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Page 5
The bull plowed up several yards of sod, swerved, shook his great head,
bellowing again, and then started off at a tangent across the field with
the farmer, brandishing a stick, close on his heels.
Saved, Ruth Fielding did sink to the earth now, and when the other girls
ran clamorously around the motor-car she was scarcely possessed of her
senses. Truly, however, she had been through too many exciting events to
be long overcome by this one.
Many queer experiences and perilous adventures had come into Ruth
Fielding's life since the time when, as an orphan of twelve years, she
had come to the Red Mill, just outside the town of Cheslow, to live with
her Great Uncle Jabez and his queer little old housekeeper, Aunt
Alvirah.
The miller was not the man generously to offer Ruth the advantages she
craved. Had it not been for her dearest friend, Helen Cameron, at first
Ruth would not have been dressed well enough to enter the local school.
But if Jabez Potter was a miser, he was a just man after his fashion.
Ruth saved him a considerable sum of money during the first few months
of her sojourn at the Red Mill, and in payment for this Uncle Jabez
allowed her to accompany Helen Cameron to that famous boarding school,
Briarwood Hall.
While at school at Briarwood, and during the vacations between
semesters, Ruth Fielding's career actually began, as the volumes
following "Ruth Fielding of the Red Mill" show. The girl had numerous
adventures at Briarwood Hall, at Snow Camp, at Lighthouse Point, at
Silver Ranch, on Cliff Island, at Sunrise Farm, among the gypsies, in
moving pictures, down in Dixie, at college, in the saddle, in the Red
Cross in France, at the war front, and when homeward bound. The volume
just previous to this present story related Ruth's adventures "Down
East," where she went with Helen and Tom Cameron, as well as Jennie
Stone, Jennie's fianc�, Henri Marchand, and her Aunt Kate, who was their
chaperon.
The girl of the Red Mill had long before the time of the present
narrative proved her talent as a scenario writer, and working for Mr.
Hammond, president of the Alectrion Film Corporation, had already made
several very successful pictures. It seemed that her work in life was to
be connected with the silver sheet.
Even Uncle Jabez had acknowledged Ruth's ability as a scenario writer,
and was immensely proud of her work when he learned how much money she
was making out of the pictures. For the old miller judged everything by
a monetary standard.
Aunt Alvirah was, of course, very proud of her "pretty" as she called
Ruth Fielding. Indeed, all Ruth's friends considered her success in
picture-making as only going to show just how smart Ruth Fielding was.
But the girl of the Red Mill was far too sensible to have her head
turned by such praise. Even Tom Cameron's pride in her pictures only
made the girl glad that she succeeded in delighting him.
For Ruth and Tom were closer friends now than ever before--and for years
they had been "chummy." The adventures which had thrown them so much
together in France while Tom was a captain in the American Expeditionary
Forces and Ruth was working with the American Red Cross, had welded
their confidence in and liking for each other until it seemed that
nothing but their youth and Tom's duties in the army kept them from
announcing their engagement.
"Do finish the war quickly, Tom," she had said to him whimsically, not
long before Tom had gone back to France. "I do not feel as though I
could return to college, or write another scenario, or do another single
solitary thing until peace is declared."
"And _then_?" Tom had asked significantly, and Ruth had given him an
understanding smile.
The uncertainty of that time--the whole nation waited and listened
breathlessly for news from abroad--seemed to Ruth more than she could
bear. She had entered upon this pleasure jaunt to the Wild West Show
with the other girls because she knew that anything to take their minds
off the more serious thoughts of the war was a good thing.
Now, as she felt herself in peril of being gored by that black bull a
tiny thought flashed into her mind:
"What terrible peril may be facing Tom Cameron at this identical
moment?"
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