The Boy Scouts of Bob's Hill Part 34

"What does it make you think of?" he asked each of us.

Benny's answer was the best of all.

"There was once a baseball nine made up of real giants," said he. "They were so big that their heads reached clear up into the sky. One day when they were practising they lost the ball and so they picked up these 'ere mountains and began to throw them to each other, playing catch. Every once in a while some guy would m.u.f.f the ball, I mean the mountain. Then he would let it lie where it had fallen and pick up another. That is why they are all tumbled together every which way."

"That's so," I said. "You can see where the dirt jarred off when they fell, leaving the bare rocks sticking out in a lot of places."

"It's alive, boys," said Bill, who had been feeling of Benny's head and looking anxious. "It feels like a nut, but it ain't cracked."

"Benny has given us a good description and something to think about,"

said Mr. Norton. "I don't believe that I should like to live here all the time, but I should enjoy staying a week and drinking in all this beauty. Talk about music! Hear the mountain breeze in the treetops. What does it remind you of, Gabriel?"

"It sounds to me exactly like beefsteak frying," Skinny told him, "and it makes me hungry. Let's have some eats."

"All right," said Mr. Norton, laughing to himself. "Now that you mention it, I believe that I can detect a faint resemblance. We can't give you beefsteak, but there is some bacon left and that ought to make much the same kind of noise. Whose turn is it to cook?"

"It's mine," Hank told him.

"Well, get busy, and for fear that we might disturb you, we'll go off somewhere and sit in the shade."

We were all as hungry as wolves when Hank at last called us to dinner and it tasted fine, although my piece was burnt a little.

"I don't know how you boys feel about it," said Mr. Norton, after the dishes had been washed and put away, "but I should like to camp here for a couple of days. We'll do just as you say, however. Perhaps you have had enough."

We all had been thinking the same thing and told him so.

"All right. We'll find a good place for our tents and go into camp. It will give us a chance to wash out some clothes in the river and to explore this delightful wilderness."

We had all kinds of fun practising our Scout stunts, exploring, playing Indian, and things like that. One of the prettiest places that we found was a ravine, where two cascades, twins, tumbled over rocky ledges; then came together and raced down the mountain. I don't mean that they were as pretty as Peck's Falls, above our cave. They don't make any finer places than that, only, of course, Niagara Falls are bigger. But they were worth looking at, just the same.

I am going to put down just how to get there, in case somebody should want to see them. You probably wouldn't walk over the mountain, as we did, because it takes so much time, but would go through Hoosac Tunnel.

After you have gone through from the North Adams side and the train stops to take off the electric engine and put a steam one on, get off and walk back to the mouth of the tunnel. Then, when you have come to the mountain, climb up a sort of path, following the brook, and after a little you will come to the twin cascades. We thought of camping there at first, but couldn't find any good place for our tents.

Except for the train pa.s.sing and the engineer leaning out of the cab window, we seemed out of the world, although we were not more than ten miles from home, in a straight line. The train was like company, and when we were around near we always watched it out of sight.

That is a queer little railroad which comes down from Wilmington and Readsboro, Vermont, as far as Hoosac Tunnel station. Mr. Norton told us all about it. It is what they call a narrow gauge railroad. That means that the rails are closer together than on most railroads, and on that account regular cars cannot run on it. Its rails are three and a half feet apart, while on a regular railroad they are four feet, eight and one-half inches apart. It runs along one bank of Deerfield River, a few feet above the water. The river is mostly stones in summer, with water in between.

The day after we camped there Skinny, Bill, Benny, Hank, and I sat on a big stone, opposite our camp, waiting to see the train go by. The other boys had gone with Mr. Norton part way up the mountain, looking for berries for our supper.

Pretty soon the train came in sight from toward Readsboro, fifteen miles north, and it was swinging along at good speed, for it was downhill.

We cheered and waved our hats as it went by. I noticed a girl, who was sitting at one of the windows in the pa.s.senger car, give a look of surprise when she saw us; then she leaned far out and waved her handkerchief. It wasn't anybody that I knew, but when Skinny saw her he jumped to his feet and let out a yell. And what he said was:

"Mary!"

It surprised us some. You may not believe it, but the girl was Mary Richmond, the one Skinny walked down the mountain with, that time he la.s.soed the bear, when he was doing his hike to Savoy and back. She had been up to Readsboro with her mother, visiting.

"Come on," said he, starting on a run. "She'll have to change cars at Hoosac Tunnel station."

"Aw, what's the use?" said Bill. "We don't know her."

At that instant, while we stood there watching, we saw the engine give a sudden lurch and then go b.u.mping over the ties. In another moment it struck a rock or something and, with an awful crash, the whole train went off the embankment into the river below.

CHAPTER XX

SCOUTS TO THE RESCUE

YOU may have heard of that wreck, for the papers printed a lot about it at the time.

After the first crash, there was not a sound. I don't know how long we stood there, paralyzed with horror, staring at the place where the train had been. Then we heard a shriek of fear, or pain, we couldn't tell which, and it was a girl's voice.

That shriek brought us to our senses.

"Scouts to the rescue!"

Skinny shouted at the top of his voice, hoping that Mr. Norton and the others would hear, and we started on a run.

Before we had gone halfway Skinny turned to Benny.

"Run back to the camp," said he. "Get the bandages and other first-aid things."

"And bring my rope and hatchet," he called, over his shoulder.

The awful stillness after that first shriek sent us on faster than ever, while something seemed to clutch at our throats so that we hardly could breathe.

Bill got there first, but we were not far behind. When we had come close we could see the train, lying on the stones in the river bed. The engine had turned bottom side up and lay there on its back with its wheels in air. The pa.s.senger car was on its side and was so badly smashed that it didn't look like a car at all.

"We've got to have help and have it quick," said Skinny, looking almost pale. "Who'll go to Hoosac Tunnel station for help? Hank, you go, and run like Sam Hill."

Hank was off like a deer before the words were out of his mouth, running toward the station, nearly two miles away.

"Mary!" called Skinny. "Mary! Where are you?"

"Here," we heard a faint voice say. And, climbing down, we found her, wedged in between some timbers so that she could not move.

"Are you hurt?" we asked, as we commenced to pry her loose.

"A little," she told us, beginning to cry. "I don't know how much, but I'm all right for now. Find mamma. I don't know where she is."

After a little search we found her, nearly covered with timbers and bleeding from a cut in her head.

"She's dead," I whispered, while an awful feeling came over me. Her eyes were closed and she didn't move, even after we had lifted the timbers away.

We dragged her out as gently as we could and laid her on a couple of car seats which we took from the train. I sprinkled some water in her face and pretty soon she opened her eyes.