Ruth Read Online Free PDF Page A

hast done it
rarely!"
    Tom stood in childish dignity for a moment, facing his admirers;
then, in an instant, his washing-tub boat was whirled round, and he
lost his balance, and fell out; and both he and his boat were carried
away slowly, but surely, by the strong full river which eternally
moved onwards to the sea.
    The children shrieked aloud with terror; and Ruth flew down to the
little bay, and far into its shallow waters, before she felt how
useless such an action was, and that the sensible plan would have
been to seek for efficient help. Hardly had this thought struck her,
when, louder and sharper than the sullen roar of the stream that was
ceaselessly and unrelentingly flowing on, came the splash of a horse
galloping through the water in which she was standing. Past her like
lightning—down in the stream, swimming along with the current—a
stooping rider—an outstretched, grasping arm—a little life
redeemed, and a child saved to those who loved it! Ruth stood dizzy
and sick with emotion while all this took place; and when the rider
turned his swimming horse, and slowly breasted up the river to the
landing-place, she recognised him as the Mr Bellingham of the night
before. He carried the unconscious child across his horse; the body
hung in so lifeless a manner that Ruth believed it was dead, and her
eyes were suddenly blinded with tears. She waded back to the beach,
to the point towards which Mr Bellingham was directing his horse.
    "Is he dead?" asked she, stretching out her arms to receive the
little fellow; for she instinctively felt that the position in which
he hung was not the most conducive to returning consciousness, if,
indeed, it would ever return.
    "I think not," answered Mr Bellingham, as he gave the child to her,
before springing off his horse. "Is he your brother? Do you know who
he is?"
    "Look!" said Ruth, who had sat down upon the ground, the better to
prop the poor lad, "his hand twitches! he lives! oh, sir, he lives!
Whose boy is he?" (to the people, who came hurrying and gathering to
the spot at the rumour of an accident).
    "He's old Nelly Brownson's," said they. "Her grandson."
    "We must take him into a house directly," said she. "Is his home far
off?"
    "No, no; it's just close by."
    "One of you go for a doctor at once," said Mr Bellingham,
authoritatively, "and bring him to the old woman's without delay. You
must not hold him any longer," he continued, speaking to Ruth, and
remembering her face now for the first time; "your dress is dripping
wet already. Here! you fellow, take him up, d'ye see!"
    But the child's hand had nervously clenched Ruth's dress, and she
would not have him disturbed. She carried her heavy burden very
tenderly towards a mean little cottage indicated by the neighbours;
an old crippled woman was coming out of the door, shaking all over
with agitation.
    "Dear heart!" said she, "he's the last of 'em all, and he's gone
afore me."
    "Nonsense," said Mr Bellingham, "the boy is alive, and likely to
live."
    But the old woman was helpless and hopeless, and insisted on
believing that her grandson was dead; and dead he would have been
if it had not been for Ruth, and one or two of the more sensible
neighbours, who, under Mr Bellingham's directions, bustled about, and
did all that was necessary until animation was restored.
    "What a confounded time these people are in fetching the doctor,"
said Mr Bellingham to Ruth, between whom and himself a sort of
silent understanding had sprung up from the circumstance of their
having been the only two (besides mere children) who had witnessed
the accident, and also the only two to whom a certain degree of
cultivation had given the power of understanding each other's
thoughts and even each other's words.
    "It takes so much to knock an idea into such stupid people's heads.
They stood gaping and asking which doctor they were to go for, as if
it signified whether it was Brown or Smith, so long as he had his
wits about him. I have no more time to waste