The Corner House Girls on a Houseboat Part 13

She and Agnes had planned to leave their jewelry and some other articles of value in their safe deposit box, but had forgotten it until now.

The two older girls sallied forth with a large umbrella, which Agnes carried, while Ruth had the package of jewelry.

They were half way to the bank, no great distance from home, when suddenly a downpour began with the usual quickness of a summer shower.

"Hurry! Raise the umbrella!" cried Ruth. "I'm getting drenched!"

"Isn't it terrible!" gasped Agnes.

She and her sister stepped into the shelter of the nearest doorway for a moment. Something was wrong with the catch of the umbrella. Ruth was just going to help her sister raise it when suddenly two rough-looking men rushed from the hall back of the doorway in which the girls had taken shelter.

One of the men rudely brushed past Ruth, and, as he did so, he made a grab for the packet of jewelry, s.n.a.t.c.hing it from her.

"Oh!" screamed the girl. "Stop! Oh! Oh, Agnes!"

The other man turned and pushed Agnes back as she leaned forward to help Ruth.

Then, as the rain came down harder than ever, the men sped up the street, leaving the two horror-stricken girls breathless in the doorway.

CHAPTER IX

ALL ABOARD

For a moment after the robbery neither Ruth nor Agnes felt capable of saying anything or doing anything. Ruth, it is true, had cried out as the burly ruffian had s.n.a.t.c.hed the packet of jewelry from her, and then fear seemed to paralyze her. But this was only for a moment. In few seconds both she and Agnes became their energetic selves, as befitted the characters of Corner House girls.

"Oh, Agnes! did you see? He has the jewelry!" cried Ruth.

"Yes, I saw! He pushed me back or I'd have grabbed it away again! We must take after them!"

The girls started to leave, having managed to get the umbrella up, but at that instant there came such a fierce blast of wind and such a blinding downpour of rain that they were fairly forced back into the doorway.

And, more than this, their umbrella was turned inside out and sent flapping in their faces by the erratic wind, so that they could not see what they were doing.

"This is awful!" exclaimed Agnes, and she was near to crying.

"We must call for help," said Ruth, but they would have needed to shout very loud indeed to be heard above the racket made by the wind and rain.

A momentary glimpse up and down the street, when a view of it could be had amid the sheets of rain, showed no one in sight.

"What shall we do?" cried Ruth, vainly trying to get the umbrella to its proper shape.

At that moment the door behind them opened. The girls turned, fearing a further attack, but they saw Myra Stetson, whose father kept a grocery, and it was in the doorway adjoining the store that the Corner House girls had taken refuge.

"What is the matter?" asked Myra, when she saw who it was. "I heard the door blow open and I came down to shut it."

The Stetson family lived up over the grocery, where there were two flats.

"What has happened?" went on the grocer's daughter. She was rather more friendly with Agnes than with Ruth, but knew both sisters, and, indeed, Ruth was planning to have Myra on one of the Civic Betterment committees. There had been some little differences of opinion between Myra and Agnes, but these had been smoothed out and the girls were now good friends.

"We've been robbed! At least Ruth has!" exclaimed Agnes. "A ruffian took our jewelry box!"

"You don't mean it!" cried Myra.

"I only wish I didn't," said Ruth brokenly. "Oh, my lovely rings!"

"And my pins!" added Agnes.

"Tell me about it," begged Myra, and, rather breathlessly, the Corner House girls told the story of the a.s.sault of the two burly men in the doorway.

"They ran off down the street with the box of jewelry we were taking to the bank," explained Ruth.

"Then you'd better tell the police at once," advised Myra. "Come on up into our flat and you can telephone from there. Mr. Buckley is a special officer and he has a telephone. Father will send for him. Do come up!"

"Yes, I think we had better," agreed Ruth. "And we must notify Mr.

Howbridge. That is, if he hasn't left his office."

"If he has we can get him at our house," said Agnes. "We were just going to start on a houseboat trip when this terrible thing happened," she explained to Myra.

"Isn't it too bad!" said the grocer's daughter. "But do come upstairs.

Did you say the man came out of our hallway?"

"Yes," answered Ruth. "We stepped into the doorway to be out of the rain for a moment and to raise the umbrella, the catch of which had been caught in some way, when they both rushed past us, one of them grabbing the box from under my arm."

"And one gave me a shove," added Agnes.

"That's the most amazing thing I ever heard of!" declared Myra. "Those men must have been hiding in there waiting for you."

"But how did they know we were coming?" asked Ruth. "We didn't think of going to the bank with the jewelry ourselves until a few minutes ago.

Those men couldn't have known about it."

"Then it's very strange," said Myra. "I must tell father about it. There may be more of them hiding upstairs."

"Do you mean in your house?" asked Agnes, for they were now ascending the stairs, the refractory umbrella having at last been subdued and turned right side out.

"I mean in the vacant flat above ours," went on Myra. "It's to let, you know, and two men were in to look at it yesterday. They said they were from the Klondike."

"From the Klondike!" exclaimed Ruth, and she and Agnes exchanged significant glances.

"Yes. That's in Alaska where they dig gold, you know," explained Myra.

"I didn't see the men. Father said they came to look at the flat, and one of them remarked they had just come back from the gold regions. They didn't rent it though, as far as I know."

"Isn't that strange?" said Agnes slowly.

"Very," agreed Ruth, and, by a look, she warned her sister not to say any more just then.

They were ushered into the Stetson living apartment over the store and Mr. and Mrs. Stetson were soon listening to the story.