The Moving Picture Girls Under the Palms Part 22

"I know a way, Ruth," declared Alice. "We have on two skirts. The under one is of heavy cloth. Couldn't we tear those into strips--?"

"Of course! How wise of you to think of it!" replied the other girl.

"Daddy, we can provide a rope!" she cried, and she quickly whispered to him what Alice had suggested.

"The very thing!" he agreed. "Quick, slip behind the bushes there and remove your underskirts. I'll have my knife ready to slit it into strips."

While the two moving picture girls retired for a moment their father quickly explained their plan.

"And you may have our skirts, too," said Miss Pennington. "Only mine is of such thin material--"

"So is mine, unfortunately," added Miss Dixon.

"Fortunately I think the two skirts of my daughters will be sufficient,"

said Mr. DeVere, as he opened his keen-bladed knife.

"Oh, I am going down!" cried Mr. Bunn, in anguished tones.

"Here are the skirts!" cried Alice, as she came out with her own and Ruth's over her arm.

Ready hands aided Mr. DeVere in cutting the stout material into strips that were quickly knotted together, making a strong rope.

"It's a shame to spoil your suit," said Paul to Alice.

"It doesn't matter. The skirts were only cheap ones, of khaki cloth, but they are very strong. I am glad we wore them."

"And I guess Mr. Bunn will be, too," added the young actor.

"Now we'll have you out!" cried Mr. DeVere, as he flung one end of the novel rope to the actor in the bog. Mr. Bunn caught it, and, at the direction of Mr. Pertell, looped it about his chest, just under his arms.

"Now, all pull together!" cried the manager. "But take it gradually, until we see what strain this rope will stand."

Indeed a slow, gradual pull was the only feasible method of releasing Mr.

Bunn. But with the rope around him, he felt that he was going to be saved, and did not struggle so violently.

Often when one gets into a quicksand bog the more one struggles the faster and deeper one sinks. Only it is almost impossible not to struggle against the impending fate.

With the skirt-rope about him, and his friends pulling on it, Mr. Bunn's hand were free. Seeing this, and realizing that the more force that was applied, up to a certain point, the sooner would the actor be freed, Ruth cried:

"If we had another rope we girls could help, and Mr. Bunn could hold on to it with his hands," for she and her sister, as well as Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon, were doing nothing.

"Let's go to the steamer and get one," proposed Miss Dixon.

"It would be too late," declared Alice. Then, as she looked about the little clearing where the accident had taken place she saw, dangling from a tree, a long vine of some creeping plant. There were several stems twined together.

"There's our rope!" she cried. "That vine!"

"Oh, Alice! How splendid!" exclaimed her sister. "You think of everything!"

"Well, let's stop thinking, and work!" suggested the younger girl. "They need all the help they can get to pull Mr. Bunn out of that bog."

Together the girls managed to get off a long piece of the stout vine, which made a most excellent subst.i.tute for a rope.

"I suppose if I had thought of this first we needn't have cut our skirts," said Alice.

"I'm not sorry we didn't," was her sister's reply.

"Nor am I!"

"Catch this, Mr. Bunn!" called Alice, as with the vine rope she went as near the bog hole as was safe.

"Good idea! Great!" cried Mr. Pertell. "You moving picture girls are as good as men!"

"Better!" declared Mr. Bunn, who was over his fright now. He caught the end of the vine Alice flung to him, and held on grimly as the four girls prepared to tug on their portion.

With this added strength the plight of the actor was soon relieved.

Slowly but surely he was pulled from the sticky mud, and, a little later, he was safely hauled out on the firm bank.

"Thank the Lord for that!" exclaimed Mr. Pertell, reverently, as he saw that his employe was safe. "I should never have forgiven myself if--if anything had happened to you. For it was my suggestion that you go in the bog. My dear man, can you forgive me?" and he held out his hand to Mr.

Bunn, while his voice grew husky, and there was a suspicious moisture in his eye.

"That's all right," responded Mr. Bunn, generously, and he seemed to have added something to his nature through his nerve-racking experience. He had been near death, or at least the possibility of it, and it had meant much to him.

"Don't blame yourself, Mr. Pertell," he went on. "I went into the hole with my eyes open. Neither of us knew the quicksand was there. And I suppose we must accept with this business the risks that go with it."

"Yes, it is part of the game," admitted the manager; "but I want none of my players to take unnecessary risks. I shall be more careful in the future."

Mr. Bunn was quite exhausted from his experience, and, as the affair had tried the nerves of all, it was decided to give up picture work for the rest of the day.

"I can't help regretting, though," said Mr. Pertell, as they were on their way back to the steamer, "that we didn't get a moving picture of that. It would have made a great film--better even than the one I had planned."

"Oh, but I did get views of it!" cried Russ, with a laugh, that did much to relieve the strain they were all under.

"You did!" exclaimed the manager, in surprise.

"Yes," went on the young operator, "when I saw that there were enough of you hauling Mr. Bunn out, I thought I might as well take advantage of the situation and get pictures. So I have the whole rescue scene here,"

and he tapped his moving picture camera.

"I am glad you have!" exclaimed the Shakespearean actor, heartily. "As long as I had to go through with it we might as well have the Comet Company get the benefit of it."

Back through the tropical forest and swamp they went, until they reached the steamer. There Mr. Bunn and Mr. Towne enjoyed the luxury of a good bath, and their clothes were cleaned.

Alice came in for much praise, for it was her quick wit, in a way, that had enabled Mr. Bunn to be so promptly saved.

"And to replace your daughters' spoiled skirts, Mr. DeVere," said the manager, in speaking of the matter later, "I beg that I may be allowed to get them whole new suits."

"Oh, that is too much," protested the actor.

"Indeed it is not!" declared Mr. Pertell. "I am also going to give each player a bonus on his or her salary, and to Mr. Bunn, for what he suffered, a special bonus."