The in the Woods Part 1 (2/2)

Jake, as a matter of fact, was responsible for a good deal of Bessie's unhappiness. As a child he had been sickly, and he had continued, long after he had outgrown his weakness, and sprouted up into a lanky, raw-boned boy, to trade upon the fears his parents had once felt for him. Among boys of his own age he was unpopular. He had early become a bully, abusing smaller and weaker boys.

Bessie he had long made a mark for his sallies of wit. He taunted her interminably about the way her father and mother had left her; he pulled her hair, and practiced countless other little tricks that she could not resent. His father tried to reprove him at times, but his mother always rushed to his defence, and in her eyes he could do no wrong. She upheld him against anyone who had a bad word to say concerning him -- and, of course, Bessie got undeserved rebukes for many of his misdeeds.

He soon learned that he could escape punishment by making it seem that she had done things of which he was accused, and, as his word was always taken against hers, no matter what the evidence was, he had only increased his mother's dislike for the orphaned girl.

The whole village shared Maw Hoover's dislike of Zara and her father. He had settled down two or three years before in an abandoned house, but no one seemed to understand how he lived. He disappeared for days at a time, but he seemed always to have money enough to pay his way, although never any more. And in the village there were dark rumors concerning him.

Gossip accused him of being a counterfeiter, who made bad money in the abandoned house he had taken for his own, and that seemed to be the favorite theory. And whenever chickens were missed, dark looks were cast at Zara and her father. He looked like a gypsy, and he would never answer questions about himself. That was enough to condemn him.

Bessie finished her churning quickly, and then went back, hoping either to make Jake relent or find some way of releasing the prisoner in the woodshed. But she could see no sign of Jake. The summer afternoon had become dark. In the west heavy black clouds were forming, and as Bessie looked about it grew darker and darker. Evidently a thunder shower was approaching. That meant that Maw Hoover would hurry home. If she was to help Zara she must make haste.

Jake, it seemed, had the only key that would open the padlock and Bessie, though she knew that she would be punished for it, determined to try to break the lock with a stone. She told Zara what she meant to do, and set to work. It was hard work, but her fingers were willing, and Zara's frightened pleading, as the thunder began to roar, and flashes of lightning came to her through the cracks in the woodshed, urged her on. And then, just as she was on the verge of success, she heard Jake's coa.r.s.e laugh in her ear. ”Look out!” he shouted.

He stood in the kitchen door, and, as she turned, something fell, hissing, at her feet. She started back, terrified. Jake laughed, and threw another burning stick at her. He had taken a shovelful of embers from the fire, and now he tossed them at her so that she had to dance about to escape the sparks. It was a dangerous game, but one that Jake loved to play. He knew that Bessie was afraid of fire, and he had often teased her in that fas.h.i.+on. But suddenly Bessie shrieked in real terror. As yet, though the approaching storm blackened the sky, there was no rain. But the wind was blowing almost a gale, and Bessie saw a little streamer of flame run up the side of the woodshed.

”The shed's on fire! You've set it on fire!” she shrieked. ”Quick -- give me that key!”

Jake, really frightened then, ran toward her with the key in his hand.

”Get some water!” Bessie called to him. ”Quick!”

And she unlocked the padlock and let Zara, terrified by the fire, out. But Jake stood there stupidly, and fanned by the wind, the flames spread rapidly.

”Gosh, now you have done it!” he said. ”Maw'll just about skin you alive for that when I tell her you set the shed afire!”

Bessie turned a white face toward him.

”You wouldn't say that!” she exclaimed.

But she saw in his scared face that he would tell any lie that would save him from the consequences of his recklessness. And with a sob of fright she turned to Zara.

”Come, Zara!” she cried. ”Get away!”

”Come with me!” said Zara. ”She'll believe you did it! Come with me!”

And Bessie, too frightened and tired to think much, suddenly yielded to her fright, and ran with Zara out into the woods.

CHAPTER II.

AN UNJUST ACCUSATION.

They had not gone far when the rain burst upon them. They stuck to the woods to avoid meeting Maw Hoover on her way home, and as the first big drops pattered down among the trees Zara called a halt.

”It's going to rain mighty hard,” she said. ”We'd better wait here and give it a chance to stop a little before we cross the clearing. We'll get awful wet if we go on now.”

Bessie, s.h.i.+vering with fright, and half minded, even now, to turn back and take any punishment Maw Hoover chose to give her, looked up through the trees. The lightning was flas.h.i.+ng. She turned back -- and the glare of the burning woodshed helped her to make up her mind to stay with Zara. As they looked the fire, against the black background of the storm, was terrifying in the extreme.

”You'd never think that shed would make such a blaze, would you?” said Zara, trembling. ”I'd like to kill that Jake Hoover! How did he set it on fire?”

”He must have been watching me all the time when I was trying to help you to get out,” said Bessie. ”Then, when I was nearly done, he called to me, and then he began throwing the burning wood at me. He knows I hate that -- he's done it before. I can always get out of the way. He doesn't throw them very near me, really. But two or three times the sparks have burned holes in my dress and Maw Hoover's been as mad as she could be. So she thinks anyhow that I play around the fire, and she'd never believe I didn't do it.”

”The rain ought to put the fire out,” said Zara presently, after they had remained in silence for a few moments. ”But I think it's beginning to stop a little now.”

”It is, and the fire's still burning, Zara. It seems to me it's brighter than ever. And listen -- when it isn't thundering. Don't you hear a noise as if someone was shouting back there?”

Zara listened intently.

”Yes,” she said. ”And it sounds as if they were chopping with axes, too. I hope the fire hasn't spread and reached the house, Bessie.”

Bessie s.h.i.+vered.

”I hope so, too, Zara. But it's not my fault, anyhow. You and I know that, even if no one believes us. It was Jake Hoover who did it, and he'll be punished for it some time, I guess, whether his maw ever finds it out or not.”

They waited a few minutes longer for the rain to stop, and then, as it grew lighter, they began to move on. They could see a heavy cloud of smoke from the direction of the farmhouse, but no more flames, and now, as the thunder grew more and more distant, they could hear shouting more plainly. Evidently help had come -- Paw Hoover, probably, seeing the fire, and rus.h.i.+ng up from the fields with his hired men and the neighbors to put it out.

”Zara,” said Bessie, suddenly, ”suppose Jake was telling the truth? Suppose they have taken your father away? You know they have said things about him, and lots of people believe he is a bad man. I never did. But suppose they really have taken him, what will you do?”

”I don't know. Stay there, I suppose. But, Bessie, it can't be true!”

”Maybe they wouldn't let you stay. When Mary Morton's mother died last year and left her alone, they took her to the poorhouse. Maybe they'd make you go there, too.”

”They shan't!” cried Zara, her eyes flas.h.i.+ng through her tears. ”I -- I”ll run away -- I'll do anything -- ”

”I'm going to run away, myself,” said Bessie, quietly. She had been doing a lot of thinking. ”No one could make me work harder than Maw Hoover, and they'd pay me for doing it. I'm going to get as far away as I can and get a real job.”

Zara looked at Bessie, usually so quiet and meek, in surprise. There was a determined note in Bessie's voice that she had never heard there before.

”We'll stick together, you and I, Zara,” said Bessie. ”I'm afraid something has happened to your father. And if that's so, we'd better wait until it's dark, and go there quietly, so that we can listen, and see if there's anyone around looking for you.”

”But we won't get any supper!” said poor Zara. ”And I'm hungry already!”

”We'll find berries and nuts, and we can easily find a spring where we can drink all we want,” said Bessie. ”I guess we've got to look out for ourselves now, Zara. There's no one else to do it for us.”

And Bessie, the meek, the quiet, the subdued, from that moment took command. Always before Zara had seemed the plucky one of the two. She had often urged Bessie to rebel against Maw Hoover's harshness, and it had been always Bessie who had hung back and refused to do anything that might make trouble. But now, when the time for real action had come, and Bessie recognized it, it was she who made the plans and decided what was to be done.

Bessie knew the woods well, far better than Zara. Unerringly she led the way to a spot she knew, where a farm had been allowed to drift back to wild country, and pointed out some cherry trees.

”Some berries aren't good to eat, but I know those cherries,” said Bessie. ”They used to be the best trees in the whole county years ago -- Paw Hoover's told me that. Some believe that they're no good now, because no one has looked after the trees, but I know they're fine. I ate some only the other day, and they're ripe and delicious. So we'll have supper off these trees.”

Zara, as active as a little cat, climbed the tree at once, and in a moment she was throwing down the luscious fruit to Bessie, who gathered it in her ap.r.o.n and called to Zara when she had picked enough of the big, round cherries.

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