubber set in the
+sole. Come, on, try a hesitation waltz," she cried gaily to Ruth.
+
+Paul whistled one of the latest popular airs, and Ruth and Alice slid
+about.
+
+"Come on!" cried Paul to Russ. "I'm getting the craze, too."
+
+The two young men danced together a moment, and then came an
+interruption that caused them all to look at one another.
+
+There was a grinding, crashing sound outside, and the next moment the
+entrance to the cave was darkened.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+THE RESCUE
+
+
+"What happened?"
+
+"There must have been an ice slide!"
+
+It was Alice who asked the question, and Paul who answered it. Standing
+in the darkened ice cave, through the walls of which, however, some
+light filtered, the four looked anxiously at one another.
+
+"It was the dancing that did it," declared Ruth, in a low voice. "It
+loosened the ice and it slid down."
+
+"Perhaps not," said Paul, not wanting Alice blamed, for she had proposed
+the light-footed stepping about on the slippery floor of the cavern. "It
+might have slid down itself."
+
+"Well, let's see what the situation is," proposed Russ. "We can't stay
+in here too long, for it's freezing cold."
+
+"Yes, let's see if we can get out," added Paul.
+
+"See if we _can_ get out!" repeated Ruth. "Why, is there any danger that
+we can not?"
+
+"Every danger in the world, I should say," spoke Russ, and there was a
+worried note in his voice. "I don't want to alarm you," he went on, "but
+the fact is that we are shut up in this ice cave."
+
+"Oh, don't say that!" cried Ruth.
+
+"Why shouldn't he--if it's true?" asked Alice. "Let's face the
+situation, whatever it is. Russ, will you see just how bad it is?"
+
+Without speaking, the young moving picture operator went to the hole
+through which they had stooped to enter the cavern. In a moment he came
+back.
+
+"It's closed tighter than a drum," he announced. "A lot of ice slid down
+from above and closed the entrance to the cave as if a door had been
+shoved across it. We can't get out!"
+
+For a moment no one spoke, and then Paul asked, quietly:
+
+"What are we going to do?"
+
+"Have you a knife?" asked Russ.
+
+"A knife? Yes, but what good is that?"
+
+"We've got to cut our way out--that's all."
+
+Ruth and Alice looked at each other. They began to understand what it
+meant.
+
+"Someone from Elk Lodge may come for us--if we don't get back,"
+murmured the younger girl, in what was almost a whisper.
+
+"Yes, they may, but it's dangerous to wait," said Paul. "It is cold in
+here, and it isn't getting any warmer. It's like being locked in a
+refrigerator. We've got to keep in motion or we'll freeze."
+
+"Then let's tackle that block of ice at the entrance," suggested Russ.
+"Get out your knife and we'll see if we can't cut a hole large enough to
+crawl through."
+
+If you have tried to cut with a pocket knife even the small piece of ice
+which you get in your refrigerator, you can appreciate the task that
+confronted the two young men. A solid block of ice had slid down from
+some higher point, and had blocked the opening to the odd cavern. But
+the two were not daunted. They realized the necessity of getting out,
+and that within a short time. Though they were all warmly dressed, the
+air of the cavern was chilly, to say the least.
+
+"Keep moving, girls!" called Russ to Ruth and Alice, as he and Paul
+chipped away at the ice. "This exercise will keep us warm; but you need
+to do something to keep your blood in circulation. Here, take my coat!"
+he called, as he arose from his knees, and tossed the garment to Ruth.
+
+"I shall do nothing of the sort!" she answered, promptly. "You need it
+yourself."
+
+"No, I don't," he replied, earnestly. "It only bothers me when I try to
+cut the ice. Please take it."
+
+"But I can't get it on over my cloak."
+
+"Yes, you can. Put it around your shoulders. I'll show you how." And he
+did it quickly, wrapping it warmly around her.
+
+"Here, Alice, you take mine!" cried Paul, as he saw what his companion
+had done. "You need it more than I do, and I can't get at that ice with
+a big coat like this on."
+
+In spite of her protests he put it about her, and the added warmth of
+the garments was comforting to the girls.
+
+The boys, really, were better off without them, for they had much
+vigorous work before them, and in the narrow quarters the heavy coats
+only hampered them.
+
+For it was an exceedingly narrow space in which they had to work. The
+fall of the mass of ice had crushed part of the opening into the cave,
+so that Russ and Paul had to crouch down and stoop in a most
+uncomfortable position in order to reach the block that had closed the
+doorway.
+
+With their knives they hacked away at the frozen mass, sending the
+chips flying. Much of it went in their faces and soon their cheeks were
+glowing from the icy spray of splinters. Then, too, they had to stop
+every now and then to clear away the accumulated ice crystals that fell
+before the attack of their knives.
+
+"Keep moving, girls," Paul urged Ruth and Alice. "Keep circling around
+or you'll surely freeze."
+
+"Let's dance," suggested Alice.
+
+"Oh, how can you think of such a thing!" cried Ruth, "when it was that
+which caused all the trouble."
+
+"I'm not going to believe that!" declared Alice, firmly. "And it isn't
+such a terrible thing to think of, at all. It will keep us warm, and
+keep up our spirits."
+
+And then she broke into a little one-step dance, whistling her own
+accompaniment. Surely it was a strange proceeding, and yet it came
+natural to Alice. The young men, too, took heart at her manner of
+accepting the situation, and chopped away harder than ever at the ice
+barrier.
+
+"Think we'll make it?" asked Paul of Russ, in a low voice, when they had
+been working for some time.
+
+"We've got to make it," answered the other. "We've just got to get the
+girls out."
+
+"Of course," was the brief reply, as if that was all there was to it.
+
+And yet, in their hearts, Russ and Paul felt a nameless fear. Ice, which
+melts so easily under the warm and gentle influence of the sun, is
+exceedingly hard when it is maintained at a low temperature, and truly
+it was sufficiently cold in the cave.
+
+Now and then the boys stopped to clear away the accumulation of ice
+splinters, and to note how they were progressing. Yet they could hardly
+tell, for they did not know how thick was the chunk of ice that covered
+the cave opening. The edges of the opening itself were several feet in
+thickness, and if this hole was completely filled it would mean many
+hours of work with the pitifully inadequate tools at their disposal.
+
+"How are we coming on?" asked Paul.
+
+Russ looked back at the girls who, in one corner of the cave, were
+pacing up and down to drive away the deadly cold.
+
+"Not very well," he returned, in a low voice. "Don't talk--let's work."
+
+He did not like to think of what might happen.
+
+Desperately they labored, eating their way into the heart of the ice.
+The splinters fell on their warm bodies, for they were perspiring now,
+and there the frosty particles melted, wetting their garments through.
+
+Suddenly Paul uttered a cry as he dug his knife savagely into the
+barrier.
+
+"What's the matter--cut yourself?" asked Russ.
+
+"No," was the low-voiced reply. "But I've broken the big blade of my
+knife. Now I'll have to use the smaller one."
+
+It was a serious thing, for it meant a big decrease in the amount of ice
+Paul could chop. But opening the small blade of the knife he kept
+doggedly at the task.
+
+It was growing darker now. They could observe this through the
+translucent walls of the cave.
+
+"Do you think they will come for us?" asked Ruth, in a low tone.
+
+"Oh, yes, of course. If we don't get back by dark," responded Russ, as
+cheerfully as he could. "But we'll be out before then. Come on, Paul.
+Dig away!"
+
+But it was very evident that they would not be out before dark. The ice
+block was thicker than Russ and Paul imagined.
+
+"Please rest!" begged Alice, after a period of hard work by the two
+young men. "Please take a rest!"
+
+"Can't afford a vacation," returned Russ, grimly.
+
+But when he did halt for a moment, to get his breath, there came from
+outside the cave a sound that sent all their hearts to beating joyfully
+for it was the voice of some calling:
+
+"Where are you? Where are you? Alice! Ruth!"
+
+"Oh, it's daddy!" cried the girls together, and then Russ took up the
+refrain, shouting:
+
+"We're in the cave! Get axes and chop us out! We've only got our
+knives!"
+
+"We'll be with you in a moment!" said another voice, which they
+recognized as that of Mr. Macksey. "We'll have to go for a couple of
+axes!"
+
+And then, as the hunter started back to Elk Lodge, Mr. DeVere, who
+remained outside the ice cave, explained through a crevice in the ice
+wall that made conversation possible how, becoming uneasy at the failure
+of his daughters to return, he had set out, in company with Mr. Macksey
+to look for them.
+
+In their turn Ruth and Alice, with occasional words from Russ and Paul,
+told how they had become imprisoned.
+
+"Are you hurt?" asked Mr. DeVere, anxiously.
+
+"Not a bit of it, but we're awfully cold, Daddy," replied Alice.
+
+"We must give the boys back their coats," said Ruth to her sister in a
+low tone. "They are not chopping now, and they'll freeze."
+
+Russ and Paul did not want to accept their garments, but the girls were
+insistent, and made them don the heavy coats. Then the four walked
+rapidly around the cave to keep their blood in circulation.
+
+"I wish Mr. Pertell would come and bring the camera," said Russ. "He
+could get a good moving picture of the rescue."
+
+"Maybe he will," suggested Paul.
+
+There was a little silence, and then Mr. DeVere called, from outside the
+cave;
+
+"Here they come! Now you will soon be rescued! There's help enough to
+chop away the whole cave!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+SNOWBOUND
+
+
+Alice and Ruth fairly flew together, holding their arms tightly about
+one another in the excess of their emotion, as they heard this joyful
+news shouted to them by their father.
+
+Ruth cried on her sister's shoulder. She could not help it. Perhaps
+Alice felt like crying, too, so great was the relief; but she was of a
+different temperament. She laughed hysterically.
+
+"Is Mr. Pertell there?" called Russ, getting down close to the hole he
+and Paul had made in the ice barrier to enable his voice to carry
+better. "Is he there, Mr. DeVere?"
+
+"Yes, he's there, and I guess the whole company."
+
+"Has he the camera?"
+
+"That's what he has, Russ."
+
+"Good! Tell him to get a moving picture of the rescue. We can fix up a
+story to go with it."
+
+"I will, Russ!" exclaimed the actor.
+
+Then, as those within the ice cave waited, they faintly heard other
+voices outside, and a little later the sound of axes vigorously applied
+told that the ice which had imprisoned them was being chopped away.
+
+Fast and furiously the rescuers worked. The ice flew about in a
+sparkling spray as the keen weapons bit deep into it, and the hole grew
+larger and larger.
+
+Meanwhile Mr. Pertell was operating the moving picture camera, getting
+view after view of the rescue. There were enough helpers so that his aid
+was not needed in chopping the ice.
+
+"There she goes!" cried Mr. Macksey, as his axe went through an opening
+and into the cave. "I've made the hole!" and he capered about like a
+boy, so delighted was he that he had been the first to bring aid to the
+imprisoned ones.
+
+"Oh, now we can get out!" cried Ruth, as she saw the head of the axe
+come through.
+
+"As if there had ever been any doubt of it," laughed Alice. She could
+laugh now, but even with all her gay spirits, there had been a time, not
+many minutes back, when it was quite a different story.
+
+The hole once made, was soon enlarged, and then, when it was of
+sufficient size to enable a person to crawl through, Russ shouted to
+the rescuers;
+
+"That'll do! Don't chop any more! We can wriggle out."
+
+"Surely, yes," agreed Ruth, as the young moving picture operator looked
+to her for confirmation. "I'm not a bit fussy," she added. "I've done
+harder things than crawl on my hands and knees out of an ice cave."
+
+"Don't chop any more!" called Paul, for Russ was leading Ruth to the
+opening.
+
+"Come ahead!" called Mr. DeVere, and a moment later he was holding his
+daughter in his arms. Alice soon followed, and she too was clasped
+tightly.
+
+"Hurray!" cried Mr. Switzer, as Russ and Paul emerged from their strange
+prison. "Dis is der best sight vot I have yet had in more as a month.
+Half a pretzel!" he exclaimed, holding out one of the queer, twisted
+things. He was never without them since the sled breakdown. He said they
+were his mascots.
+
+There was a scene of rejoicing, and even the gloomy Mr. Sneed
+condescended to smile, and looked almost happy.
+
+"There, I guess we can use this film in some sort of a play, if I have
+to write it myself!" exclaimed Mr. Pertell, as he finished grinding
+away at the camera crank. "I can call it 'Caught in The Ice,' or
+something like that," he went on, "We can make some preliminary scenes,
+and some others to follow, and get quite a play out of it."
+
+"I'm glad you thought to bring the camera," said Russ. Even in the
+stress of what had happened to him and his companions, his instinct as a
+moving picture operator was ever foremost.
+
+"We had better get them to Elk Lodge, and feed them upon something
+warm," suggested Mr. Macksey. "I told the wife to have a good meal
+ready, for I knew they would be chilled through."
+
+"It _was_ pretty cold in there," confessed Alice.
+
+"Oh, don't let's talk about it!" cried Ruth. "It was too terrible."
+
+An examination of the exterior of the ice cave showed that just what the
+young men surmised had taken place. A large chunk of ice had slid down
+from above, and had jammed against the opening to the cavern.
+
+Back at Elk Lodge, with warm garments on, the four who had passed
+through such a trying experience soon forgot their troubles. They had to
+tell all over again just what had happened, and the young men were
+considered quite the heroes of the hour.
+
+The next day none of the four was any the worse for the experience, save
+in the matter of a nightmare memory, and that would gradually pass away.
+
+Feeling that the two girls were not capable of doing any hard work in
+posing for the camera that day, Mr. Pertell announced another vacation,
+save that Russ was engaged in making some scenes of snow and ice
+effects.
+
+Late in the afternoon, when the shadows were lengthening, and the long
+winter evening was about to close in, Alice, who was out on the side
+porch, saw Mr. Macksey coming in from the barn. The hunter had an
+anxious look on his face, and as he walked toward the house he cast
+looks up at the sky now and then. And Alice heard him murmur:
+
+"I don't like this! I don't for a cent, by hickory!"
+
+"What's the matter now?" she asked, merrily. "Have you seen some of
+those strange men about again, hunting on your preserves?"
+
+"No, Miss Alice. Not this time," he replied, slowly.
+
+"What is it then?"
+
+"Well, to tell you the truth, I don't like the looks of the weather."
+
+"Do you think we're going to have another blizzard?" and there was a
+note of alarm in her voice.
+
+"I'm thinking that's what's coming," he made answer. "I never knew the
+weather to act just this way before except once, and then we had the
+worst storm I ever remember. That was when I was a boy, and more snow
+fell in that one storm than in any three winters put together."
+
+"Gracious! I hope that won't happen now!" cried the girl.
+
+"So do I," went on the hunter. "And I'm going to take all precautions.
+I'll get the men, and we'll pile the fodder in the barn so if we can't
+get out to feed the stock they won't starve for a week, anyhow."
+
+"Does it ever happen that you can't get out to the barns?" Alice wanted
+to know.
+
+"Indeed it does, young lady. When there is a heavy fall of snow, and the
+wind blows hard, it drifts almost as high as the house. Yes, I think
+we're in for a storm, and I'm going to get ready for it. Best to be on
+the safe side."
+
+A little later he and a number of his hired men, as well as some of the
+picture players, were engaged in looking after the horses and cows.
+Great piles of hay and grain were moved from the barns where the fodder
+was kept in reserve, to the buildings where the stock were stabled.
+
+"How about our rations?" asked Mr. Bunn, who was not of much help in
+work of this sort. "Have we enough to last through a storm?"
+
+"Well, we've got some," Mr. Macksey admitted. "But I own I would like a
+little better stock in the Lodge. I counted on some supplies coming in
+to-day; but they haven't arrived. We'll have to do the best we can."
+
+"What is all the excitement about, Alice?" asked Ruth as she came out to
+join her sister on the porch.
+
+"A big storm coming, Mr. Macksey says. They're getting ready for it. I
+want to see it!"
+
+"Oh, Alice. Suppose it should be a blizzard!"
+
+"Well, I want to see it anyhow. If it's going to come I can't stop it;
+but I can enjoy it," Alice remarked in her characteristically
+philosophical way.
+
+There was a curious humming in the air, as though someone, a great way
+off, were moaning in pain. It did not seem to be the wind, and yet it
+was like the sigh of a breeze. But the gaunt-limbed trees did not bow
+before this strange blast.
+
+The air, too, had a bite and tingle to it as though it were filled with
+invisible particles of ice. The clouds were lowering, and as the
+afternoon wore away there sprang up in the west a black band of vapor,
+almost like ink.
+
+Alice induced Ruth to pay a visit to the barn, to watch the preparations
+for providing for the stock. Even the animals seemed uneasy, as though
+they sensed some impending disaster. The horses, always nervous, were
+doubly so, and moved restlessly about, with pricked-up ears, and
+startled neighs. The cows, too, lowed plaintively.
+
+"Well, we've done all we can," announced Mr. Macksey, as night came on.
+"Now all we can do is to wait. There's plenty of fuel in the cellar, and
+we'll not freeze, at any rate."
+
+There was a sense of gloom over all, as they sat in the big living room
+of Elk Lodge that night, and looked at the blazing logs. Everyone
+listened apprehensively, as though to hear the first message of the
+impending storm.
+
+The sighing of the wind, if wind it was that made that curious sound,
+was more pronounced now, and as the blast came down the chimney it
+scattered ashes and embers about, and at times rose to an uncanny wail.
+
+"Oh, but that gives me the shivers!" exclaimed Miss Pennington, tossing
+aside the novel in which she had tried to become interested. "This is
+positively awful! I wish I were back in New York."
+
+"So do I!" added her chum.
+
+"Oh, but a good snow storm is glorious!" cried Alice. "I am just wild to
+see it."
+
+"That's right," exclaimed her father, with a smile. "Take a cheerful
+view of it, anyhow."
+
+Some one proposed a guessing game, and with that under way the spirits
+of all revived somewhat. Then came another simple game, and the time
+passed pleasantly.
+
+Mr. Macksey, coming back from a trip to the side door, startled them all
+by announcing:
+
+"She's here!"
+
+"Who?" asked his wife, looking up from her sewing.
+
+"The storm! It's snowing like cotton batting!"
+
+Alice rushed to the window. She shaded her eyes with her hands at the
+side of her head and peered out. It seemed as though the lamplights
+shone on a solid wall of white, so thickly was the snow falling.
+
+The wind had now risen to a blast of hurricane-like velocity and it
+fairly shook Elk Lodge, low and substantial as the house was.
+
+By ones and twos the picture players went to their rooms, and soon
+silence and darkness settled down over the Lodge. That is, silence
+within the house, but outside there was the riot of the storm.
+
+Two or three times during the night Alice awakened and, going to the
+window, looked out. She could make out a dim whiteness, but that was
+all. Around the window there was a little drift of snow on the sill,
+where it had been blown through a crack.
+
+And in the morning they were snowbound. So heavy was the fall of snow,
+and so high had it drifted, that some of the lower windows were
+completely covered, from the ground up. And before each door was such a
+drift that it would be necessary to tunnel if they were to get out.
+
+"The worst storm I ever see!" declared Mr. Macksey, as he closed the
+door against the blast. "It would be death to go out in it now. We are
+snowbound, by hickory!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+ON SHORT RATIONS
+
+
+Apprehensive as all had been of the coming of the big storm, and fully
+warned by the hunter, none of the picture players was quite prepared for
+what they saw--or, rather, for what they could not see. For not a window
+on the lower floor of the Lodge but was blocked by a bank of snow, so
+that only the tops of the upper panes were clear of it. And through
+those bits of glass all that could be seen was a whirling, swirling
+mass, for the white flakes were still falling.
+
+Not an outer door of the house but was blocked by a drift, and it was
+useless to open the portals at present, as the snow fell into the room.
+
+"But what are we to do?" asked Mr. Pertell, when the situation had been
+made plain to him. "We can't take any moving pictures; can we?"
+
+"Not in this storm," Mr. Macksey declared. "It would be as much as your
+life is worth to go out. It is bitter cold and the wind cuts like a
+knife!"
+
+"I wish I could get some views," spoke Russ. "It would give New York
+audiences something to talk about, to see moving pictures of a storm
+like this."
+
+"You might go up in the cupola on the roof," suggested Mr. Macksey. "You
+could stand your camera up there and possibly get some views."
+
+"I'll do it!" cried Russ.
+
+"And may I come?" asked Alice, always ready for an adventure of that
+sort.
+
+"Come along!" he cried, gaily.
+
+The cupola was more for ornament than use, but it was large enough for
+the purpose of Russ. After breakfast he took his moving picture camera
+up there, and managed through the windows, to get some fairly good
+pictures. The trouble was, however, that the snow was falling so thickly
+that it obscured the view. At times there would come a lull in the
+storm, and then Russ was able to get scenes showing the great black
+woods, and the white banks of snow.
+
+"Oh, but it's cold work!" he cried, as he stopped to warm his hands, for
+the little room on the roof was draughty, and the snow blew in.
+
+"It's a wonderful storm," cried Alice. "I wouldn't have missed it for
+worlds!"
+
+All that day the storm raged, and all that night. There was nothing
+which could be done out of doors, and so the players and the men of the
+Lodge were forced to remain within. Great fires were kept up, for the
+temperature was very low.
+
+The wise forethought of Mr. Macksey in providing for the stock prevented
+the animals from starving, as they would have done had not a supply of
+fodder been left for them. For it was out of the question to get to the
+barns.
+
+After two days the storm ceased, the skies cleared and the sun shone.
+But on what a totally different scene than before the coming of the
+great blizzard!
+
+There had been plenty of snow in Deerfield before, but now there was so
+much that one old man, who worked for Mr. Macksey, said he never
+recalled the like, and he had seen many bad storms.
+
+"Well, now to tunnel out!" exclaimed Mr. Macksey when it had been
+ascertained, by an observation from the cupola, that the fall of snow
+was over. "We'll see if we can't raise the embargo."
+
+But it was no easy matter. All the doors were blocked by drifts, and in
+making a tunnel through snow it is just as necessary to have some place
+to put the removed material as it is in tunneling through the side of a
+hill.
+
+"We can't start in and dig from the door, for we'd have to pile the snow
+in the room back of us," said the hunter. "So the only other plan is to
+get outside, somehow, and work up to the house, tossing the snow to one
+side. I may have to dig a trench instead of a tunnel. I'll soon find
+out."
+
+Finally it was decided that the men should go to the second story, out
+on a balcony that opened from Mr. DeVere's room, and get down into the
+snow that way. They would use snowshoes so as to have some support, and
+thus they could attack the drifts.
+
+This plan was followed. Fortunately Mr. Macksey had thought to bring in
+snow shovels before the storm came, and with these the men attacked the
+big white piles.
+
+It was hard work, but they labored with a will, and there were enough of
+them to make an effective attack. Mr. Macksey, in spite of the fact that
+he had food and water for his stock, was anxious to see how the animals
+were doing. So he directed that first paths, tunnels or trenches be made
+to the various barns.
+
+In some places, around the lee of a building, the ground was bare of
+snow, and in other places the drifts were fully fifteen feet high.
+
+Russ, who had not gone out to shovel snow, was observed to be nailing
+some light broad boards together in a peculiar way.
+
+"What are you making?" Ruth asked him.
+
+"Snowshoes for my camera," was his surprising answer.
+
+"Snowshoes for your camera?"
+
+"Yes, I want to get out and take some views, but I can't stand the thin
+legs of the camera on the snow. They'd pierce through it. So I'm going
+to put a broad board under each leg, and that will hold the machine up
+as well as snowshoes hold me."
+
+"What a clever idea!" she cried. "I'm going to watch you. What sort of
+views do you expect to get?"
+
+"Some showing the men digging us out. We can get up a film story and
+call it 'Prisoners of the Snow,' or something like that."
+
+"Fine!" cried Alice. "I'm coming out, too."
+
+She and Ruth got their snowshoes, and by this time the men had a deep
+trench up to the front door, so that it was not necessary for the girls
+to go out by the way of the balcony. They were delighted with the
+strange scene, and Russ obtained many fine pictures of the men laboring
+in the snow.
+
+It was hard work to tunnel and trench out to the barn where the animals
+were, but finally it was done. They were found to be all right with two
+exceptions. A horse had died from getting into the oat bin and eating
+too much, and a cow was frozen, having gotten away from the rest, and
+broken into a small outbuilding.
+
+But the rest of the stock was in good condition, and, as Alice said,
+they seemed almost human, neighing or lowing at the sight of the men.
+
+"I believe they were actually lonesome," said Alice.
+
+"Indeed, animals do get that way!" declared Mr. Macksey.
+
+As the snow was so deep, no dramas could be filmed in it, so Mr. Pertell
+and his players were enjoying enforced idleness. The time was spent,
+however, in learning new parts, in readiness for the time when some of
+the snow should have melted.
+
+Many more paths, tunnels and trenches were made, but it was impossible
+to go more than a short distance from Elk Lodge, even on snowshoes.
+Later, when the snow had packed more, and a crust had been formed, it
+was planned to take many pictures of various happenings in the great
+piles of white crystals.
+
+Three days after the storm saw little change in the appearance of the
+country and landscape about the hunting lodge. It was snow, snow, snow
+everywhere--on all sides. Within the house it was warm and cozy, and for
+months afterward it was a pleasant recollection to talk of the hours
+spent about the great fire in the living room.
+
+But in spite of the fact that his animals were safe, except for the two
+that had died, Mr. Macksey seemed worried. Several times he paid a visit
+to the cellar, or the store room, where the provisions were kept, and
+more than once the girls heard him murmuring to himself.
+
+"What is the trouble?" Alice asked him once, as he came up from a trip
+to the cellar.
+
+"Well, I'm afraid you folks will have to go on short rations if the
+supplies don't come in soon from the store," he replied. "I've got
+plenty of meat on hand, but other things are somewhat scarce."
+
+"Then we won't starve?" she asked.
+
+"Well, maybe not actually starve, but you may be hungry for certain
+things."
+
+"Oh, I'm not fussy!" Alice laughed. "I can eat anything."
+
+The storm was so severe and so wide-spread, that, in about a week, there
+was an actual shortage of provisions at Elk Lodge. The meals had to be
+curtailed in regard to certain dishes, and there were loud complaints
+from Mr. Bunn and Mr. Sneed, as well as from Miss Pennington and Miss
+Dixon. But the others made the best of it.
+
+"I wish I had never come to this horrid place!" exclaimed Miss
+Pennington, when her request for a fancy dish had to be denied.
+
+"You may go back to New York any time you wish," observed Mr. Pertell,
+with a grim humor, as he looked out on the great piles of snow. It would
+have been impossible to get half-way to the station.
+
+Miss Pennington "sniffed" and said nothing.
+
+But there was no actual suffering at Elk Lodge. Before it got to that
+point Mr. Macksey hitched up six horses to a big sled and made his way
+into town. He brought back enough provisions for a small company of
+soldiers.
+
+"Now let it 'bliz' if it wants to!" he cried, as he and his men stocked
+up the storeroom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+THE THAW
+
+
+"Now for some hard work," said Mr. Pertell one day, about ten days after
+the big storm. "I think we can safely go out, and make some of the
+scenes in the play 'Snowbound,'" he went on. "There will not be much
+danger that we will be caught in another blizzard; will there?" he asked
+of Mr. Macksey.
+
+"I should hope not!" was the answer. "I don't believe there is any snow
+left in the clouds. Still, don't take too many chances. Don't go more
+than ten miles away."
+
+"Oh, I wasn't thinking of going half that distance!" said Mr. Pertell.
+"I just want to get a scene or two at some place where the snow is piled
+in fantastic forms. The rest of the story takes place around the Lodge
+here."
+
+"Is it the one that is something like the story of Lorna Doone?" asked
+Alice, who had been reading that book.
+
+"That's the one," said Mr. Pertell. "And I think I shall cast you as
+Lorna."
+
+"Oh, how nice!" she laughed. "But who will be John Ridd? We need a great
+big man for him!"
+
+"Well, I was thinking of using Mr. Macksey," went on the manager, with a
+look at the hunter.
+
+"What? Me have my photograph took in moving pictures!" cried the keeper
+of the Lodge. "Why, I don't know how to act!"
+
+"You know how a great deal better than some that are in the business,"
+returned Mr. Pertell, coolly. "Present company always excepted," he
+added, as Mr. Bunn looked up with an injured air. "What I mean is that
+you are so natural," he continued. "In fact, you have had your pictures
+taken a number of times lately, when you and your men were clearing away
+the snow. So you see it will be no novelty for you."
+
+"But I didn't know when you took my pictures!" objected the hunter.
+
+"No, and that's just the point. Don't think of the camera at all. Be
+unconscious of it. I'll arrange to have it masked, or hidden, if you
+think you can do better that way. But I have some scenes calling for a
+big man battling in the snow to save a girl, and you and Miss Alice are
+the proper characters. So I hope you won't disappoint me."
+
+"I'll do my best," promised Mr. Macksey. "But I'm not used to that sort
+of work."
+
+However, when the preliminary scenes for the big drama were filmed he
+did some excellent acting, the more so as he was totally unconscious
+that he was acting.
+
+Several days were spent in making films of the play, for Mr. Pertell
+wanted to take advantage of the snow.
+
+"It won't last a great while longer," remarked the hunter. "It's getting
+warm, and there'll be a thaw, soon."
+
+He proved to be a true weather prophet for in two weeks there was
+scarcely a vestige of the snow left. It grew warm, and rained, and there
+was so much water about, from the rain and melting snow, that it was
+nearly as difficult to get about as it had been in the big drifts.
+
+But the thaw proved an advantage in one way, for it opened up the roads
+that had been well-nigh impassable, and mail and other supplies came
+through.
+
+The storm, while it gave Mr. Pertell a chance to make some fine
+pictures, had one drawback. He was not able to send the reels of film in
+to New York for development and printing. He lost considerable time and
+some money on this account, but it could not be helped.
+
+But with the passing of the snow the highways were clear, and traffic to
+and from the village was made easy.
+
+One day Mr. Macksey came back from town with a good-sized bag, filled
+with mail for the picture players.
+
+"Oh, here's a letter for you, Ruth, and one for me!" cried Alice, as she
+sorted them over. "One for daddy, too! Oh, it's a big one!"
+
+The moving picture girls were busy over their epistles for some time, as
+there proved to be a number of missives for them, from relatives, and
+from friends they had made since posing for the camera. But when Alice
+read all hers and was passing some of them to her sister, she happened
+to glance at her father's face.
+
+"Why Daddy!" she cried, "what is the matter?"
+
+"Oh--nothing!" he murmured, hoarsely for he had caught a little cold,
+and his voice was almost as bad as it had been at first.
+
+"But I'm sure it's something!" Alice insisted. "Is it bad news? Ruth,
+make him tell!"
+
+The three were in Mr. DeVere's room, where they had gone to look over
+the mail.
+
+"Oh, it isn't anything!" declared the actor, and he tried to slip into
+his coat pocket the letter in the large envelope that Alice had handed
+to him.
+
+"I'm sure it is," she insisted. "Please tell me, Daddy."
+
+The letter fell to the floor, and Alice could not help seeing that it
+was from a firm of New York lawyers.
+
+"Oh, is it the trouble about the five hundred dollars?" the girl cried.
+"Is Dan Merley making more trouble?"
+
+"Yes," answered Mr. DeVere. "He has brought suit against me, it seems.
+This is a notice from the lawyers that if I do not pay within a certain
+time I will be brought to court, and compelled to hand over the money."
+
+"Can they make you do that, Daddy?" asked Ruth, anxiously.
+
+"I'm afraid they can, my dear. As I told you, I have no proof, except my
+own word, that I paid Merley. He still holds my note, and that is legal
+evidence against me. Oh, if I had only been more business-like!"
+
+"Never mind, Daddy!" Alice comforted him, putting her arms about his
+neck. "Perhaps there will be a way out."
+
+"I hope so," her father murmured, in broken tones.
+
+"How did the lawyers know you were here?" asked Ruth.
+
+"They didn't. They sent it to the apartment, and the postman forwarded
+it to me."
+
+"They can't sue you up here in this wilderness though; can they?" asked
+Alice.
+
+"I don't know anything about the law part of it," replied Mr. DeVere. "I
+presume, though, that they can sue me anywhere, even though I have paid
+the money, as long as Merley holds that note. They can make a great deal
+of trouble if they wish."
+
+"Poor Daddy!" Ruth sighed.
+
+"Oh, but I mustn't make you worry this way," he said spiritedly. "I
+shall find some way to fight this case. I'll never give in to that
+scoundrel."
+
+"I wonder where he is?" mused Alice. "We thought he was injured in the
+accident, and would not bother you."
+
+"This notice does not mention him," replied Mr. DeVere, as he paused
+over the letter again. "It merely speaks of him as 'our client.' He may
+be in the hospital, for all I can tell."
+
+They discussed the matter from all viewpoints, but there was nothing to
+be done.
+
+"You will have to reply to the lawyers, though; won't you, daddy?" asked
+Ruth.
+
+"Oh, yes, I must write to them. I shall state the case plainly, and,
+though, I have no proof, I shall ask them to drop the suit, as it is an
+unjust one."
+
+"And if they don't?" suggested Alice.
+
+"If they don't--well, I suppose I shall have to suffer," he replied,
+quietly. "I cannot raise the money now."
+
+"Oh dear!" cried Alice, half petulantly. "I wish the blizzard was still
+here!"
+
+"Why, Alice!" cried Ruth.
+
+"Well, I do! Then there wouldn't have been any mail, and daddy wouldn't
+have received this horrid letter."
+
+"Oh, well, it's best to know the plans of one's enemies," said Mr.
+DeVere. "Now I know what to expect. I think I shall write to Dan Merley
+myself, and appeal to his better nature. Surely, even though he was not
+entirely sober when I paid him the money, he must recall that I did. I
+confess I do not know whether he is merely under the impression that I
+did not pay him, or is deliberately telling a falsehood. It is hard to
+decide," he added, with a sigh.
+
+Mr. DeVere sent a letter to Merley the next day, and a few days later an
+answer came back from New York, from the same firm of lawyers who had
+served the legal notice, to the effect that their client had left the
+matter entirely in their hands, and that the money must be paid. Mr.
+Merley, the lawyer said, preferred to have no direct communication with
+Mr. DeVere.
+
+"That settles it! They mean to push the case to the limit!" exclaimed
+the actor.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+IN THE STORM
+
+
+"That's the way to drive!"
+
+"Come on now!"
+
+"Faster, if you can make the horses go!"
+
+"Get all that in, Russ!"
+
+It was a lively scene, for a spirited race in cutters was in progress
+between Mr. Bunn and Mr. Sneed. It was taking place on the frozen
+surface of the lake, and each actor had been instructed to do his best
+to win. The race was a scene in the big snow drama, and it was being
+filmed several days after the events narrated in the preceding chapter.
+
+The thaw was over, there had been a spell of cold weather, and Deerfield
+was icebound. The lake was a glittering expanse, and the ice on it was
+thick enough to support a regiment.
+
+"A little more to the left, Mr. Sneed!" called Russ, who was taking the
+pictures. "I want to get a better side view."
+
+"But if I go too far to the left I'm afraid I'll run into Mr. Bunn,"
+objected the gloomy actor.
+
+"No matter if you do--if you don't run into him too hard," cried Mr.
+Pertell. "It will make it look more natural."
+
+"If he runs into me--and does me any damage--I shall sue him and you
+too!" declared Mr. Bunn. "This is a farcical idea, anyhow. You said I
+might get a chance to do some Shakespearean work up here; but so far I
+have done nothing."
+
+"I'll see what I can do on that line next week," promised the manager.
+"Go on with this race now. The idea is for you, Mr. Sneed, to be in
+pursuit of Mr. Bunn. You must look as though you really wanted to catch
+him. Put some spirit into your acting."
+
+"It is too cold!" complained Mr. Sneed. "I would a great deal rather be
+sitting beside the fire in the Lodge."
+
+"No doubt," commented Mr. Pertell, drily. "But that won't make moving
+pictures. Come on, now, start your horses again," for they had, so far,
+been only rehearsing.
+
+Finally Mr. Pertell was satisfied that the play would be done to his
+satisfaction, and gave the word for Russ to start unreeling the film.
+
+Away started the two cutters over the ice, and the two actors really
+managed to put a little enthusiasm into their work. Then, as Russ called
+to Mr. Sneed to edge over a little to the left, as he had done before,
+at the rehearsal, the gloomy actor pulled too hard on one rein. His
+horse swerved too much, and, the next instant, the cutter upset, and Mr.
+Sneed was neatly deposited on the ice.
+
+Fortunately he fell clear of the vehicle, and was not entangled in the
+reins, so he was not hurt. The horse, an intelligent animal, feeling
+that something was wrong, came to a stop after running a little
+distance.
+
+"Stop! Stop!" called Mr. Pertell to Mr. Bunn, who was still urging on
+his horse, unaware of the accident to his fellow actor. "The scene is
+spoiled. Don't take that, Russ. Sometimes I like an accident on the
+film, but not in this case. It would spoil the action of the play. It
+will have to be done over again."
+
+"Not with me in it!" said Mr. Sneed, as he got up and went limping
+toward shore.
+
+"Why not?" asked Mr. Pertell. "Why don't you want to do this act?"
+
+"Because I am hurt. I knew something would happen when I got up this
+morning, and it certainly has. I may be injured for life by this."
+
+"Nonsense!" exclaimed the manager. "You're not hurt. You only think so.
+Here, Mrs. Maguire, give him that bottle of witch hazel I saw you use
+for little Tommy the other day. That will fix you up, Mr. Sneed."
+
+"Humph!" exclaimed the "grouch." And then, as the motherly Irish woman,
+with a quizzical smile on her face, started to the house for the
+liniment, Mr. Sneed said:
+
+"Oh, you needn't make such a fuss over me. I suppose I can go on with
+this, if I am suffering. Bring back the horse."
+
+The overturned cutter was righted, and the play went on. This time no
+mishap occurred and the race was run to a successful finish.
+
+"Now, Alice and Ruth, you will get into the larger cutter, and with Paul
+for a driver we'll make the next scene," directed Mr. Pertell, and so
+the making of the play went on.
+
+The filming of the big drama was to occupy several days, as some of the
+scenes were laid in distant parts of the game preserve belonging to Elk
+Lodge, and there was not time to take the company there, and come back
+for other scenes, the darkness falling early, as the year was dying.
+
+There came fair weather, and storms, alternating. A number of fine films
+were obtained by Russ, some of them showing weather effects, and others
+views of the ice at the falls where the two girls and their companions
+had been imprisoned in the ice cave.
+
+It was on one comparatively warm afternoon that Alice, who had been out
+in the barn to give some sugar to a favorite horse, came back and called
+to Ruth:
+
+"Let's go for a walk. It's perfectly lovely out, and it will do us both
+good."
+
+"All right!" agreed Ruth. "I've been sewing all morning and my eyes are
+tired. Where are you going?"
+
+"Oh, in a direction we have never taken before."
+
+"Don't get lost," advised their father.
+
+"We won't," returned Alice. "Don't you want to come, Daddy?"
+
+"Too busy. I'm studying a new part," he said.
+
+So the two moving picture girls started off, and soon were tramping
+through the woods, following an old lumber trail.
+
+"This leads to the camp of Flaming Arrow," said Alice, for they had paid
+the promised visit some time before. "Shall we take it?"
+
+"Yes, but not all the way to the lumber camp," objected Ruth. "That is
+too far."
+
+"Oh, I wouldn't think of going there now," responded Alice. "I mean to
+branch off on the new path I spoke of."
+
+The day was pleasant, but there was the hint of a storm in the feeling
+of the air and in the clouds, and the hint was borne out a little later,
+for a fine snow began sifting down.
+
+The girls kept on, however though Ruth wanted to turn back at the first
+white flake.
+
+"There's going to be a storm," she declared.
+
+"What of it?" asked Alice, with a merry laugh. "It will be all the more
+fun!"
+
+But a little later, when the wind suddenly sprang into fury, and lashed
+the flakes into their faces with cutting force, even Alice was ready to
+turn back.
+
+"Come on," she cried to her sister. "We'd better not go to the snow
+grotto--that was a natural curiosity I wanted to show you. But we'll
+have to wait until another time."
+
+"I should think so!" exclaimed Ruth. "This is terrible! Oh, suppose we
+should be lost?"
+
+"How can we be, when all we have to do is to follow the path back to Elk
+Lodge?"
+
+Alice thought it would be as easily done as she had said, and Ruth
+trusted to the fact that her sister had been that way on a previous
+occasion. But neither of them realized the full force of the storm, nor
+how easy it was to mistake the way in blinding snow.
+
+They emerged from a little clump of woods, and then they felt the full
+force of the blast in their faces.
+
+"Oh, Alice, we can't go on!" cried Ruth, halting and turning her face
+aside.
+
+"But we must!" Alice insisted. "We've got to get back. We can't stay out
+in this snow. It's a small-sized blizzard now, and it is growing worse."
+
+"Oh, what shall we do?" cried Ruth, almost sobbing.
+
+"We must keep on!" declared Alice, grimly.
+
+They locked arms and bent their heads before the blast. They tried to
+keep to the path, but after a few moments of battling with the storm,
+Ruth cried:
+
+"Alice where are we?"
+
+"On the way to Elk Lodge, of course."
+
+"No, we're not. We're off the path! See, we didn't come past this big
+rock before," and she pointed to one that reared up from the snow.
+
+Alice paused for a moment, and then, with a curious note of fear in her
+voice, she said:
+
+"I--I am afraid we are lost, Ruth. Oh, it is all my fault!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE THREE MEN
+
+
+They stood there together--the two moving picture girls--in the midst of
+the sudden storm. They stood with their arms about each other, and the
+frightened eyes of Alice gazed into the terror-stricken ones of Ruth.
+
+"Alice," cried Ruth, "do you really think we are lost?"
+
+"I'm afraid so. I didn't notice which way we were going; but, as you
+say, we didn't pass that rock before. We must be lost!"
+
+"But what are we to do?"
+
+"We've got to do something, that's sure!" Alice exclaimed. "We can't
+stay here and freeze."
+
+"Of course not. But if we go on in the storm we may be snowed under."
+
+"And I'm more afraid to stay here. We must keep on the move, Ruth."
+
+"Yes, I suppose so. Oh, if we could only see our way! We can't be so
+very far from Elk Lodge."
+
+"We are not," agreed Alice. "We did not walk fast, and we have not been
+gone very long. The Lodge can't be more than two miles away; but it
+might just as well be two hundred for all the good that does us in this
+storm."
+
+Indeed the snow was so thick that it was impossible to see many feet
+ahead. The white flakes swirled, seeming to come first from one
+direction, and then from another. The wind blew from all points of the
+compass, varying so quickly that the girls found it impossible to keep
+it at their backs.
+
+"Well, there is one thing we can do," said Alice, when they had advanced
+a few steps and then retreated, not knowing whether it was better to
+keep on or not.
+
+"And what is it?" asked Ruth. "If there's any one thing to do in a case
+like this I want to know it."
+
+"We can go over behind that rock and get a little protection from the
+wind and snow," Alice went on. "See, the snow has drifted on one side;
+and the other is quite bare. That shows it affords some shelter. Let's
+go over there."
+
+"Come on," agreed Ruth. She caught her sister's arm in a firmer grasp,
+and the two girls plowed their way through the snow. They had,
+heretofore, been on a sort of path, that had been formed over the crust.
+The girls had on their snowshoes or they would have scarcely been able
+to progress. As it was the going was sufficiently difficult.
+
+"Oh, wait a moment!" panted Ruth, half way to the sheltering rock.
+
+"What's the matter?" asked Alice, quickly. "Are you ill?"
+
+"No, don't worry about me, dear. I'm only--out of breath!"
+
+"I positively believe you're getting stout!" laughed Alice, and Ruth was
+glad that she could laugh, even in the face of impending danger. "You
+must take more exercise," she went on.
+
+"I'm getting plenty of it now," observed Ruth. "Oh, but it is hard going
+in this snow!"
+
+Together they struggled on, and finally reached the rock. As Alice had
+surmised, the big boulder did give them shelter, and they were grateful
+for it, as they were quite exhausted by their battle with the storm.
+
+"What a relief!" sighed Alice, as she leaned back against the big stone.
+
+"Oh, isn't it!" agreed Ruth. "But, Alice, if we are so played out by
+that little trip, how are we ever going to get back to Elk Lodge?"
+
+"I don't know, dear," was the hesitating answer. "But we must get back.
+Maybe the snow will stop after a little, and we can see our way. That is
+really all we need--to see the path. I'm sure I've been out in worse
+storms than this."
+
+"It is bad enough," responded Ruth, apprehensively. "See how it snows!"
+
+Indeed the white flakes were coming down with increased violence, and
+the wind swept and howled about the rock with a melancholy sound. The
+girls huddled close together.
+
+"Can you ever forgive me for bringing you out in such weather as this?"
+begged Alice, self-reproachfully.
+
+"It wasn't your fault at all, dear," Ruth reassured her and her arms
+went about her sister in a loving embrace. "I wanted to come. Neither of
+us knew this storm would make us get lost."
+
+Alice said nothing for a moment. She was busy arranging a scarf more
+tightly about her throat, for she felt the flakes blowing and sifting on
+her, and did not want to take cold. The girls were warmly dressed, which
+was in their favor.
+
+For five or ten minutes they remained under the lee of the rock, not
+knowing what to do. They realized, though neither wanted to mention it
+to the other, that they could not remain there very long. Night would
+settle down, sooner or later, and they could not remain out without
+shelter. Yet where could they go?
+
+"If it would only stop!" cried Ruth.
+
+"Yes, or if someone from Elk Lodge would come after us!" added Alice.
+
+"I'm sure they will!" cried Ruth, catching at this slender hope. "Oh,
+Alice, I'm sure they'll come."
+
+"And so am I, as far as that is concerned," agreed Alice. "The only
+trouble is they will not know where to come. Don't you see?"
+
+"But they know where we were going--you mentioned it to daddy."
+
+"I know, but don't you understand, my dear, we're not where we said we
+would go. We're lost--we're off the path. If it was only a question of
+someone from the Lodge following the proper path it would be all right.
+But we're far from it, and they will have no idea where to search for
+us."
+
+"Couldn't they trail us with--with bloodhounds?"
+
+"Oh, I don't believe it will get as desperate as that. Not that there
+are any bloodhounds at Elk Lodge. But there are some hunting dogs, and I
+presume they might be able to follow our trail. Won't it seem odd to be
+trailed by dogs? Just as if we were fugitive slaves!"
+
+"I don't care how they trail us, as long as we get back to Elk Lodge!"
+and there was a sob in Ruth's voice.
+
+The next moment Alice, on whose shoulder Ruth had laid her head, uttered
+a cry.
+
+"Oh, what is it?" asked the elder girl. "Do you see someone? Are they
+coming for us?"
+
+"No, but the snow is stopping, and I can see a house--two of them, in
+fact."
+
+"A house! Good! Is it far off?"
+
+"No, not far. Come on, I believe we can reach it."
+
+As Alice had said, the snow had ceased falling almost as suddenly as it
+had set in, and this gave the girls a clear view. They had made a little
+turn from their original direction in getting to the rock, and they had
+a view down in a little glade. There, as Alice had said, nestled two
+houses; or, rather log cabins. One was of large size, and the other
+smaller.
+
+"Let's go there!" suggested Alice. "We can get shelter, and perhaps
+there is someone in one of the cabins who will take us to Elk Lodge. We
+can offer to pay him."
+
+"They wouldn't want it," declared Ruth. "But come on. We mustn't lose
+any time, for the snow may set in again at any moment. We must get there
+while we can see."
+
+The wind, too, had died out somewhat, so that it was comparatively easy
+travelling now. Together the girls made their way over the snow toward
+the smaller of the two cabins, that being the nearer.
+
+They reached it, struggling, panting and out of breath, and after
+waiting a moment, to allow their laboring hearts to quiet down, that
+they might speak less brokenly, Alice knocked at the door. There was no
+answer.
+
+"Oh, suppose they should not be home?" cried Ruth.
+
+"That seems to be the case," spoke Alice, as she knocked again, without
+result.
+
+"What shall we do--go to the other cabin?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Let's see if this one is open," proposed Alice. "They may be hospitable
+enough to have left the door unlocked."
+
+As she spoke she tried the latch. Somewhat to her surprise the door did
+open, and then to the astonishment of both girls they found themselves
+in an unoccupied cabin.
+
+"Oh dear!" cried Ruth. "What a disappointment!"
+
+"Isn't it?" agreed Alice. "Well, we can try the other."
+
+They stood for a moment in the main room of the small cabin, and looked
+about. There was nothing in it save a few boxes.
+
+"We could make a fire--I have matches, and we could break up the boxes
+on the hearth," said Alice. "Shall we?"
+
+"No, let's go to the other cabin. I'm sure someone will be there,"
+suggested her sister.
+
+"Come on!"
+
+They stepped to the door, but at that instant the snow began again,
+harder than before.
+
+"No use!" cried Alice. "We're doomed to stay here, I guess."
+
+"Well, it's a shelter, at any rate," sighed Ruth. She was not frightened
+now.
+
+"And there's another good thing," went on Alice. "These cabins are a
+definite place. If a searching party starts out for us Mr. Macksey will
+be sure to think about these, and look here for us. I think we are all
+right now."
+
+"We're better off, at any rate," observed Ruth. "I believe we might make
+a fire, Alice."
+
+"That's what I say."
+
+They had taken off their snowshoes, and now, by stamping and kicking at
+the boxes, they managed to break them up into kindling wood. Soon a
+little blaze was crackling on the hearth. The warmth was grateful to the
+chilled girls.
+
+They stood before it toasting their cold hands, and then, when Ruth
+went to the window to look out, she called:
+
+"It's stopped snowing again. Don't you think we'd better run to the
+other cabin while we have the chance?"
+
+"I suppose it would be wise," agreed Alice. "We really ought to start
+for Elk Lodge, and we could if we had a guide. Come on."
+
+Together they started for the larger cabin, but when half way to it they
+saw three men coming out. The men had guns over their shoulders, and
+they headed down the trail, away from the girls.
+
+Not before, however, the two sisters had a good view of the features of
+the trio. And instantly the same thought came to both.
+
+"Did you see who one of those men was?" gasped Ruth.
+
+"Yes, it is he! And those are the same two men who were with him
+before," answered Alice.
+
+"Dan Merley--the man who is going to sue daddy for that five hundred
+dollars!" went on Ruth, clasping her hands.
+
+"And with him are the two men who were present when the street car
+accident happened in New York--Fripp and Jagle. They are the hunters who
+have been annoying Mr. Macksey."
+
+"Oh, what shall we do?" asked Ruth. "We can't appeal to them for help,
+not after the way Merley behaved to us."
+
+"Of course not! Oh, isn't it provoking? Just as we see help we can't
+avail ourselves of it. The men are getting farther and farther away,"
+Alice went on. "If we are going to appeal to them we must be quick about
+it."
+
+"Don't call to them!" exclaimed Ruth. "It might be dangerous. They
+haven't noticed us--let them go. But Alice, did you see how Merley seems
+to have recovered from his accident? He walks as well as the others."
+
+"Yes, so he does. I'm glad they didn't see us. But I have a plan. There
+may be other persons in the cabin. When the three men are out of sight,
+and they will be in the woods in a little while, we can go and ask help
+of whoever is left in the cabin."
+
+"Yes," agreed Ruth, and they waited, going back to the small cabin. "I
+remember now," Ruth added after a pause, "that man who was in the bushes
+the time of the coasting race was Fripp. I knew I had seen him somewhere
+before, but I could not recall him then."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THE PLAN OF RUSS
+
+
+The three men, with their guns on their shoulders, passed out of sight
+into a clump of woodland.
+
+"Now's our chance," said Alice. "We'll slip over to the other cabin, and
+see if we can get help. These men are evidently up here on a hunting
+trip, and they may have a man cook, or some sort of help in the cabin.
+Whoever it is can't refuse to at least set us on the right road. We
+don't need to mention that Mr. Merley is going to sue our father."
+
+"I should say not," agreed Ruth. "Oh, that horrid man! I never want to
+see him again. But isn't it queer how soon he recovered from his
+injury?"
+
+"Rather odd. We must tell daddy about it when we get back."
+
+"If we ever do," sighed the older girl.
+
+"If we ever do?" repeated Alice. "Why of course we'll get back. I don't
+believe it is going to storm any more."
+
+"I hope not."
+
+On their snowshoes the moving picture girls made their way to the second
+cabin. But again disappointment awaited them, for there was no answer to
+their repeated knocks.
+
+"No one at home," spoke Alice. "Shall we try to go in?"
+
+"It would do no good," Ruth decided. "If it is shelter we want we can
+get it at the other cabin. And as there is no one at home here we can't
+ask our way. Besides, those men might come back unexpectedly, and I
+wouldn't have Merley and his two companions find us in their cabin for
+anything!"
+
+"Neither would I. That Merley would be mean enough," Alice declared, "to
+charge us rent, and add that to the five hundred dollars he is going to
+make daddy pay."
+
+"Oh, Alice! What queer ideas you have. But, dear, we mustn't linger
+here. I wonder if it would do to follow those men?"
+
+"Follow them? What in the world for?"
+
+"Why they seem to have taken some sort of a trail, and it may lead out
+to a road that will take us to Elk Lodge."
+
+"It isn't very likely," Alice declared. "I'm sure I know the general
+direction in which Elk Lodge lies, and it's just opposite from where
+those men went. I think, now, that the storm has stopped, that we can
+get back on the path."
+
+"Then, for goodness sakes, let's try!" proposed Ruth. "It seems to be
+getting darker. Oh, if they would only come for us!"
+
+"Let us try to help ourselves first," counseled Alice.
+
+The girls retraced their steps, going back toward the smaller cabin.
+They stopped in for a moment to see that the blaze they had kindled on
+the hearth was out, for they did not want a chance spark to set fire to
+the place. But the embers were cold and dead, for the wood had been
+light, and there was not much of it.
+
+Then gliding over the crust on their snowshoes, Ruth and Alice got back
+to the sheltering rock.
+
+"Let me look about a bit," Alice requested. "I think I can pick up the
+trail again. If I could only get back to the point where we got off from
+I would be all right."
+
+She walked about a little and then, passing through a small clump of
+trees, while Ruth remained at the rock, Alice suddenly gave a joyful
+cry.
+
+"I've found it!" she called. "Come on, Ruth. It's all right. I'm on the
+proper path now."
+
+Ruth hurried to join her sister, and confirmed the good news. They
+recognized the path by which they had come, and soon they were traveling
+along it, certain, now, that they were headed for Elk Lodge.
+
+And their adventures seemed to be over for that day at least, for, on
+covering about three-quarters of a mile they were delighted to see,
+hurrying toward them, Russ and Paul.
+
+"There are the boys!" cried Alice.
+
+"And I was never more glad to see anyone in all my life!" exclaimed
+Ruth.
+
+"We're not lost now, and don't really need them," said Alice.
+
+"Well, don't tell them that--especially after they have been so good as
+to come for us," advised Ruth.
+
+"Silly! Of course I won't!"
+
+"Well, you two seem to have the oddest faculty for getting into
+trouble!" cried Russ as he and Paul reached the girls. "The whole Lodge
+is worried to death about you, and we're all out searching for you."
+
+"Oh, it's too bad we gave so much trouble," responded Ruth, contritely.
+"But we couldn't help it. We were lost in the storm."
+
+"We thought that likely," Paul said. "Your father is quite worried."
+
+"Is he out searching, too?" Alice asked.
+
+"No, his throat troubles him," the young actor replied. "But every other
+man at the Lodge is. Mr. Macksey told us to come this way, and if we
+didn't locate you we were to meet him at some place where there are two
+cabins."
+
+"We just came from there," Ruth said, "and we had the oddest adventure.
+I'll tell you about it when we get back. We tried to get a guide to show
+us the path, but as it happened we didn't need one. Oh, I believe it's
+snowing again!"
+
+Some white flakes were sifting down.
+
+"It's only a little flurry," decided Paul. "And it won't matter, for the
+path back is very plain now. But what happened?"
+
+The girls told him, and when he heard that Merley was in the
+neighborhood, and apparently uninjured, Russ said:
+
+"I always thought that fellow was a faker. I'd like to know what his
+game was."
+
+"Do you think it is a game?" asked Alice.
+
+"Yes, and I think it's more of a game than the game they are after up
+here. I think they're hatching some plot."
+
+They arrived at Elk Lodge a little later, and leaving the girls with
+their father, Russ and Paul went after the other searchers, to tell
+them that the lost ones were found.
+
+"You must not go away alone again," cautioned Mr. DeVere to his
+daughters, when all the searchers had returned, and there was a joyful
+reunion in the big living room.
+
+"We won't!" promised Alice. "I was really a bit frightened this time."
+
+"A _bit_ frightened!" cried Ruth. "I was awfully scared! I could see us
+both frozen stiff under the snow, and the dogs nosing us out as they do
+travelers in the Alps."
+
+"I'm glad that didn't happen," laughed Russ. "For I suppose if it had
+Mr. Pertell would have insisted on having a moving picture of it, and I
+would have been too prostrated with grief to be able to work the
+camera."
+
+"Well, we're all right now," declared Alice. "And such an appetite as I
+have!"
+
+"Did you tell your father about Dan Merley?" asked Russ.
+
+"Oh, no!" exclaimed Ruth. "Listen Daddy, whom do you think we saw?"
+
+"Not Dan Merley up here?" cried the actor.
+
+"Yes, he was with two other men--those who were with him when he was
+hurt by the street car."
+
+"Dan Merley up here?" mused Mr. DeVere. "I wonder what he can want? Can
+he be going to make trouble for me?"
+
+"We won't let him, Daddy!" cried Alice. "If he walks over here to ask
+for that five hundred dollars again, I'll----"
+
+"You say he was walking around?" cried Mr. DeVere.
+
+"Yes, on snowshoes," answered Ruth. "He was walking as well as anyone."
+
+"And he was supposed to be seriously hurt!" murmured the actor. "Where
+is that paper?" and he looked about him.
+
+"What paper?" asked Ruth.
+
+"That New York paper I was just reading. There is something in it I want
+to show you. I begin to see through this."
+
+The journal was found, and Mr. DeVere glanced through it rapidly,
+looking for some item. Russ and the two girls watched him curiously.
+
+"Here it is!" cried the actor. "It is headed 'Brings Damage Suit for Ten
+Thousand Dollars.' Listen, I'll just give you the main facts. It says
+Dan Merley had started an action in one of the courts demanding ten
+thousand dollars' damages for being hurt by a street car. Merley claims
+he will never be able to walk again, because his back is permanently
+hurt. And yet you saw him walking?" he appealed to the two girls.
+
+"We certainly saw him," declared Ruth.
+
+"Then that is a bogus damage suit. He isn't hurt at all. The court
+should know of this, and so should the street car company. I shall write
+to them!"
+
+"Wait!" cried Russ. "I have a better idea."
+
+"What is it?" asked Mr. DeVere.
+
+"I'll get some moving pictures of him," went on the young operator.
+"I'll take a film, showing him tramping around, hunting, and when that
+is shown to the street car company's lawyer I guess that will put an end
+to Mr. Merley's suit. I'll film the faker!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+THE PROOF ON THE FILM
+
+
+Enthusiastic over his new idea, Russ gazed triumphantly at Mr. DeVere
+and the two girls. They did not seem to comprehend.
+
+"What--what was that you said?" asked Mr. DeVere.
+
+"I said I was going to make a moving picture of that faker," repeated
+Russ. "Excuse that word, but it's the only one that fits."
+
+"Yes, he really is a faker and cheat," agreed the actor. "And, Russ,
+your idea is most excellent. It will be the best kind of evidence
+against the scoundrel, and evidence that can not be controverted."
+
+"That's my idea," went on the young operator. "Some of these accident
+fakers are so clever that they fool the doctors."
+
+"Do they really make a business of it?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Indeed they do," Russ answered. "Sometimes a gang of men, who don't
+like to work for a living, plan to have a series of accidents. They
+decide on who shall be 'hurt,' and where. Then they get their witnesses,
+who will testify to anything as long as they get paid for it. They hire
+rascally lawyers, too. Sometimes they have fake accidents happen to
+their wagons or automobiles instead of themselves. And more than once
+conductors or motormen of cars have been in with the rascals."
+
+"It doesn't seem possible!" protested Alice.
+
+"It is though," her father assured her. "I read in a newspaper the other
+day how two fakers were found out and arrested. But they had secured a
+large sum in damages, so I presume they figured that it paid them. I
+knew Dan Merley was an unprincipled man, but I did not believe he was an
+accident swindler. But you can stop him, Russ."
+
+"I don't see how you are going to do it," remarked Alice. "I mean, I
+don't see that Dan Merley will let you take a moving picture of him, to
+show to the court, proving that he is a swindler."
+
+"I don't suppose he would--if he knew it," laughed Russ. "But I don't
+propose to let him see me filming him. I've got to do it on the sly,
+and it isn't going to be very easy. But I think I can manage it."
+
+"I wish we could help you," said Ruth.
+
+"Perhaps you can," the young moving picture operator answered. "I'll
+have to make some plans. But we've got a big day ahead of us to-morrow,
+and I can't do it then. I'll have to wait."
+
+"Do you think I had better write to the court, and to the lawyers of the
+street car company?" asked Mr. DeVere. "Your plan might fail, Russ."
+
+"Well, of course it might, that's a fact. But there is time enough. I'd
+like to try my way first, though, for it would be conclusive proof. If
+you sent word to the lawyers, and they sent a witness up here to get his
+evidence by eyesight, Merley might hear of it in some way and fool them.
+He might pretend to be lame again, if he knew he was being watched.
+
+"Then, too, he could bring his own witnesses to prove that he was lame
+and unable to walk. It would be a case of which witnesses the court and
+jury would believe.
+
+"But if I get the proof on the film--you can't go back of that. Just
+imagine, working a moving picture machine in one of the courts!" and he
+laughed at the idea.
+
+"Perhaps you won't have to go to that end," suggested Ruth.
+
+"No, we may be able to give Merley a hint that he had better not keep on
+with the suit," Mr. DeVere said. "Well, Russ, I wish you luck."
+
+A little later all the members of the company had heard of Russ's plan
+and Mr. Pertell said that as soon as the big drama was finished Russ
+could have as much time as he wanted to try and get a moving picture
+film of Merley.
+
+"I'll have to go over to that cabin, and sort of size up the situation,"
+Russ decided. "I want to get the lay of the land, and pick out the best
+spot to plant my camera. I suppose it will have to be behind a clump of
+bushes."
+
+"Oh, no! I know the very place for you!" cried Ruth.
+
+"Where?" he asked.
+
+"In the second, or small cabin. You can hide yourself there and focus
+your camera through the window. Then you can film him without him seeing
+you."
+
+"Good!" cried Russ. "That will be the very thing!"
+
+As Russ had said, the next day was a very busy one for him, and all the
+members of the company. Several important scenes in the big drama were
+made. A few of them were interiors, in the barn or in the living room
+of Elk Lodge, and for this the players were thankful, for the weather
+had turned cold, and it was disagreeable outdoors.
+
+Still, some snow scenes were needed, and the work had to go on. Russ had
+one of his hands slightly frost-bitten using it without a glove to make
+some adjustments to his camera, and the tips of Mr. Sneed's ears were
+nipped with the cold.
+
+This happened when the actor was doing a little bit which called for him
+to shovel a supposedly lost and frozen person out of a snow bank. Of
+course a "dummy" was put under the snow, and the real person, (in this
+case Mr. Bunn,) acted up to the time of the snow burial. Then a clever
+substitution was made and the film was exposed again. This is often done
+to get trick pictures.
+
+Mr. Sneed was shoveling away at the snow bank. His ears had been very
+cold, but suddenly seemed to have lost all feeling. He was rather
+surprised, then, when the act was over, to have Mr. Switzer rush up to
+him with a handful of snow and hold some over each ear.
+
+"Here! Quit that! What do you mean?" cried the grouchy actor.
+
+"I got to do it alretty yet!" exclaimed the German.
+
+"Quit it! Stop it!"
+
+"No, I stops not until I haf der cold drawed out of your ears. They are
+frosted, mine dear chap, und dis is der only vay to make dem proper. I
+know, I have been in der Far North."
+
+"That's right--it's the best way. Hold snow on your frosted ears or
+nose, whatever it happens to be," declared Mr. Pertell. "You can thank
+Mr. Switzer for saving you a lot of trouble, Mr. Sneed."
+
+"Humph! It's a funny thing to be thankful for--because someone washes
+your face with snow," declared the grouchy actor.
+
+It was two days later before Russ had time to carry out his plan of
+"filming the faker," as he referred to it. Then he and Paul, with Ruth
+and Alice, went to the two cabins. Russ took along a special moving
+picture camera made for fast work, and one with a lens that admitted of
+a long focus.
+
+"For Merley may not come very near the small cabin," the young moving
+picture operator said. "I may have to get him a long way off. But I
+don't want to miss him."
+
+When the four were in the vicinity of the place they proceeded
+cautiously, for they did not want to expose themselves. From a screen of
+bushes Russ took an observation, and announced that the coast was clear.
+
+"We'll slip into the cabin, and stay there as long as we can," Russ
+said, and they ran across an open space. As far as they could tell they
+were not observed.
+
+Two hours passed, and Russ was beginning to be afraid his plan would be
+a failure, for that day at least.
+
+"But I'll come back again to-morrow, and the next day--until I film that
+faker!" he exclaimed. "I'm going to expose him!"
+
+"Look!" exclaimed Paul, who was standing near a window. "There are two
+men over near that other cabin. Is one of them Merley?"
+
+Russ and Alice reached the window at the same time.
+
+"There he is!" Alice cried.
+
+"And walking as well as any man," Russ exclaimed. "Here's where I get
+him!"
+
+The moving picture camera was brought to the casement, and a moment
+later Russ began clicking away at it. He had it focused on Merley who,
+with Fripp, was walking about the other cabin. Merley walked without the
+suspicion of a limp, and a little later he took a shovel, and began
+clearing snow away from some of the walks.
+
+"Good!" cried Russ. "Better and better! If he can do such strenuous work
+as that he isn't hurt. This cooks your goose, Dan Merley!"
+
+He continued to grind away, getting the proof of the fellow's
+criminality on the sensitive film.
+
+"Oh, they're coming over this way!" exclaimed Ruth. "What shall we do?"
+
+"Nothing," declared Russ, calmly. "The nearer he comes the better
+pictures I can get. Don't be afraid. Paul and I are here."
+
+Merley had indeed started toward the smaller cabin. He was walking
+rapidly and well, and Russ got some excellent pictures. Then Fripp, who
+remained at the larger cabin, called to his companion, who turned back
+for some reason.
+
+"Good!" cried Russ. "I've got him going and coming! Oh, this will be
+great!"
+
+He continued to grind away at the film, and soon had sufficient
+pictures.
+
+"But how are we going to get away without them seeing us?" asked Alice.
+
+"We can wait until dark," Russ said.
+
+But there was no need. A little later the two men went into the large
+cabin, and presently came out with their guns. There was no sign of
+Jagle. But Merley and Fripp started for the woods, and as soon as they
+were out of sight the four emerged from the small cabin, Russ carrying
+his camera that now contained the proof on the film. They hurried back
+to Elk Lodge.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE MOVING PICTURE
+
+
+The last drama of the backwoods had been filmed. The unexposed reels
+were sent in to New York, together with the one made of Dan Merley,
+showing a supposedly injured man walking vigorously about.
+
+"And now good-bye to Elk Lodge," sighed Alice, when they were packing up
+to go back to New York. "I'm sorry to leave it."
+
+"So am I!" added Ruth. "We have had some lovely times here."
+
+"And strenuous ones, too," spoke Alice.
+
+"Oh, but won't I be glad to see dear old Broadway again!" cried Miss
+Pennington, affectedly.
+
+"And won't I!" sighed Miss Dixon. "I want to see the sights."
+
+"As if there weren't finer ones here than any in New York!" murmured
+Alice.
+
+"Everyone to their notion, my dear," remarked Miss Pennington, in a pert
+manner.
+
+The last days at Elk Lodge were ones of delight. For the weather was
+good, and there was plenty of snow, which made fine coasting. There was
+also skating, with a number of straw rides.
+
+The members of the picture company gave themselves up to pleasure, and
+Russ put away his cameras and joined in the fun with the others.
+
+"I don't care what happens now!" he cried. "I don't have to film it."
+
+Paul and Russ, with the two girls, paid another visit to the vicinity of
+the two cabins. There was a deserted look about the larger one, and a
+cautious examination revealed the fact that the occupants had gone.
+
+"I suppose he has returned to New York to prosecute his suit against the
+street car company," said Ruth.
+
+"And also his one against daddy," added Alice.
+
+Three days later the moving picture company returned to New York.
+
+"And what are the next plans--I mean what sort of pictures are you going
+to make next?" asked Mr. DeVere of Mr. Pertell.
+
+"I haven't quite made up my mind. I'll let you all know a little later,"
+the manager answered.
+
+"I hope it isn't any more snow and ice," remarked Mr. Bunn.
+
+Mr. Pertell only smiled.
+
+Mr. DeVere and his daughters went to their apartment, Russ accompanying
+them. His mother and brother were glad, not only to see the young
+operator but the DeVere family as well.
+
+The next day Mr. DeVere received a call from a lawyer who said he
+represented Dan Merley.
+
+"I have come to see if you are ready to pay that five hundred dollars
+before we go to court, Mr. DeVere," the lawyer said, stiffly.
+
+"I haven't got it," answered the actor.
+
+"Very well then, we shall sue and you will have to pay heavy costs and
+fees, in addition to the principal."
+
+Mr. DeVere was very much worried, and spoke of the matter to Russ. The
+young operator laughed.
+
+"Dan Merley will never collect that money," he said.
+
+"What makes you think so?"
+
+"I don't think--I know. Give me that lawyer's address, and then don't do
+anything until you hear from me."
+
+It was two days later that Russ said to the actor:
+
+"Can you make it convenient to be at our film studio this evening?"
+
+"I think so--why?" asked Mr. DeVere.
+
+"You'll see when you get there."
+
+"May we come?" asked Ruth.
+
+"Surely," Russ answered. "I think you'll enjoy it, too!"
+
+Rather mystified, but somehow suspecting what was afoot, the two girls
+accompanied their father to the studio at the appointed hour. Russ met
+them and took them into the room where the films were first shown after
+being prepared for the projector. It was a sort of testing room.
+
+"I think you have met this gentleman before," said Russ, as he nodded at
+one sitting in a corner. It was Dan Merley's lawyer.
+
+"Oh, yes, I guess Mr. DeVere knows me," returned the latter. "I
+understand you have come here for a settlement," he went on.
+
+"Yes," said Russ, smiling.
+
+"A--a settlement!" murmured Mr. DeVere. "I--I am not prepared to settle.
+I have not the money!"
+
+"You don't need the money," declared Russ. "You have brought Mr.
+DeVere's promissory note with you; have you not?" he asked the lawyer.
+
+"I brought it, at your request," was the answer. "But I tell you, here
+and now, that it will not be surrendered until the five hundred dollars
+is paid."
+
+"Oh yes," said Russ gently, "I think it will. Look! Ready!"
+
+As he spoke the room was suddenly darkened, and then, on the big white
+screen, there sprang into prominence life-size moving pictures of Dan
+Merley, showing him walking about the backwoods cabin, and shoveling
+snow. The likeness was perfect.
+
+"I--er--I--what does this mean?" stammered the lawyer, springing to his
+feet.
+
+"It means that Dan Merley is a faker!" cried Russ, as the lights were
+turned up again, and Mr. Pertell came up from the booth where he had
+been working the moving picture machine.
+
+"It means that he is a faker when he says he was injured by the street
+car," cried Russ, "and we're going to show these pictures in court if he
+persists in the suit. And it means he's a faker when he says Mr. DeVere
+owes him five hundred dollars. It means he's a faker from beginning to
+end! We've got the proof on the film!" and his voice rang out.
+
+"Oh, Russ!" cried Ruth, and she clasped his hand in delight.
+
+"I--er--I--" stammered Mr. DeVere as he sank into a chair.
+
+"Daddy, you won't have to pay!" exclaimed Alice, joyfully.
+
+"How about that, Mr. Black?" asked Russ of the lawyer. "Do you think
+your client will go on with the street car suit?"
+
+"Well, my dear young man, in view of what you have shown me, I--er--I
+think not. In fact I know not." The lawyer was beaten and he realized
+it.
+
+"And about Mr. DeVere's note?" asked Russ.
+
+The lawyer took out his pocketbook.
+
+"Here is the note," he muttered. "You have beaten us. I presume if we
+drop both suits that you will not show these pictures in court?"
+
+"It won't be necessary," said Russ. "If the suits are withdrawn the
+pictures will not be shown. But they will be kept--for future
+reference," he added significantly.
+
+"I understand," spoke the lawyer. "You are a very clever young man."
+
+"Oh, the young ladies helped me," laughed Russ.
+
+"Good-night," said the lawyer, bowing himself out.
+
+"There you are, Mr. DeVere!" cried Russ, as they were on their way from
+the studio. "You'd better destroy that note. It's the only evidence
+Merley had, and now you have it back. Tear it up--burn it!"
+
+"I will indeed! I never can thank you enough for securing it for me.
+Those moving pictures were a clever idea."
+
+The next day formal notice was sent to Mr. DeVere that the suit against
+him had been withdrawn, and Merley had to pay all advance court
+charges. The actor would not again be made to pay the five hundred
+dollars. The suit against the street car company was also taken out of
+court. And Dan Merley and his confederates disappeared for a time. It
+seems that Merley went to the woods to hunt as a sort of relief from
+having to pose all the while in New York as an injured man. He felt at
+home up in that locality, having been there many times before.
+
+"Well," said Mr. Pertell to Mr. DeVere and the girls one day, when he
+had called to see them, "I suppose you are ready for more camera work by
+this time?"
+
+"What now?" asked Ruth. "Can't you give us something different from what
+we have been having?"
+
+"Indeed I can," was his answer. "How would you like to go to Florida?"
+
+"Florida!" the girls cried together. "Oh, how lovely."
+
+"That's answer enough," said the manager. "We leave in a week!"
+
+"I wonder what will happen down there?" asked Alice.
+
+And my readers may learn by perusing the next volume of this series, to
+be entitled "The Moving Picture Girls Under the Palms; Or, Lost in the
+Wilds of Florida."
+
+"It seems too good to be true," spoke Alice that night, as she and Ruth
+were talking over what dresses they would take.
+
+"Doesn't it! Oh, I am just wild to go down South!"
+
+"So am I. I'd like to know what part we're going to."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Oh, you know those two girls we met in the train. They were going
+somewhere near Lake Kissimmee. We might meet them."
+
+"We might," answered Ruth sleepily. "Put out the light, dear, and come
+to bed. We will have some busy times, getting ready to go to Florida."
+
+And thus we will take leave of the moving picture girls.
+
+
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+   Obvious punctuation errors corrected.
+
+   Page 3, "dissappointed" changed to "disappointed". (he never
+   disappointed)
+
+   Page 13, "roles" changed to "roles". (played minor roles)
+
+   Page 13, "felt" changed to "left". (left her father's)
+
+   Page 22, "went" changed to "want". (want to pay me)
+
+   Page 31, "handful" changed to "handful". (handful of snow)
+
+   Page 37, "wildy" changed to "wildly". (pawed about wildly)
+
+   Page 44, "dollares" changed to "dollars". (hundred dollars means)
+
+   Page 45, "seem" changed to "seen". (seen that he)
+
+   Page 66, "colonge" changed to "cologne". (spirits of cologne)
+
+   Page 101, "Dicken's" changed to "Dickens'". (In Dickens' story)
+
+   Page 103, "your" changed to "you". (his coat you)
+
+   Page 105, the word "have" was inserted into the text. (could have
+             happened)
+
+   Page 108, "accidently" changed to "accidentally". (accidentally
+             hit you)
+
+   Page 148, "temperment" changed to "temperament". (a different
+             temperament)
+
+   Page 180, "We" changed to "we". (we can't go)
+
+   Page 185, "fugutive" changed to "fugitive". (were fugitive slaves)
+
+   Page 204, "lense" changed to "lens". (a lens that)
+
+   Page 212, the word "spoke" is presumed as the original is smudged.
+             (spoke the lawyer)
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS SNOWBOUND***
+
+
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