Ruth Fielding in Moving Pictures by Alice Emerson

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She did not spend all her time fishing, but ran about and examined the
early plants and sprouting bushes, and woke up the first violets and
searched for May flowers, which, of course, she did not find. Squirrels
chattered at them, and a blue jay hung about, squalling, evidently hoping
for crumbs from their lunch. Only there were no crumbs of Curly's frugal
bologna and crackers left.

When the sun was in mid-heaven the boy confessed to being as hungry as
ever, and tightened his belt. "Crackers don't stick to your ribs much," he
grumbled.

Ruth calmly began opening her box. Curly looked at her askance.

"You aren't figgering on going home _now_, are you?" he asked.

"Oh, no. I sha'n't go home till you do."

Then she produced from the box sandwiches, deviled eggs, a jelly roll, a
jar of peanut butter, crackers, olives, and some more of Mrs. Smith's good
doughnuts.

"Old Scratch!" Curly ejaculated. "You're the best fellow to go fishing
with, Ruth Fielding, that I ever saw. You can come to _my_ parties any
time you like."

They spent the whole day delightfully and, tired, scratched, and not a
little wind-burned, Ruth tramped home behind Curly in good season for
supper at Mrs. Sadoc Smith's.

She did not tell the boy that the whole outing had been arranged the night
before with his grandmother before Ruth herself went to bed. Curly
expected to be "called down," as he expressed it, by his grandmother when
they arrived home. To his amazement they were met cheerfully and ushered
in to a bounteous supper on which Mrs. Smith had expended no little
thought and time.

Curly was stricken almost dumb by his grandmother's generosity and
good-nature. After supper he whispered to Ruth:

"Say! you're a wonder, you are, Ruth Fielding. Never anybody got around
Gran the way you do, before. You're a wonder!"

Helen and Ann met Ruth in great excitement. "Where under the sun have you
been--and in that ragged old gym suit?" gasped Helen.

"You look as though your face was burnt. I believe you've been playing
hooky, Ruth Fielding!" cried Ann.

"Right the first time," sighed Ruth, happily. "Oh, I feel _so_ much
better. And I know I shall sleep like a brick."

"You mean, a railroad tie, don't you?" demanded Ann. "_That's_ a sleeper!"

"Of course we found your note, and we told Miss Brokaw. But she's got it
in for you just the same," said Helen, slangily. "And only guess!"

"Yes! Guess! Ruth! Fielding!" and Ann seized her and danced her about the
room. "You missed it by being absent to-day."

"Oh, don't! Never mind all this! I'm tired enough. I've walked _miles_,"
groaned Ruth. "What have I missed?"

"Mr. Hammond is in Lumberton. He came to see you about the scenario,"
Helen eagerly said.

Ruth sat down and clasped her hands, while her cheeks paled. "It's a
failure!" she whispered.

CHAPTER XIX

GREAT TIMES

That was not so, however, and Helen and Ann soon blurted out the good
news:

"It's a great success!"

"He's going to bring up the company next week and make the pictures at the
Hall!"

"He's been with Mrs. Tellingham all the afternoon planning when the
pictures shall be taken, and how they shall be taken," Helen said. "I
guess it's _not_ a failure!"

"I should say not!" joined in Ann Hicks.

"Oh, girls!"

If it had not been for Ruth's long day in the open and the fact that her
nerves had become much quieter, she could never have forced back the tears
of relief that answered so quickly these reassuring words.

Then a great flood of thankfulness welled up in her heart. She had
accomplished something really worth while! Later, when she saw, on the
screen, the story she had written, she was to feel this gratitude and joy
again.

She went to bed that night and slept, as she had promised, until Mrs.
Sadoc Smith knocked on the door for them all to rise. She got up with all
the oppression lifted from her mind, and wanted to race the other girls to
the Hall before breakfast.

"It won't do for you, young lady, to go gallavanting into the woods with
Curly another day," said Helen, holding on to Ruth. "You're neither to
hold nor to bind after such an expedition. I say, girls, let's all go with
Curly next time."

Amy had been very sullen ever since the evening before. Now she snapped:
"I guess Curly didn't want her--or any of us. Ruth just forced herself
upon him. He doesn't like girls."

"Bless the infant!" said Ann. "What's got her _now_?"

"Jealous of our Ruth, I declare!" laughed Helen.

Amy burst out crying and ran ahead, nor did the older girls see her at the
breakfast table. Ruth was sorry about this. She had only then begun to win
Amy Gregg's confidence, and now she feared that the girl would be angry
with her.

That day, however, Ruth was too happy to think much about Amy Gregg.

Recitations went with a rush. Miss Brokaw even was disarmed, for all
Ruth's quickness and coolness seemed to have returned to her. She did not
fail once and the strict teacher praised her.

Besides, there was a long conference with Mrs. Tellingham and Mr. Hammond.
The scenario of "The Heart of a Schoolgirl" was to be filmed at once.

"We will do our best to release it for first presentation in six weeks,"
the producer said. "And I assure you that means some quick work. You
girls," he added, to Ruth, "must do your prettiest when we take the
pictures here. Your physical culture instructor will drill you in
marching, and forming the tableaux we require. Your exposition of the
legend of the Marble Harp is a clever bit of invention, Ruth, and in the
picture will make a hit, I am sure."

Of course Ruth was proud; why should she not be? But her head was not
turned by all the flattering things that were said to her.

The girls adored her. The fact that they were all working in unison toward
the rebuilding of the dormitory, removed from the daily life and
intercourse of the big boarding school one of its more unpleasant
features.

It was only natural that there should be cliques among two hundred girls.
But now rivalries were put aside. All were striving for the same end. Some
of the girls interested various societies in their home towns to hold
fairs and bazaars for the benefit of Briarwood Hall.

Personal appeals were made directly to every girl on the alumni list--and
some of those "girls" now had girls of their own almost old enough to
attend Briarwood.

By these methods the dormitory fund was swelled. In the results from the
moving picture drama, however, was the possibility for the greatest help.
Mrs. Tellingham risked rebuilding the dormitory on the same scale as the
burned structure, because of Mr. Hammond's enthusiasm over Ruth's
achievement.

The days of early spring passed in swift procession now. It seemed that
the longer the days grew, the faster they seemed to go. There were not
hours enough in which to accomplish all that the girls, who looked toward
graduation in June, wished.

Even Jennie Stone worked harder and took her school tasks more seriously
than ever before.

"But, see here!" she said to her mates one day, "here's some 'hot ones'
Miss Brokaw has been handing the primes, and I believe they'd puzzle some
of us big girls. Listen! 'What is longitude?' Sue Mellen came to me,
puzzled, about _that_," chuckled Jennie, "and I told her longitude is
those lengthwise stripes on a watermelon."

"Oh, Heavy!" gasped Lluella. "How could you?"

"Didn't hurt me at all," proclaimed Jennie, calmly. "And I told her that a
'ski' is what a Russian has on the end of his name. That quite
satisfiedski Miss Mellenski, whether it does Miss Brokawski or not!"

Mrs. Tellingham gave the school a serious talk the day before the film
company arrived to take the first pictures for Ruth's play. She read and
explained that part of the scenario in which the Briarwood girls would
appear, and begged their serious co-operation with the director who would
have the making of the film in charge.

Ruth still shrank from seeing Mr. Grimes again; but she found that, while
engaged in the work of making these pictures, he behaved quite differently
from the way he had acted the day she had first seen him on the bank of
the Lumano river.

He was patient, but insistent. He knew just what effect he wanted and
always got it in the end. And Ruth and Helen told each other that, ugly as
he could be, Mr. Grimes was really a most wonderful director. They did not
wonder that Hazel Gray expressed her desire to work under Mr. Grimes,
harsh as he had been to her.

It was difficult for the girls--even for Ruth who had written the
scenario--to follow the trend of the story of "The Heart of a Schoolgirl"
by closely watching the taking of these scenes in and about Briarwood
Hall; for they were not taken in proper rotation.

Mr. Grimes had his schedule before him and he skipped from one part of the
story's action to another in a most bewildering way, getting the scenes
about the school filmed in each "setting" in succession, rather than
following the thread of the story.

Nor could Ruth judge the effect of the several pictures. She was too close
to them. There was no perspective.

Sometimes when Mr. Grimes seemed the most satisfied, Ruth could see
nothing in that scene at all. Again he would make the participants go over
and over a scene that seemed perfectly clear the first time.

Hazel Gray and several other professional performers were at Briarwood and
had their parts in the scenes with the schoolgirls. Hazel played the
heroine of Ruth's drama, but Mr. Hammond had insisted upon Ruth herself
acting the part of the heroine's chum--a not unimportant role.

Ruth did not feel that she had histrionic ability; but she was so anxious
for the moving picture to be a success, that she would have tried her very
best to suit Mr. Grimes in any role. She was surprised, however, when he
warmly praised her work in her one scene which was at all emotional.

"You naturally feel your part in this scene, Miss Fielding," he said. "Not
everybody could get the action before the camera so well."

"'Praise from Sir Hubert!'" whispered Hazel Gray, smiling at her young
friend. "You should be proud."

Ruth was not quite sure whether she was proud of this unsuspected talent
or not. She had written to Aunt Alvirah about her acting in the play, and
the good woman had warned her seriously against the folly of vanity and
the sin of frivolity. Aunt Alvirah had been brought up to doubt very much
the morality of those who performed upon the stage for the amusement of
the public.

What Mr. Jabez Potter thought of his niece's acting for the screen, even
his opinion of her writing a play, was a sealed matter to Ruth; for the
old miller, as Aunt Alvirah informed her, grew grumpier and more morose
all the time. "He is a caution to get along with," wrote Aunt Alvirah
Boggs in her cramped handwriting. "I don't know what's going to become of
him. You'd think he was weaned on wormwood and drunk nothing but boneset
tea all his life long."

However, it must be confessed that Ruth Fielding's thoughts were not much
upon her Uncle Jabez or the Red Mill these days. The work of making the
pictures occupied all her thought that was not taken up with study.

Jennie Stone, Sarah Fish, Helen, Lluella and Belle, all appeared
prominently in the "close up" scenes Mr. Grimes took. In the classroom,
dining hall, the graduation march, and in the Italian garden scenes, most
of the seniors and juniors were used.

A splendid gymnasium scene pleased the girls, and views of the hand-ball,
captain's-ball, tennis and basket-ball courts, with the girls in action,
were bound to be spectacular, too.

These typical boarding school scenes closely followed the text of Ruth's
play. Hazel and Ruth were in them all; and on the tennis court Hazel and
Ruth played Helen and Sarah Fish a fast game, the former couple winning by
sheer skill and pluck.

Ruth naturally had to neglect some duties. Discipline was more or less
relaxed, and she lost sight of Amy Gregg.

One evening the smaller girl did not appear at Mrs. Sadoc Smith's after
supper. Of late the other girls had let Amy Gregg alone and Ruth had
ceased to watch her so carefully. But when darkness fell and Amy did not
appear, Ruth telephoned to the school. Miss Scrimp, who answered the call,
had not seen her. It was learned, too, that Amy had not been at the supper
table. Nobody had seen her depart, but it was a fact that she had
disappeared from Briarwood Hall sometime during the afternoon. Nor had she
been near Mrs. Sadoc Smith's since early morning.

CHAPTER XX

A CLOUD ARISES

While Mrs. Smith and Helen and Ann Hicks were "running around in circles,"
as Ann put it, wondering what had become of Amy Gregg, Ruth did the only
practical thing she could think of.

She hunted up Curly.

"Old Scratch!" ejaculated the boy. "I haven't seen Amy to-day. Sure I
haven't! No, Ma'am!"

"Not at _all_?" asked Ruth. "And don't you know where to look for her?"

"Oh, she'll take care of herself," said the boy, carelessly. "She isn't as
soft as most girls."

"But Mrs. Tellingham will be awfully angry with me," Ruth cried. "I was
supposed to look out for her when she came over here."

"Shucks!" exclaimed Curly. "Amy didn't want to be looked out for."

"That doesn't absolve me from my duty," sighed Ruth. "Haven't you the
least idea where she's gone?"

"No, Ruth, I haven't," the boy declared earnestly. "If I had I'd tell
you."

"I believe you, Curly."

"She and I haven't been so friendly," admitted the boy, in some
embarrassment, "since you went fishing with me that time."

"Goodness me! she's not jealous?" cried Ruth.

"I don't know what you call it," said Curly, hanging his head. "It's some
foolish girl stuff. Boys don't act that way. I told her I'd take her
fishing, too--if she'd get up early enough." Here Curly began to laugh.
"You can bet, Ruth, that wherever she is, she got there before dark and
won't come back until daylight."

"What do you mean?" asked Ruth, sharply.

"I know she's afraid as she can be of the dark. She's a regular baby about
that. Of course, she won't own up to it."

"Why! I never knew it," Ruth exclaimed.

"She wouldn't go fishing because I start so early--while it's still dark.
Catch _her_ out of the house before sun-up!"

"Oh, Curly! I blame myself," gasped Ruth. "I never knew that about her.
Are you sure?"

"'Course I am. She's scared of the dark. I can make her mad any time by
just hinting at it. So that proves it, don't it?" responded this young
philosopher.

"Maybe she has gone somewhere and is afraid to come back till morning,"
repeated Ruth.

"She's been after me to take her up to that dam where we caught the fish,
in the afternoon; but I told her we couldn't get home before pitch dark. I
ought to have taken her along, I guess, and said nothing," Curly added
reflectively.

"Last night she was talking about it. She said I should take her because I
took you there."

"You don't suppose she's gone clear over there by herself, do you?" Ruth
cried, in alarm.

"I don't believe she knows how to start, even," Curly said easily. "And I
told her last night she'd better not go anywhere till she got rid of that
sore throat."

"Sore throat!" repeated Ruth, with added worriment. "I never knew her
throat was sore."

"She told me, she did," Curly said. "It was pretty bad, I guess, too. I
guess maybe she was afraid to say anything about it. I don't like to tell
Gran when there's anything the matter with me. She mixes up such nasty
messes for me to take!"

"The poor child!" murmured Ruth, thinking only of Amy Gregg. "What _shall_
we do?"

"I'll get a lantern and we'll go hunt around for her," suggested Curly,
ripe for any adventure.

"But where will we hunt?"

"Maybe she's gone with some other girl somewhere."

"You know that can't be so," Ruth said. "There isn't a girl friendly
enough with her for her to say ten pleasant words to. The poor little
mite! I'm just as sorry as I can be for her, Curly."

"Well!" returned Curly, "what did she want to tell a story for? I know
what she did. She left the candle burning in her room because she was
afraid to come back to it in the dark after supper. I made her own up to
that."

"Oh! the poor child!" cried Ruth.

"And she didn't understand the electric light. They don't have electricity
in the town where she comes from; natural gas, instead. So that's the
_why_ of the fire," Curly said. "I picked that out of her long ago."

"And she was so close-mouthed with us!" exclaimed Ruth.

"She doesn't like it at Briarwood. She doesn't like the girls. She doesn't
like the teachers. Old Scratch!" exclaimed the boy, "I don't blame
her--and I guess I'd run away myself."

"You don't suppose she _has_ run away, Curly Smith? Not for _keeps_?"

"I don't know," answered the boy. "Her folks don't treat her right, I
guess. They sent her to Briarwood to get her out the way. So she says. And
she's afraid of what her father will do to her if he ever hears about that
candle and about how the dormitory got afire."

"That's why she wouldn't write to him for a contribution to the rebuilding
fund," cried Ruth.

"I guess so," said Curly. "She never said much to me about it. I just
wormed it out of her, as you might say. She isn't so awful happy here, you
bet."

"Oh, Curly! I blame myself," groaned Ruth.

"What for?"

"Because I ought to have learned more about her--got closer to her."

"You might's well try to get close to a prickly porcupine," laughed the
boy. "She'd made up her mind to hate the rest of you girls and she's going
to keep on hating you till the end of time. That's the sort of a girl Amy
is."

"And nothing to be proud about," declared Ruth, with some vexation. "Don't
you think it, Curly?"

"Huh! I don't. You're silly, Ruth--but I like you a whole lot more than I
do Amy."

"Goodness! what a polite boy," cried Ruth. "There's the telephone!"

She ran back upstairs, hoping the message would be that Amy Gregg was
found. But that was not it. Over the wire Mrs. Tellingham herself was
speaking to Ann.

"No, Ma'am. We don't know where to look for her," Ann said.

"We haven't any idea."

"Yes, Ma'am; Helen and I have looked. She hasn't taken any of her
clothes."

"Oh, goodness! you don't really suppose she's run away?"

"Do come here, Ruth, and hear what Mrs. Tellingham says!"

Ruth went to the telephone and heard the principal of Briarwood Hall
talking. What Mrs. Tellingham said was certainly startling.

It seemed that Amy Gregg had received a letter that afternoon. It was from
her father, and, of course, was not opened by the principal. But
afterward--after the child had disappeared from the premises, of
course--the letter came into Mrs. Tellingham's hands. It was found by Tony
Foyle down by the marble statue in the sunken garden. Evidently Amy had
run there, where she would be out of the way, to read it.

It was a very stern letter and accused Amy of some past offense before she
had left home. It likewise said that Mr. Gregg had received an anonymous
letter from some girl at Briarwood, telling about the fire, and about
Amy's supposed part in starting the blaze, and complaining that Amy would
not ask for a contribution to the dormitory fund.

Mr. Gregg was extremely angry, and he told his daughter that he would come
to Briarwood in a few days and investigate the whole matter. Why Amy Gregg
should run away was now clear. She was afraid to meet her father.

"Make sure that the poor child is nowhere about Mrs. Smith's, Ruth," Mrs.
Tellingham begged her over the wire. "I am sure I should not know what to
say to Mr. Gregg if he comes and finds that his daughter has disappeared.
The poor child! I shall not sleep to-night, Ruth Fielding. Amy must be
found."

Ruth felt just that way herself. No matter what her friends said in
contradiction, Ruth felt that she was partly to blame. She should have
kept a close watch over Amy Gregg.

"I let that picture-making get in between us," she wailed. "I'm glad it's
all done and out of the way. I'd rather not have written the scenario at
all, than have anything happen to Amy."

"You're a goose, Ruthie," declared her chum. "You're not to blame. Her
father's harshness with her has made the child run away. _If_ she has."

"Her own unhappy disposition has caused all the trouble," said Ann,
bitterly.

"Oh! don't speak so," begged Ruth. "Suppose something has happened to
her."

"Nothing ever happens to kids like her," said Ann, bruskly.

But that was not so. Something already had happened to Amy Gregg. She was
lost!

CHAPTER XXI

HUNTING FOR AMY

In spite of her seemingly heartless words, it was Ann Hicks who agreed to
go with Ruth to hunt for the lost girl. Helen frankly acknowledged that
she was afraid to tramp about the woods and fields at night, with only a
boy and a lantern for company.

"Come along, Ruthie. I have helped find stray cattle on the range more
times than you could shake a stick at," declared good-natured Ann Hicks.
"Rouse out that lazy boy of Grandma Smith's."

Mrs. Sadoc Smith had to give just so much advice, and see that the
expedition was properly equipped. A thermos bottle filled with coffee went
into Ruth's bag, while Curly was laden with a substantial lunch, a roll of
bandages, a bottle of arnica and some smelling-salts, beside the lantern.

"Huh!" protested the boy to Ann, "if she was sending us out to find a lost
_boy_ all she'd send would be that cat-o'-nine-tails of hers that hangs in
the woodshed. I know Gran!"

"And the cat-o'-nine-tails, too, eh?" chuckled the Western girl.

"You bet!" agreed Curly, feelingly.

They set forth with just one idea about the search. Amy Gregg, as far as
Curly could remember, had expressed a wish to go to but one place. That
was the old dam up in Norman's Woods, where he and Ruth had gone fishing.

They were quite sure that it would be useless to hunt for the girl in any
neighbor's house. And Mrs. Sadoc Smith's premises had already been
searched. They had shouted for Amy till their throats were sore before the
news had come from Briarwood Hall. The fact that Amy had been suffering
from a physical ailment, as well as one of the mind, troubled Ruth
exceedingly.

"Maybe she was just 'sickening for some disease,' as Aunt Alvirah says,"
the girl of the Red Mill told Ann Hicks, as they went along. "A sore
throat is the forerunner of so many fevers and serious troubles. She might
be coming down with scarlet fever."

"Goodness gracious! don't say _that_" begged Ann.

Ruth feared it, nevertheless. The two girls followed Curly through the
narrow path, the dripping bushes wetting their skirts, and briers at times
scratching them. Ann was a good walker and could keep up quite as well as
Ruth. Beside, Curly was not setting a pace on this occasion, but stumbled
on with the lantern, rather blindly.

"Tell you what," he grumbled. "I don't fancy this job a mite."

"You're not 'afraid to go home in the dark,' are you, Curly?" asked Ann,
with scorn.

"Not going home just now," responded the boy, grinning. "But the woods
aren't any place to be out in this time of night--unless you've got a dog
and a gun. There! see that?"

"A cat, that's all," declared Ruth, who had seen the little black and
white animal run across their track in the flickering and uncertain light
of the lantern. "Here, kitty! kitty! Puss! puss! puss!"

"Hold on!" cried the excited Curly. "You needn't be so particular about
calling that cat."

"Why not? It must be somebody's cat that's strayed," said Ruth.

"Ya-as. I guess it is. It's a pole-cat," growled Curly. "And if it came
when you called it, you wouldn't like it so much, I guess."

"Oh, goodness!" gasped Ann. "Don't be so friendly with every strange
animal you see, Ruth Fielding. A pole-cat!"

"Wish I had a gun!" exclaimed Curly. "I'd shoot that skunk."

"Glad you didn't then," said Ruth, promptly. "Poor little thing."

"Ya-as," drawled the boy. "'Poor little thing.' It was just aiming for
somebody's hencoop. One of 'em 'll eat chickens faster than Gran's hens
can hatch 'em out."

Pushing on through the woods at this slow pace brought them to the ruined
grist mill and the old dam not before ten o'clock. There was a pale and
watery moon, the shine of which glistened on the falling water over the
old logs of the dam, but gave the searchers little light. The moon's rays
merely aided in making the surroundings of the mill more ghostly.

Nobody lived within a mile of the mill site, Curly assured the girls, and
if Amy had found this place it was not likely that she had likewise found
the nearest human habitation, for that was beyond the mill and directly
opposite to Briarwood and the town of Lumberton.

They shouted for Amy, and then searched the ghostly premises of the ruined
mill. Years before the roof had been burned away and some of the walls
fallen in. Owls made their nests in the upper part of the building, as the
party found, much to the girls' excitement when a huge, spread-winged
creature dived out of a window and went "whish! whish! whish!" off through
the long grass, to hunt for mice or other small, night-prowling creatures.

"Goodness! that owl is as big as a turkey!" gasped Ruth, clinging to Ann
in her fright.

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