and, as they neared the camp, saw Aunt Truth sitting at the door of Tent Chatter, looking the very picture of comfort, as she drew her darning-needle in and out of an unseemly rent in one of Dicky’s stockings. Margery and Polly came up just behind, and dropped into her lap some beautiful branches of wild azalea.
‘Did you have a pleasant walk, dears?’ she asked.
‘Yes, indeed, dear auntie. Now, just hold your head perfectly still, while we decorate you for dinner. We will make Uncle Doc’s eyes fairly pop with admiration. Have you been lonely without us?’
‘Oh, not a bit. You see there has been a good deal of noise about here, and I felt as if I were not alone. Hop Yet has been pounding soap-root in the kitchen, and I hear the sound of Pancho’s axe in the distance,—the Doctor asked him to chop wood for the camp-fire. Was Dicky any trouble? Where is he?’
‘Why, darling mother, are you crazy?’ asked Bell. ‘If you think a moment, he was in the hammock and you were lying down in the tent when we started.’
‘Why, I certainly thought I heard him ask to go with you,’ said Mrs. Winship, in rather an alarmed tone.
‘So he did; but I told him it was too far.’
‘I didn’t hear that; in fact, I was half asleep; I was not feeling well. Ask Hop Yet; he has been in the kitchen all the afternoon.’
Hop Yet replied, with discouraging tranquillity, ‘Oh, I no know. I no sabe Dicky; he allee time lun loun camp; I no look; too muchee work. I chop hash—Dicky come in kitch’—make heap work—no good. I tell him go long—he go; bime-by you catchum; you see.’ Whereupon he gracefully skinned an onion, and burst into a Chinese song, with complete indifference as to whether Dicky lived or died.
‘Perhaps he is with Pancho; I’ll run and see!’ cried Polly, dashing swiftly in the direction of the sky-parlour. But after a few minutes she ran back, with a serious face. ‘He’s not there; Pancho has not seen him since lunch.’
‘Well, I’ve just happened to think,’ said pale Aunt Truth, ‘that papa came into the tent for some cartridges, after you left, and of course he took Dick with him. I don’t suppose it is any use to worry. He always does come out right; and I have told him so many times never on any account to go away from the camp alone that he surely would not do it. Papa and the boys will be home soon, now. It is nearly six o’clock, and I told them that I would blow the horn at six, as usual. If they are too far away to hear it, they will know the time by the sun.’
‘Well,’ said Bell, anxiously, ‘I hope it is all right. Papa is so strict that he won’t be late himself. Did all the boys go with him, mamma?’
‘Yes, all but Philip.’
‘Oh, then Dicky must be with them,’ said Margery, consolingly. ‘Geoffrey always takes him wherever he can.’
So the girls went into the tent to begin their dinner toilet, which consisted in carefully brushing burrs and dust from their pretty dresses, and donning fresh collars and stockings, with low ties of russet leather, which Polly declared belonged only to the stage conception of a camping costume; then, with smoothly brushed hair and bright flower-knots at collar and belt, they looked charming enough to grace any drawing-room in the land.
The horn was blown again at six o’clock, Aunt Truth standing at the entrance of the path which led up the cañon, shading her anxious eyes from the light of the setting sun.—
‘Here they come!’ she cried, joyously, as the welcome party appeared in sight, guns over shoulder, full game-bags, and Jack and Geoff with a few rabbits and quail hanging over their arms.
The girls rushed out of the tent. Bell took in the whole group with one swift glance, and then turned to her mother, who, like most mothers, believed the worst at once, and grew paler as she asked:
‘Papa, where is little Dick?’
‘Dick! Why, my dear, he has not been out with us. What do you mean?’
‘Are you sure you didn’t take him?’ faltered Aunt Truth.
‘Of course I am. Good heavens! Doesn’t any one know where the child is?’ looking at the frightened group.
‘You know, uncle,’ said Geoffrey, ‘we started out at three o’clock. I noticed Dicky playing with his blocks in our tent, and said good-bye to him. Did you see him when you came back for the cartridges?’
‘Certainly I did; he called me to look at his dog making believe go to sleep in the hammock.’
‘We girls went down to the pool soon after that,’ said Bell, tearfully. ‘He asked to go with us, and I told him it was too far, and that he’d better stay with mamma, who would be all alone. He said “Yes” so sweetly I couldn’t mistrust him. Oh, was it my fault, papa? Please don’t say it was!’ and she burst into a passion of sobs.
‘No, no, my child, of course it was not. Don’t cry; we shall find him. Go and look about the camp, Geoff, while we consider for a minute what to do?’
‘If there is any fault, it is mine, for going to sleep,’ said poor Aunt Truth; ‘but I never dreamed he would dare to wander off alone, my poor little disobedient darling! What shall we do?’
‘Have you spoken to Pancho and Hop Yet?’ asked Phil.
‘Yes; they have seen nothing.’
Hop Yet just at this moment issued from his kitchen with an immense platter of mutton-stew and dumplings, which he deposited on the table. On being questioned again, he answered as before, with the greatest serenity, intimating that Dicky would come home ‘heap bime-by’ when he got ‘plenty hungly.’ He seemed to think a lost boy or two in a family rather a trifle than otherwise, and wound up his unfeeling remarks with the practical one, ‘Dinner all leady; you no eat mutton, he get cold! Misser Wins’, I no find pickle; you catchum!’
‘I don’t believe he would care if we all died right before his eyes,’ muttered Polly, angrily. ‘I should just like to see a Chinaman’s heart once, and find out whether it was made of resin, or cuttle-fish, or what.’
‘Well,’ said Phil, as Dr. Winship came through the trees from the card-room, ‘we must start out this instant, and of course we can find him somehow, somewhere; he hasn’t been gone over two hours, and he couldn’t walk far, that’s certain. Now, Uncle Doc, shall we all go different ways, and leave the girls here to see if he doesn’t turn up?’
‘Oh, papa,’ cried Bell, do not leave us at home! We can hunt as well as any one; we know every foot of the cañon. Let me go with Geoff, and we’ll follow the brook trail.’
‘Very well. Now, mamma, Pancho and I will go down to the main road, and you wait patiently here. Make all the noise you can, children; and the one who finds him must come back to the camp and blow the horn. Hop Yet, we go now; if Dicky comes back, you blow the horn yourself, will you?’
‘All light, boss. You eat um dinner now; then go bime-by; mutton heap cold; you—’
‘Dinner!’ shouted Jack. ‘Confound your impudence! If you say dinner again, I’ll cut the queue off your stupid head.’
‘Good!’ murmured Polly, giving a savage punch to her blue Tam o’ Shanter cap.
‘Jack,
