The Red Signal (Grace Livingston Hill Book) (15 page)

The boy looked alertly down the track.

“It's a long way back, mother. You stay here and I'll run up to that little house on the hill and ask.”

The mother looked up at the hill house again and shook her head.

“Oh, I don't think I would. There might be bulldogs up there, Karl, and I should be frightened to death if they came after you. No; we'll walk back this way. I'm sure there was a village back there and we can hire a carriage and drive to the right place. It won't cost much in the country, and that will be much better than hunting around everywhere and asking people who don't know anything.”

Karl gave a lingering look at the house on the hill, put his two fingers in his mouth and brought forth a long, peculiar whistle.

“There! If Hilda's around she'll hear that awl come to the door!” he said as he turned reluctantly to follow his mother down the track.

“But Hilda wouldn't be in a house like that, dear,” said the mother smiling. “Your uncle said it was a very nice place.”

“You can't most always be sure about Uncle Otto,” said the boy shrewdly. “Look at that asylum! Good night! He thought that was good .enough for you!”

“I really don't believe your Uncle Otto knew how had things were there, dear. I'm sure he didn't.”

“Then why didn't you tell him and have him getcha a better place?”

“Well, dear, I thought it was best not to trouble him any more. He is a busy man, and I thought we would just come down and see how Hilda was fixed, and then find a nice place near her. We'll get a couple of rooms for the present, and I can do sewing and embroidery, and by and by we will save up and all be together again.”

“Well, all right. Only I'm going to get a place to work on the farm and begin to earn, too, right away! Remember that! I'm no baby any more. I'm nine years old, and it's time I was taking care of you!”

The mother smiled indulgently, and they walked on down the track tugging a big valise between them.

Karl's whistle had brought the men in Schwarz's house instantly -to their feet, with Heinrich at their head, and they peered cautiously out the open door, with Mrs. Schwarz's tear-stained face looking out the open window, but when they saw nothing but woman and a child they melted back into the dusk of the room again, all but Heinrich, who stood on the porch watching them thoughtfully.

The mother and boy turned back once and saw him standing there.

“There! See! I'm glad you didn't go up to that house. I don't like the look of that rough man. Let's hurry away!” said the mother.

They walked for nearly half an hour without apparently getting any nearer to the little white village that hung like a mirage in a distant valley; then they reached a field of young corn where a laborer was hoeing quite near to the fence and inquired the way.

They turned reluctantly back again, drooping wearily on the side that carried the valise, the boy tugging to get the whole weight away from his mother, and she in turn lifting her side higher than need be so the weight would not fall upon the boy.

“It must have been further on in the other direction,” said the mother with a troubled look at the long blinding track beaten upon by the high sun.

“I'll bet it was that ugly little house on the hill,” said Karl. “I'll bet it was just some more of Uncle Otto's big talk!”

“Hush, dear! We mustn't judge before we know! Maybe we'll find her in a lovely big white farm house with green blinds and a stone walk and hedges, and white hens walking around the thick grass on yellow kid feet. That's what I've always dreamed of a farm house being. And a cow that gives cream, and a row of bright milk pans, and a bright little garden close to the carriage drive.”

“S'pose you don't! S'pose it's that house where she is?” asked the child after a long pause.

“Then I shall certainly take her away with me at once,” said the mother with spirit. “I couldn't think of leaving her in a place with a lot of men like that! We'll manage somehow. Hilda and I can get work. And you know I've got fifty dollars yet after buying our tickets. I didn't tell your uncle I had that. It seemed almost like deceiving him not to, but I thought if anything happened I'd like to be able to get to your sister at once without asking anybody for a loan. I worried a little bit about not turning that over to your uncle when he told us your father owed him so much, but you know really that was my own money. I earned it myself at embroidery. It wasn't your father's money. You don't think that was dishonest, do you, dear? I wouldn't like to do a thing that seemed that way to you, even if you are young, because you might think later when you grew up that it gave you an excuse for not being always perfectly honest.”

“No, mother! I think you were perfectly right I don't think Uncle Otto had any business with our money, anyway. I don't believe father owed him all that! I believe he's a—he's a—well, mother, anyhow I hate him! I do! I just hate him for letting you and me go to that horrid old 'sylum and sending Hilda off alone when she wanted to teach!”

He stopped short on the track and, setting down the bag, mopped his hot young forehead defiantly.

“There, there, dear! We better not talk about him any more. It isn't right. And besides we don't know. We just think, and that's wicked to think evil of people. Let's talk about the day. Isn't it beautiful off on that hill? See those clouds.”

“It's hot!” said the boy, “and you're tired. Gee! When I get to that farm house where you say Hilda is, I'm going to lie down in that thick green grass and let the hens walk over me with their yellow kid gloves while you go in and find her. I'm hot and sleepy.”

They walked on back to Platt's Crossing and then more slowly on down the track, looking ahead.

“There aren't any houses over there at all, mother! It's just woods and a bridge!” declared the boy, after they had travelled, anxiously for another five minutes. “We'll just have to go up to that house and ask. You couldn't ever walk over that railroad bridge; it would make you dizzy.”

“Well, we'll go together then,” said the mother with determination.

Once more they turned back and this time climbed the path up to the Schwarz house.

MRS. SCHWARZ sat gloomily on the porch paring potatoes and heaving deep sighs of despair. She did not see her visitors until they were almost upon her.

“Can you tell me where Mr. Schwarz lives?” asked a clear voice in German, and she looked up startled.

She surveyed her visitors stolidly, but finally admitted that Mr. Schwarz was not at home.

“Oh! Then he lives here!” The visitor caught her breath sorrowfully and looked at the boy with a faint smile of apology.

“I have come to see my daughter, Hilda,” she said to Mrs. Schwarz. “I am Mrs. Lessing. Will you be kind enough to tell her we are here?”

But Mrs. Schwarz did not move. A great wave of dark red swept up over her swarthy countenance and her under lip came out uglily:

“Your taughter iss not here!” she hissed. “I know nodding apout her!”

“Oh, then perhaps there is another Mr. Schwarz near here! Could you direct us?”

Up the track beyond the station rumbled the two o'clock freight, not stopping at the station, but rattling noisily by; and opposite the house came the clear, piercing whistle, three long blasts and two short ones. But for once Mrs. Schwarz did not look toward the train at the signal. She rose from her chair, letting fall her pan of potatoes with a. clatter, and came toward her visitor angrily:

“No, there iss no other Mr. Schwarz, and I know nodding apout your taughter. Get you gone! Ye do nod like gumpany! My man vill be home soon und he vill nod haf beeble around! Your daughter Hilda vat you call her iss nod here!”

She was speaking in broken English, perhaps to stop her visitor from talking German, and she looked wildly toward the garden where the men were working. She did not notice that the little boy had slipped away around the house. His mother stepped back courteously from the porch:

“Oh, but I have not come to stay with you. I am not company. I shall make you no trouble. I. merely wish to speak with my daughter a moment,” she said in English with a quiet dignity that checked Mrs. Schwarz for a moment.

“I dell you she iss nod here! Your taughter iss nod here!” reiterated the overwrought woman.

The freight train a rod or two from the bridge had come to a sudden halt. Train hands with red flags ran out ahead and behind, and the engineer leaped out of the cab and slid down the cinder parapet to the fence, which he vaulted easily and came striding up through the furrows of plowed ground, making short work of the trip. But neither Mrs. Schwarz nor her visitor noticed. Down behind the powder house Heinrich, carefully hidden in the bushes, with a pair of field glasses, studied the train. It happened that the engineer's route or travel was hidden by a row of elderberry bushes in full leaf and bloom. Heinrich was worried about those flagmen, but he did not see the engineer.

The engineer made straight for the house, approaching it from, the side where Hilda's window looked. He came flying along with his eyes on a little red signal fluttering languidly from the window, and he was so intent upon it that he almost fell over a small boy who stood under the window also looking at the red_ signal.

"

“Hullo!” said the engineer, catching himself just in time. “What are you doing here?”

The boy looked up loftily:

“I'm looking for my sister. The woman out there on the porch says she isn't here, but I know she is, for there's her scarf up there in the window. I know it, for it used to be mine. I guess I couldn't make a mistake about a scarf I hated and used to wear to school and the fellahs all made fun of, could I?”

“Well, I rather guess not,” said the engineer heartily. “Say, young chap, what's her name?”

“Hilda Lessing,” said the boy, eyeing him suspiciously.

“Well, I'm looking for your sister, too, and it's that very scarf that brought me. She agreed if anything went wrong with her to hang out a red signal and when I saw that I thought she might be in trouble. You're sure that's hers, are you?”

“Sure!” said the boy scornfully.

“Well, then, here goes. Have you called her?” The boy nodded disconsolately.

“And she didn't answer. Well, suppose you shin up on my shoulder and get in at that window and see if there is anything else of hers up there in that room. If there is, we'll find out where she is or we'll know the reason why.”

The boy gave the stranger's clear brown eyes one searching look, sprang into his arms and scrambled up to his shoulders. Slowly, carefully, he was lifted up till his fingers grasped the windowsill and he could pull himself up and look in.

“Nope!” he said disconsolately, shaking his head. “Nothing! Aw, wait! Here's a handkerchief. Yes, that's Hilda's. It's got her name written on the corner in mother's writing.”

“Reach in and get it, old man., and get a hustle on; someone might be coming, and we'd rather catch them than have them catch us.”

The boy struggled a moment and reached a handkerchief down on the floor by the window where Hilda had dropped it. Then slowly he was lowered till he sprang to the ground. A strange, hollow sound reverberated under his feet as he dropped, and he looked down doubtfully, stamping at something hard under the earth.

“Gee! That sounded funny!” he said.

“It certainly did,” said the engineer, looking thoughtfully up to the window and down to the ground again. Then he drew out a crumpled sheet of paper and glanced over some writing on it. He put the paper back in his pocket, and, stooping down, began to dig in the soft earth with his hands.

“We'll investigate this matter,” he said cheerfully, “but don't make any noise. I have an idea.”

Carefully he lifted out two cabbage plants and laid them to one side, then scooped away the earth and revealed a big iron ring.

“Just as I thought!” he remarked. Then, looking up, “Say, son, just cast your eye about and see if anyone is watching. Give me the high sign if you see anybody.”

The boy looked cautiously around and the digging went on rapidly. A moment more and the engineer lifted up the iron cover and peered down the ladder into the hole.

“Just one second more, son,” he said softly. “You're on guard. I'm going down. If anyone comes, whistle!"

He disappeared down the hole and. Karl stood by, his eyes large with wonder. He stood his guard faithfully, looking in every direction, almost holding his breath in his earnestness. In a moment more the young man was back again, springing up the ladder and putting the iron lid back into place with set jaw and a light of battle in his eye.

“Just help me camouflage this up, won't you, son? We've got to cover our tracks and then beat it. No, your sister isn't down there. I guess she's all right. Anyhow, we're going to find her. Just band me that off-cabbage, will you? Smooth that side up. Don't leave any footprints. Now, we're ready. Take your scarf around to mother and see what she says.”

Mrs. Lessing was standing in the path a little way from the house, a look of mingled distress and dignity upon her gentle face when Karl shot around the corner of the house waving the scarf.

“Mother, she's here all right, somewhere. See what I found in her window!” he shouted.

Mrs. Lessing grasped the scarf and looked up frightened.

“It is my daughter's scarf!

Then, seeing the engineer, she appealed to him. “Sir, I wonder if you could help me to find my daughter. She is staying with some people named Schwarz on a farm at Platt's Crossing, and this woman says she is not here.”

The young man flashed a courteous smile at the woman, noting with satisfaction that she looked as much of a lady as did her sweet young daughter, and then turned to Mrs. Schwarz, large and red and towering on her porch.

“You are Mrs. Schwarz, aren't you?” he hazarded.

Mrs. Schwarz did not answer.

“Well, Mrs. Schwarz,” went on the young man commandingly, “you will have to tell us at once where Miss Hilda Lessing is or you will find yourself in serious trouble. We have found her scarf and a handkerchief with her name on it, and it is of no use whatever for you to deny that she is here. Will you call her at once or shall I send for the sheriff and have you arrested?