There's a lot of wild animals here, and they're biting my legs--oh!"

A series of piercing shrieks followed, showing that the poor child was terribly alarmed, if not seriously hurt; and the Captain saw that no time was to be lost.

"Can you reach her, Bob?" he sang out; "or see her, eh?"

"No, I can't get through these p.r.i.c.kly bushes, they're just like a wall!" replied Bob, fighting manfully through to get down to his sister's relief. "I can't see her a bit, either!"

"Humph!"

The Captain thought a moment, rather shirking going amongst the thorns.

"Ha, the very thing!" he exclaimed. "Hi, Rover!"

The dog, who had been barking and running here and there aimlessly, at once c.o.c.ked his ears and came up to the Captain, scanning his face with eager attention.

"Fetch her out, good dog!" he cried, pointing to the spot where the broken branch of the oak-tree had given way, adding in a louder voice, "Call him, Nellie--call the dog to you, missy."

A cry, "Here, Rover!" came from underneath the tangled ma.s.s of brushwood, borne down and partly torn away by Nellie in her fall to the depths below. "Come here, sir!"

No sooner did he hear this summons, faint though it was, from his young mistress, than any uncertainty which may have obscured his mind as to what the Captain meant by telling him to "fetch her out," at once disappeared; and Rover, uttering a short, sharp, expressive bark, to show that he now understood what was expected of him, boldly plunged into the thicket with a bound.

"Chuck, chuck, chuck! Whir-r-r-ur," and a blackbird flew out, dashing in the Captain's face; while, at the same time, another piercing screech came from Nellie-- "Ah-h-ah! Help!"

The old sailor was so startled that he jumped back, his hat tumbling off into a bramble-bush.

"Zounds!" he exclaimed. "What the d.i.c.kens is that?"

In a moment, however, he recovered himself.

"Pooh, what a fool I am!" he said, ashamed of the slight weakness he had displayed, and hoping neither of the boys had noticed it; and then, to show how cool and collected he was, he whistled up the retriever.

"Whee-ee-up, Rover, fetch her out, good dog!"

Rover did not need this adjuration, not he.

Even as the Captain spoke, there was a rustling and tramping in the thicket, accompanied by the snapping of twigs; and, almost at the same instant, the dog dashed out from amidst the brushwood with Nellie holding on to his tail.

"Oh my!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed d.i.c.k, rushing to her side; and, with the a.s.sistance of Bob, who also emerged from the p.r.i.c.kly cavern at the same time, she was got on her feet-- "Poor Nell!"

She presented a sorry spectacle.

Never was such a piteous plight seen!

Her face was scratched by the thorns, her clothes torn, and her hat had fallen off like that of the Captain, who had, by the way, in the flurry forgotten to replace his on his head, the venerable article remaining in a sadly battered condition where it had fallen.

On being released, however, from her predicament, Nellie treated the matter much more lightly than might have been expected.

She was a very courageous little girl now that she knew she was in safety.

But she was also, it should be said, blest, too, with great amiability.

"Oh, never mind the scratches," she replied, in answer to the Captain's inquiries. "I'm not at all hurt, thank you."

"How about those wild animals?" asked the old sailor smiling, "eh, missy?"

Nellie coloured up, but could not help laughing at the Captain's quizzical face, as he took up his hat gingerly and put it on.

"I--I made a mistake," she stammered. "I was frightened!"

At that moment, however, very opportunely, Master Rover, who had darted back into the thicket after reclaiming his young mistress, saved her all further explanation as to the unknown beasts that had caused her such alarm by appearing now in full pursuit of an unfortunate rabbit which, putting forth its best speed, escaped him in the very nick of time by diving into a hole on the other side of the knoll, contemptuously kicking up its heels as it did so, almost into his open mouth.

The mystery of Nellie's disappearance was thus satisfactorily solved.

She had fallen into an old rabbit-burrow.

The harmless little creatures, whom she had imagined to be making desperate a.s.saults on her legs and about to eat her up, too, were probably even more frightened than she was!

"Oh--oh, that's one of those ferocious wild animals, little missy, eh?"

chuckled the Captain. "I see, young lady."

"Yes, but they frightened me," pleaded poor Nell. "They moved about under my feet, jumping up at me, I thought; and it was so dark down there that I didn't know what they might be. You would have been frightened too, I think, sir!"

She added this little retort to her explanation with some considerable spirit, a bit nettled by the Captain's chaff.

"Well, well, my dear, perhaps you are right," he replied good- humouredly. "I also have a confession to make, missy. Just before Rover cantered up, with you holding on to his tail like Mazeppa lashed to the back of the fiery untamed steed of the desert, a blackbird flew out of your blackberry thicket, brushing past my face, and do you know it startled me so that I jumped back, losing my hat. So, you see, I got a fright too!"

"I see'd yer, sir," said d.i.c.k, the Captain looking round as if awaiting comment on his action. "I see'd yer done it!"

"And so did I," cried Bob, the appearance of whose face had not been improved by his struggles with the th.o.r.n.y bushes as he tried to force his way through them to Nellie's rescue. "I saw you too!"

"You young rascals!" exclaimed the Captain, shaking his stick at them.

"I thought you were looking at me! I suppose you'll be going and telling everybody you saw the old sailor in a terrible funk, and that I was going to faint?"

"Sure and that's what I feel like doing!" cried Mrs Gilmour in a very woebegone voice, she having only just succeeded in arriving at the scene of action, scrambling down with some difficulty from the top of the slope, the pathway being blocked at intervals by the struggling creepers which twined and interlaced themselves with the undergrowth, trailing down from the branches of the trees above, and making it puzzling to know which way to go. "I couldn't crawl a step further. What with scurrying to catch that dreadful steamboat, and then my fright of hearing the children scream, and now having to clamber down this mountain, I'm ready to drop!"

"Don't, ma'am, please," said the Captain imploringly; "you'll be sorry for it if you do. The ground is full of rabbit-burrows, and there are a lot of nettles about."

"Good gracious!" she exclaimed, looking round her in the greatest alarm, and drawing in the skirts of her dress. "Whatever made you bring me here then, Captain Dresser?"

"Well, ma'am," began the Captain; but Mrs Gilmour, who at that moment first caught sight of Nellie's face, interrupted him before he could get in a word further than, "you see--"

"Oh, my dearie!" cried she, in a higher key, forgetting at once all her own troubles; and, rushing up to Nell with the utmost solicitude, she hugged her first and then inspected her carefully, "what have you done to your poor dear face?"

"Oh, it's not much, auntie," said Nellie, just then busy arranging her dress. "I have only got a scratch or two."

"And your clothes too," continued Mrs Gilmour, her consternation increasing at the sight of the damage done. "Why, your frock is torn to shreds!"

"Not so bad as that, auntie," laughed the girl, but with a look of dismay on her face the while. "It is rather bad though."

"Bad," repeated her aunt, "sure, it's scandalous! And, say your brother, now--whatever have you both been about? His poor face is all bleeding, too!"