The Mystery at Bob-White Cave

for a foothold, gained it, then lost it to swing again under the choking rush of icy water.
    Slowly, oh, so very slowly, it seemed she was being raised. Or did she only imagine it? Now cold water from below crept up her body as high as her waist.
    Suddenly the upward pull stopped. Her arms holding the rope slackened. I just can’t hold on any longer , Trixie thought. Oh , Moms! Daddy! Someone help me!
     

Lessons to Learn ● 16
     
    THE NOISE around Trixie grew louder and louder. Water splashed from above, gurgled from below, menacing, nearing. Voices... voices.... Mart shouted something. Honey screamed. Voices... voices... the rope isn’t moving up.... Mart’s drowned.... Honey’s drowned.... This awful... awful water.
    In her confusion, Trixie imagined she saw white shapes moving about her, clouds of white shapes, ghosts of people, ghosts of fish... ghosts... ghosts.
    Doggedly she held on; in frenzied desperation, she reached for a toehold, anything to propel herself upward from the swirling water, which was now up to her armpits.
    That ghostly light... voices nearer... then a vigorous sharp tug at the rope! The ghostly forms merged into a blur of head lamps. Strong arms reached for Trixie, pulled her over the edge of the sinkhole, and gathered her up.
    With a great sigh, Trixie opened her eyes and looked into Jim’s anxious green eyes. Quietness came. I’m safe, she thought, safe.
    Water covered even the floor of the entrance room as Jim carried Trixie outside and placed her on a pallet Honey had made of their sweat shirts. Then they all waited, watching carefully while she rested.
    The sun burst through the curtain of black clouds that had brought the cloudburst to swell the underground spring.
    “That rain was a hazard nobody thought of,” Jim whispered.
    “There we were, sheltered under the ledge, till Honey shouted for us,” Brian said in a low voice.
    “In the minute it took me to get inside, she could have drowned,” Bill Hawkins said. “What a guardian I turned out to be!”
    Honey said nothing but “Poor Trixie! Poor Trixie!” over and over again, till the refrain sparked Trixie’s sense of humor, and she sat up, laughing.
    “You look like Chinese professional mourners,” she said. “I’m all right. I’m a little damp, but I’m all right!” She stretched her arms, pretending'to feel her muscles. “What happened?”
    “What a girl!” Jim said. Then he told Trixie of the quick thunderstorm that had come up unexpectedly, just as it had the day after they arrived at the lodge. “It seemed as though the whole lake fell on us.”
    “We never dreamed you’d be in danger in the cave,” Brian said. “In fact, we remarked that it was fortunate you were under cover.”
    “We took cover under the ledge to wait out the storm,” Jim said. “Suddenly there was Honey, struggling through the downpour, calling for help.”
    “We ran to help, and then everything happened at once,” Brian went on. “There was Mr. Hawkins, flat on his face, trying to bring you up. And there was Mart, practically purple, holding on to the rope, the water gushing in, the stream roaring, a waterfall as big as Niagara pouring over the edge of a big hole, and Honey screaming that Trixie was down there!”
    “We don’t know what happened from then on,” Jim said. “We only know that we brought you up in time—thank God, in time!”
    “Did you save my fish?” Trixie asked.
    Her question, so anticlimactic, brought a burst of relieved laughter.
    “The fish and other stuff are in the bucket,” Mart said, “and their delicious food in this other bucket.” He tipped the bait pail so Trixie could see the squirming worms.
    “Oh, down at the bottom there are hundreds of ghost fish,” Trixie said. “Did I get any of them, Mart? I don’t seem to remember right now.”
    “Two ghost fish, a salamander, two white crayfish, and a bunch of round ghost worms,” Mart recited.
    “And a partridge in a pear tree!” Trixie mimicked. “But two fish are not enough. After that awful trip after them, we still don’t have specimens that’ll win the reward. Brian! Jim!” Trixie looked expectantly toward the cave. “I’ll bet that water’s gone down, now that the rain’s stopped.”
    “Good grief, Trixie! Go down that hole again? Not for a million miserable ghost fish!” Mart threw his hands over his head and made a gesture of complete bewilderment.
    “I didn’t mean go down right now,” Trixie