Page:Ralph on the Railroad.djvu/268

254 the creek. The spot was indescribably wild and lonely. Its picturesque beauty, too, interested the boys, and they were not averse to a halt in mid-stream, the horse luxuriating in a partial bath and enjoying a cool, refreshing drink.

Suddenly Ralph, who had been taking in all the lovely view about them, put a quick hand on Van's arm.

"Right away!" he said, with strange incision—"get ashore and in the shelter of the brush."

"Eh! what's wrong?" interrogated Van, but obediently urged up the horse, got to the opposite bank, and halted where the shrubbery interposed a dense screen.

"Now—what?" he demanded.

Ralph made a silencing gesture with his hand. He dropped from his seat, went back to the edge of the greenery, and peered keenly down stream.

He seemed to be watching somebody or something, and was so long at it that Van got impatient, and leaping from the wagon approached his side.

"What's up?" he asked.

Ralph did not reply. Van peered past him. Down stream about five hundred feet a human figure stood, faced away from the ford, bent at work over some kind of a frame structure partly in the water.