# Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp/Chapter 24
#### CHAPTER XXIV
##### THE SEARCH

It was a most anxious night for everybody at Snow Camp. The thought of the six girls adrift in the blizzard kept most of the household awake. Long Jerry Todd, the guide, remained in the kitchen, on the watch for the first break in the storm. The others retired, all but Mr. Cameron and Tom, who sat before the fire in the living hall.
"I couldn't sleep anyway," said Tom, "with Helen and Ruth out in the cold. It's dreadful, Dad. I feel that we boys are partly to blame, too."
"How's that?" his father asked him.
"Why, the girls were mad with us. I let Isadore go too far with his joking," and he told Mr. Cameron about the spoiled taffy. "If we hadn't done that to them of course they wouldn't have gone into the woods without us——"
"But I am afraid you lads would have been no more cautious than the girls," interposed Mr. Cameron. "This storm would have taken you by surprise just the same."
​"But we couLd have been with them and helped them."
"I have great faith in that little Fielding girl's good sense—and Madge Steele is to be trusted," said his father. "Don't blame yourself, boy. It was something entirely unforeseen."
Several times during the night Mr. Cameron tried to communicate with the neighbors over the telephone; but some disaster had overtaken the line and it probably could not be repaired until after the storm.
About five o'clock Long Jerry came into the room. He had been out into the storm, for he was covered with snow.
"How does it look?" asked Mr. Cameron, earnestly.
"She's going to break with sun-up," prophesied the woodsman. "I've been feeding the cattle and I've got the other men up. If it breaks at all, we three'll start for the neighbors and rouse a gang to help beat the woods."
"But hadn't we better try to find the girls at once, Jerry?" queried Tom.
"We'll need a large party, Master Tom," said the guide. "We must cover a deal of ground, and the more men we have who are used to the trail, the better. If it stops snowing we can get around to the neighbors on snowshoes easier than any other way. The drifts are packed hard. I ​had to tunnel out of the kitchen door. The snow has banked up to the second story gallery."
"They'll be buried yards under this snow," groaned Tom.
"Keep up your courage," said Long Jerry, cheerfully. "If them gals was sharp at all they'd find some shelter and make a fire."
"If they had matches," said Mr. Cameron, doubtfully.
"Ruth had matches, I know," said Tom.
"Oh, we'll find them safe and sound," declared the guide.
One of Long Jerry's prophecies was fulfilled within the hour. The storm broke. Tom had aroused his friends and the three boys had enlarged the tunnel through the snow from the back porch into the yard, and were shoveling a passageway to the stables. The last flakes of the blizzard fluttered down upon them, and the tail of the gale blew the clouds to tatters and revealed the almost black sky with the stars sparkling like points of living fire.
"Hurrah!" cried Bob Steele. "It's over!"
The guide and the two other men were already getting on their snowshoes, having eaten hurriedly by the kitchen fire. They started out at once to rouse the neighbors. By sunrise the sky was entirely clear and the visitors to the back-woods could climb to the second floor gallery of ​the lodge and look out over the great drifts. In places the snow was heaped fifteen feet high; but the men shuffled off over these drifts and back again as easily as they would have walked on six inches of snow.
They brought with them six other men, who all sat down to breakfast in the big kitchen, while Mr. Cameron and the boys and Mrs. Murchiston finished their meal in the dining-room. To the surprise of the visitors to the camp, one of the men whom Long Jerry had brought in to help find the girls was the Rattlesnake Man, as he was called.
"We found him poking about the woods by himself, sir," said Long Jerry, privately, to Mr. Cameron. "He says there's been a boy staying with him for a while back, and that he started out hunting just before the storm. The old hermit was looking for him. By what he says, I believe it's the same boy you folks was bringing up here—the one that claims to be Fred Hatfield."
"That poor fellow may have lost himself in the blizzard, too, eh?" returned the merchant. "Let us hope we will find them all safely."
In fifteen minutes the whole party started from the lodge on snowshoes, the boys dragging their toboggans and the men carrying food and hot coffee in vacuum bottles. They separated into ​four parties; the three boys and Jerry Todd kept together. Jerry believed that the girls would have drifted some with the storm and therefore he struck off due east from the house.
In an hour they came back to the bank of the stream near where Ruth and Reno had their adventure with the panther.
"If old Reno had been well enough to come with us, he would have scented them in a hurry," declared Tom. "See the creek! it's completely smothered in snow."
They followed the course of the stream for some distance and found the banks growing more steep. Suddenly Jerry began to sniff the keen air, and in a moment he cried:
"There's a fire near, boys. Somebody is burning pine boughs—and there isn't any house near, that I can swear to!"
They hurried on. Inside of half a mile Isadore descried a column of blue smoke ahead. They began to shout at once, and it was not long before answering cries delighted them.
"That's Madge yelling," declared Bob. "I'd know her warwhoop anywhere."
Tom had set out as fast as he could travel, the toboggan jumping after him over the drifts. Even Busy Izzy grew excited, and yelled like a good fellow as he joined in the chase. They all ran down the bed of the stream and reached a ​deep cut where the banks were very high on either hand.
Up the white slope of the left hand bank was a small plateau on which the fire was burning. Some sort of a camp had been established, surrounded by an embankment of tramped snow. Over this fortress the heads of all six of the girls became visible, all crying out to their rescuers in such a medley of exclamations that no one was understandable.
"Helen! Ruth!" cried Tom. "Are you all right?"
"We're right as right can be, Tommy," returned his sister, gaily.
"We're not!" squealed Jennie Stone. "We're almost starved to death. If you haven't brought anything for us to eat, don't dare come up here, for we've turned cannibals and we're just about to cast lots to see who should first be sacrificed to the general good!"
But there was more than laughter to season this rescue. Some tears of relief were shed, and even Isadore Phelps showed some shame-faced joy that the catastrophe had resulted in no worse hardships for the girls. He said to Heavy:
"I'm sorry I spoiled that old taffy. If you'd eaten your full share of that the other day, I expect you wouldn't have suffered so from hunger."
The only person who was seriously troubled ​by the adventure was the strange boy. He had suffered severely in the storm and now he could scarcely move for pains in his back and legs. Otherwise it is doubtful if he would not have run when he heard Long Jerry's voice among the rescuers.
"Great turtle soup!" roared the guide, when he beheld the shrinking, cowering boy. "How did you get here? Do you mean to say you are alive, Fred Hatfield? Why, they buried you——"
"No, they didn't!" snarled the boy. "They only thought they did."
"And you've let 'em think all this time that you were shot—and poor 'Lias in jail? Well! you always was a mean little scamp, Fred Hatfield!"
But Ruth would not let the guide scold the boy any more. "He's very sick, Mr. Todd," she said. "He'll have to be carried to the lodge. I believe it is rheumatism, and he ought to have a doctor at once."
"Lucky he is down and out, then," muttered the guide, "or I'd be tempted to lay him across my knee and spank him right here and now!"
The girls were very thankful indeed for the hot drink and the food that had been brought. Jerry signaled with his rifle and brought the whole party to the spot within the hour, ​including the Rattlesnake Man. But when the old hermit saw that the boy was found he would stop no longer.
"Let his folks look after him. I gave him shelter; but he's a bad boy, I reckon. And he doesn't like my children. I don't want anybody about my place that doesn't like my children. Now, that little girl," he added, pointing to Ruth, "she wasn't afraid of them; was you?"
"Not much," returned Ruth, bravely. "And I'm coming to see you again, sir, if I can."
"You may come at any time, and welcome," answered the Rattlesnake Man, with a low bow. "Maybe you would like to learn how to handle my pets," he added, with a queer grin.
"What, the snakes!" screamed Helen.
"No, I don't think I'd care to do that," replied Ruth.
"They would not hurt you—they soon learn to know their friends and they get to be as friendly as kittens," returned the hermit. "I have a name for each one of them," he went on, somewhat proudly.
"Maybe I'll—I'll look at them—but I won't want to touch them," answered Ruth. A few minutes later the strange Rattlesnake Man took his departure.
Fred Hatfield and the girls were all packed upon the sleds and drawn over the snow to the ​camp, where the rescued and rescuers arrived in safety before noon. But the girls had been through such an experience, and were so exhausted, that as soon as dinner was over they were commanded to go to bed, while one of the men started to town for a doctor to attend young Hatfield.
"And be sure and take this letter to the sheriff," said Mr. Cameron. "This foolish boy's brother must be released from jail at once. And if his folks want him, they can come here to Snow Camp and take him home," added the merchant, in some disgust. "I must say that it seems as though pity would be wasted on Fred Hatfield."