The Moving Picture Girls Snowbound Part 15

"I don't know any of you, except Russ and Mr. Pertell," she said, for the manager and his helper had paid a visit to the place sometime before to make arrangements about using it.

"You'll soon know all of 'em," declared Mr. Pertell with a laugh. "I'll introduce you," which he quickly did.

"Now then, I expect you'll want to wash up," went on the hunter's wife.

"I'll have the girl show you to your different rooms, and then you can come down to supper. It's been waiting. What kept you? I'll have to ask you folks because it's like pulling teeth to get any news out of my husband. What happened?"

"A breakdown," explained Ruth, who took an instant liking to motherly Mrs. Macksey. "Oh, we had such a time!"

"Such a glorious time!" supplemented Alice.

"Here's a girl who evidently likes outdoors," laughed the hunter's wife.

"Indeed I do!" cried Alice.

There was some little confusion, getting the players to their rooms, because of the lateness of the arrival, but finally each one was in his or her appointed apartment, and trying to get settled. The rooms were small but comfortable, and the hunters who had built the lodge for themselves had provided many comforts.

"There ought to be a private bath for each one," declared Miss Pennington, as she surveyed her room.

"Indeed there ought," agreed her friend Miss Dixon. "I think this place is horrid!"

"How thoughtless and selfish they are," said Ruth, who shared a room with Alice.

"Aren't they! I think it's lovely here. Oh, but I am so hungry!"

"So am I, dear."

"Glad to hear it for once, Ruth. Usually you have so little appet.i.te that one would think you were in love."

"Silly! I'm going to eat to-night anyhow."

"Does that mean you are _not_ in love?"

"Silly!" cried Ruth again, but that was all she answered.

What a glorious and home-like place Elk Lodge was! Yes, even better than the best home the moving picture girls had known most of their lives, for they had spent part of the time boarding, as their father traveled about with his theatrical company, and who can compare a home to a boarding house?

Down in the big living room a fire burned and crackled, and gave out spicy odors on the great hearth that took in logs six feet long. And how cheerfully and ruddily the blaze shone out! It mellowed and cheered everyone. Even Mr. Sneed smiled, and stretched out his hands to the leaping flames.

As Ruth and Alice were about to go down, having called to their father across the hall that they were ready for him, there came a knock on their door.

"Come in!" invited Ruth.

"Sorry to trouble you," spoke Miss Pennington, "but have you any cold cream and--er--powder? Our things were left in the other sled--I mean all of those things, and Laura and I can't--we simply can't get along without them."

"I have cold cream," said Alice. "But powder--that is unless it's talc.u.m or rice----"

"That will have to do I guess," sighed the vaudeville actress. "But I did hope you had a bit of rouge, I'm so pale!"

"Never use it!" said Alice quickly. Too quickly, hospitable Ruth thought, for, though she decried the use of "paint," she would not be rude to a guest, and, under these circ.u.mstances Miss Pennington was a guest.

"You don't need it," the caller said, with a glance at Alice's glowing cheeks, to whom the wind and snow had presented two damask spots that were most becoming.

"The weather is very chapping to my face," the former vaudeville actress went on. "I really must have something," and she departed with the cold cream and some harmless rice powder, which Ruth and Alice used judiciously and sparingly, and only when needed.

The fine supper, late as it was, necessarily, was enjoyed to the utmost.

It was bountiful and good, and though at first Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon were inclined to sniff at the lack of "courses," and the absence of lobster, it was noticed that they ate heartily.

"There is only one thing more I want," sighed Paul, as he leaned back in his chair.

"What, pray? It seems to me, and I have been watching you, that you have had about all that is good for you," laughed Alice. "I have seen you get three separate and distinct helpings of fried chicken."

"Oh, I didn't mean anything more to eat," he said, quickly, "and if you are going to watch me so closely I shall have to cut down my rations, I fear. What I meant was that I would like a moving picture of this supper. It has memories that long will linger, but I fain would have a souvenir of it."

"Be careful that you don't get indigestion as a souvenir," laughed Alice, as he followed her sister from the table.

The dining room opened off the great living apartment with that wonderful fire, and following the meal all the members of the company gathered about the hearth.

Outside the storm still raged, and Mr. Macksey, who came in from having with his men, put away the horses, reported that the blizzard was growing worse.

"It's a good thing we thought of changing the bobs and coming on," he said. "Otherwise we might be there yet."

"What really happened?" asked his wife. "I was telling one of the young ladies that it was like pulling teeth to get any news out of you."

"Oh, we just had a little breakdown," he said. "Now, folks, just make yourselves at home. Go to bed when you like, get up when you please.

I'll try and get the rest of your baggage here some time to-morrow, if this storm lets up."

"I hope you do get it," complained Miss Pennington.

"Selfish thing!" whispered Alice. "All she wants is her paint!"

"Hush," cautioned Ruth. "She'll hear you!"

"I don't care," voiced her sister.

They talked of many things as they sat about the fire, and then Mr.

Pertell said:

"We will film no dramas while the storm continues, but as soon as we can get out on the ice I want to start one."

"Is there skating about here?" asked Alice, who was very fond of the sport.

"There's a fine lake back of the lodge," replied Mr. Macksey, "and as soon as the storm lets up I'll have the men clear a place of snow, and you can have all the fun you want."

"Oh, joy!" cried Alice.

"Save me the first skate," whispered Paul to her, and she nodded acquiescence.

Mr. Pertell briefly outlined the drama he expected to film on the ice, and then, after a little more talk, every one voted that bed was the best place in the world. For the wind had made them all sleepy, and they were tired out from the storm and their long journey.