The Nowadays Girls in the Adirondacks 35 – Brownell · Verses Across
Literature · Crime, Thrillers & Mystery
The Nowadays Girls in the Adirondacks 35Recovery
18
Literature · Crime, Thrillers & Mystery
The Nowadays Girls in the Adirondacks 35
Recovery
BrownellEnglish
Sylvia was so overcome for the moment, not knowing what might be her further discovery, that she trembled violently, and swayed as though about to fall. Felton put out his arms to catch her, but she fought back the weakness and smiled faintly at him.
"I--I am all right," she assured him.
"Really?" he asked. Mrs. Brownley came hurrying up.
"What is it?" she asked.
"We--we have found him," whispered Sylvia. "But I am afraid, oh, I am so afraid----"
She did not finish, but they all knew what she meant.
Felton said not a word. He walked steadily up to the huddled figure lying under the ledge of rock. The sun was slanting into the niche.
Sylvia forced herself to follow him, and watched, as if fascinated, while her Knight leaned over the figure of her brother. Felton touched Roy with a tender hand, and then, after a moment--a moment of suspense--fraught with an agony that made it seem a year, he cried out:
"He's all right! He's alive--and sleeping!"
A silent prayer of thankfulness welled up, not only in the heart of Sylvia, but in the hearts of all her friends.
As they gathered around, Sylvia kneeling on the hard, stone floor of the niche beside her brother, he opened his eyes. And it needed but a glance to show that reason was again on her throne. He looked weak and emaciated and showed the effects of the terrible sufferings through which he had passed, but his eyes no longer glowed with the fire of delirium.
Roy sat up, gazed about him, but did not seem at all surprised at his condition or location--that is, for a moment. He looked at Sylvia recognisingly, and spoke coolly but in a weak voice:
"Hello, sis! How's everybody?"
Sylvia could not keep a tremor out of her voice as she answered:
"All well. And you, Roy?"
"Oh, I--I'm feeling better. I----" And then he seemed to feel the strangeness of his condition, and realise that something unusual had occurred. A great wonder showed in his fever-sunken eyes. He tried to get up, but fell back weakly. Sylvia put her arm under him, as did Felton, and they held Roy up together.
"Why--why--what has happened?" he stammered.
"Haven't you any recollection?" Sylvia asked.
"No. I--I----!"
He put his hand up to his head.
"Take it easy now, old man," said Felton, in a low voice. "Bring up that vacuum bottle, Carroll," he ordered. "A sip of hot coffee will warm you up, Roy."
Slowly Roy drank the hot beverage. The wonder in his questioning eyes grew, as he looked at Sylvia and her friends. The party had brought food with them, and Roy was given some sparingly, for it was evident that he was half-starved. Gradually a little strength came back to him.
"But what does it all mean?" he asked. "How did I get here? How did you get here, Sylvia? And Rose?"
He smiled at her, and put out his hand, which she clasped warmly.
"Look here, old man," said Felton. "I think explanations had better be deferred until you are a little stronger. We'll get some sort of a conveyance, and have you taken to the bungalow. You need a doctor, I'm thinking."
"Yes," answered Roy, in puzzled fashion. "I seem to remember something about a doctor. I know I went out in the woods to get something, but I don't recall what it was. It rained, and I walked about a thousand miles, I guess. Then I was very tired and I crawled in here. I must have slept the clock around, for it was sunrise when I came here, and it's sunrise again. But I can't understand it all. I feel a lot better--up here," and he put his hand to his head.
"Oh, I am so glad!" Sylvia murmured. She was sure her brother was now in his right mind, though very weak.
It would be a problem to get him back to the bungalow, but the boys helped solve that. They made a litter of some boughs and poles and carried Roy to the nearest road. Then some one went for a waggon, the bottom of which was filled with straw. Roy protested that he could sit up, but Mrs. Brownley took charge of him, as she knew something of nursing, and made him lie down.
"It's a pretty long drill to the Russman bungalow," suggested Felton. "Now there's a pretty good sanitarium, with some doctors our family know, not far from here. Why not take him there?"
"We will!" Sylvia quickly decided. Roy made no objection. He smiled up into his sister's face, reached out for the hand of Rose again, and seemed content.
The sanitarium of which Felton had spoken proved to be just the place for Roy. He needed medical treatment of a different sort from that his ailment had at first called for. The head doctor knew Sylvia's "Knight," as she laughingly called him, and the physician promised to give Roy every care and attention.
Sylvia and Rose arranged to stay at a boarding-house connected with the institution, while Mrs. Brownley, Alice and Hazel would return to the Russman bungalow, tell the good news, get their own belongings, as well as those of Rose and Sylvia, and join them later.
Felton and his chums would pilot the party to the "deserted bungalow," as it was occasionally called, and then they would return to their own camp.
These arrangements were carried out. On the way to the bungalow the party met some of the guides who were searching for the lost girls and Mrs. Brownley. The good news was soon spread, and again Old Sam blew the tidings on his conch horn. The search had ended.
"But, oh! I wonder if Roy will remember that missing formula, that means so much to him?" said Rose to Sylvia.
"It will be hard to say," was the answer. "We must not hope for too much."
Roy's physical improvement was rapid, once he was given the proper care and treatment at the sanitarium. The shock and exposure while wandering in the woods had restored his mind. He progressed every hour, it seemed, now that Sylvia and Rose were with him. Harry Montray was again to take up his quarters with his friend, and soon the party of Nowadays Girls was complete once more, with the addition of Roy and Harry.
As yet nothing had been said to Roy regarding the missing formula. His memory came back to him, and he recalled everything up to the time of rushing out of the bungalow in a delirium and off into the woods. What happened to him there, neither he nor any one else could say.
It was apparent that he had wandered far. What he ate, if anything, no one knew, but unconsciously he may have appropriated food from some camp from which the owners were temporarily absent. And finally he had wandered to Bald Mountain, and fallen into a natural sleep as the fever left him. Luckily he had not been much out in the wet, though heavy dews had drenched him.
Every day saw a further improvement in the invalid, until at last came a time when he could go out into the woods with his sister and the other girls.
And then, like a flash from a clear sky, there came to Roy that which he had found and lost--the memory of the formula.
They were all walking in the beautiful woods one day when Roy suddenly began sniffing the air, as though some new odour, different from that of balsam and fir, came to him.
"What is it?" asked Sylvia.
"That smell--what is it?" he demanded, sharply.
"Oh, it's a menthol pencil I'm using," said Mrs. Brownley. "I have a slight headache, and that nearly always cures it. It's simply menthol, and perhaps----"
"That's it!" cried Roy, interrupting. "That's where the whole trouble is! The menthol smell brings it all back to me--that and the name! It's methane--that's what I need to use to complete the formula! It's methane! That one element slipped from me, and I couldn't recall it to save my life. The mention of menthol brought it back to me, though methane isn't at all like menthol. It was just the smell and the similarity of names."
"But what does it all mean?" asked Rose, looking bewildered.
"It means that I have rediscovered the chemical formula I lost!" Roy cried. "It's complete now. I must write it down before I lose it again."
He scribbled some chemical symbols on a bit of white birch bark that Sylvia hastily tore from a tree for him, and put it in his pocket. But not before he had looked at it for a moment, murmuring:
"Ah, there you are! You shan't get away from me again! I have the lost formula! Now I'll show 'em what's what!"
"Oh, Roy, I am so glad!" cried Sylvia, her eyes bright with tears--tears of joy.
And Harry Montray rejoiced with his friend over the recovery of the valuable discovery. He insisted on sending a wire to the firm in New York, and Roy received a congratulatory telegram in response. It meant much to the firm, and more perhaps to Roy in the way of honour and wealth.
And now my little story is drawing to a close. Indeed there is really nothing left to tell. For with Roy's physical and mental recovery, which waxed more perfect every day, all the worriment of Sylvia and Rose, not to mention that of their friends, passed away.
Then came happy times for the Nowadays Girls and the boys; for the Knight of the Overturned Canoe and his chums came to see them quite often. Indeed, after Roy was able to leave the sanitarium he and Sylvia arranged to open a camp for themselves in the woods, and there entertain their friends. And this was done.
Canoeing, boating, fishing, long tramps in the woods, pleasant evenings about the camp fire, an occasional dance--all this made up the remainder of a happy summer.
"Well, how did you like my Adirondack outing?" asked Sylvia of her girl chums one day when, regretfully enough, they began to think of returning to the city and preparing for their college careers.
"It was just perfectly all right, my dear!" said Rose, as she went down the path toward the lake in response to a call from Roy, who was in a canoe.
"Couldn't have been better!" declared Hazel.
"And if I were only sure we would have as scrumptious a time next season I would be perfectly happy," sighed Alice.
"We shall go somewhere," Sylvia decided. "The Nowadays Club will live for many years. But we have plenty of time to pick out another place before next summer."
And those of you who care to follow the future fortunes, fun and frolic of our friends may do so in the next volume of this series, to be called: "The Nowadays Girls on Casco Bay; or, The Treasure Box of Orr's Island."
The outing was over. By easy stages Sylvia and her chums were returning from the Adirondacks. Once more they stopped at Saranac Inn. It was a night of the dance. Sylvia sat out on a veranda in the shadows.
"May I have this next waltz?" a voice murmured at her ear.
"What is it?" she asked. It will be noticed that she did not ask "who."
"A canoe glide," was the laughing answer. "May I?"
"You may," said Sylvia.
And, as she joined her companions in the room where the dreamy music called to willing feet, we will take leave of her and the other Nowadays Girls.
