The Corner House Girls at School Part 33

"Wait. Joe's stopped them."

Eldred had interfered when Trix and her escort started into the snow castle. The Corner House girls and Neale drew near.

"I don't care!" Trix was saying in her loud voice. "I'm going to skate.

Oh! don't bother to tell me it isn't safe, Joe Eldred. You just want to keep me off the ice."

She was already sitting on a rough bench that had been drawn there by the boys, and Wilbur was putting on her skates.

"You always do know it all, Trix," Joe said, sharply, "but I advise you to go slow----"

The obstinate girl stood up as Wilbur finished with the last strap. She laughed in Joe's face.

"You make me tired, Joe Eldred," she observed, and without waiting for further parley she shot away into the otherwise empty castle.

"Oh! why didn't you stop her?" cried Ruth, anxiously.

"I'd like to see anybody stop _that_ girl," growled Joe.

"She's as reckless as she can be," said Neale.

"Aw, say!" exclaimed Wib, as they called young Ketch.e.l.l, "is the roof really unsafe?"

"We don't know," Neale said, in a worried tone. Then suddenly there was a sharp crack from inside the snow castle.

"Crickey! it's coming down!" exclaimed Wilbur.

"What _was_ that, Neale?" demanded Joe Eldred.

"That pillar's gone!" exclaimed Neale O'Neil, pointing to one of the wooden supports by which the roof of planks and snow was partly upheld.

On the tail of his declaration there was another crash and a second support, farther down the hall, was splintered.

"The roof's coming down, Trix! Come back! come back!" shrieked Agnes.

Trix was at the far end. She had turned swiftly and they could see her face. The wooden supports giving way between her and the exit frightened the reckless girl immeasurably.

"Come back, Trix!" Ruth added her cry to her sister's.

The electric lights began to quiver. The whole ma.s.s of the roof must be sagging down. Ketch.e.l.l kicked off his skates and picked them up, preparatory to getting out of the way.

And perhaps it was just as well that he had showed no heroism. Had he skated in for the girl, he could not have aided her in any way.

Trix started for the front of the snow castle. They saw her stoop forward and put on speed, and then--in a flash--the middle of the roof settled and crashed to the floor--and the sound of the wreck almost deafened the onlookers!

CHAPTER XXI

A BACKYARD CIRCUS

They said afterward that the wreck of the snow castle was heard clear to the outskirts of the town. The _Morning Post_ said that it was disgraceful that the school authorities had allowed it to be built.

Parents and guardians were inclined to rail against what they had previously praised the boys for doing.

The fact remained, and the calmer people of the community admitted it, that as soon as there was any danger the boys had warned everybody out.

That one headstrong girl--and she, only--was caught in the wreckage, did not change the fact that the boys had been very careful.

At the moment the roof of the snow castle crashed in, the only thought of those in sight of the catastrophe was of Trix Severn.

"Oh! save her! save her!" Ruth Kenway cried.

"She's killed! I _know_ she is!" wept Agnes, wringing her hands.

Joe Eldred and Wib Ketch.e.l.l were as pale as they could be. None of the little group at the entrance moved for a full minute. Then Neale O'Neil brought them all to life with:

"_She wasn't under that fall!_ Quick! 'round to the rear! We can save her."

"I tell you she's dead!" avowed Wilbur, hoa.r.s.ely.

"Come on!" shouted Neale, and seized a shovel that stood leaning against the snow wall. "Come on, Joe! The roof's only fallen in the middle. Trix is back of that, I tell you!"

"Neale is right! Neale is right!" screamed Agnes. "Let's dig her out."

She and Ruth started after Neale O'Neil and Joe. Wilbur ran away in terror and did much to spread the senseless alarm throughout the neighborhood that half the school children in town were buried beneath the wreckage of the snow castle!

But it was bad enough--at first. The Corner House girls and their boy friends were not altogether sure that Trix was only barred from escape by the falling rubbish.

Neale and Joe attacked the rear wall of the structure with vigor, but the edge of their shovels was almost turned by the icy ma.s.s. Axes and crowbars would scarcely have made an impression on the hard-packed snow.

It was Ruth who pointed the right way. She picked up a hard lump of snow and sent it crashing through the rear ice-window!

"Trix!" she shouted.

"Oh! get me out! get me out!" the voice of the missing girl replied.

Another huge section of the roof, with the side battlements, caved inward; but it was a forward section.

The boys knocked out the rest of the broken ice around the window-hole and Neale leaped upon the sill which was more than three feet across.

The walls of the castle were toppling, and falling, and the lights had gone out. But there was a moon and the boy could see what he was about.

The spectators at a distance were helpless during the few minutes which had elapsed since the first alarm. n.o.body came to the a.s.sistance of the Corner House girls and the two boys.

But Trix was able to help herself. Neale saw her hands extended, and he leaned over and seized her wrists, while Joe held him by the feet.

Then with a heave, and wriggle, "that circus boy," as Trix had nicknamed him, performed the feat of getting her out of the falling castle, and the Corner House girls received her with open arms.

The peril was over, but rumor fed the excitement for an hour and brought out as big a crowd as though there had been a fire in the business section of the town.