makes me so mad I can’t contain myself. Come, Margery, let’s be off. Get your shawl; and hurrah for the one who comes back to blow the horn first! I’ll wager you ten to one I’ll have Dick in auntie’s lap inside the hour!’—at which Aunt Truth’s eyes brightened, and she began to take heart again. But as he tore past the brush kitchen and out into the woods, dragging Madge after him at a breathless pace, he shut his lips together rather grimly, saying, ‘I’d give five hundred dollars (s’posin’ I had a cent) to see that youngster safe again.’
‘Tell me one thing, Jack,’ said Margery, her teeth chattering with nervousness; ‘are there any animals in this cañon that would attack him?’
‘Oh, of course it is possible that a California lion or a wild-cat might come down to the brook to drink—they have been killed hereabouts—but I hardly believe it is likely; and neither do I believe they would be apt to hurt him, any way, for he would never attack them, you know. What I am afraid of is that he has tumbled over the rocks somewhere in climbing, or tangled himself up in the chaparral. He couldn’t have made off with a pistol, could he? He is up to all such tricks.’
Presently the cañon began to echo with strange sounds, which I have no doubt sent the owls, birds, and rabbits into fits of terror; for the boys had whistles and pistols, while Polly had taken a tin pan and a hammer. She had gone with Phil out behind the thicket of manzanita bushes, and they both stood motionless, undecided where to go.
‘Oh, Phil, I can’t help it; I must cry, I am so frightened. Let me sit down a second. Yes, I know it’s an ant-hill, and I shouldn’t care if it were a hornets’ nest—I deserve to be stung. What do you think I said to Margery this morning? That Dicky was a perfect little marplot, and spoiled all our fun, and I wished he were in the bottom of the Red Sea; and then I called him a k-k-k-ill-joy!’ and Polly buried her head in her blue Tam, and cried a good, honest, old-fashioned cry.
‘There, chirk up, poor little soul, and don’t you fret over a careless speech, that meant nothing at all. I’ve wished him in the Red Sea more than once, but I’m blessed if I ever do it again. Come, let’s go over yonder, where we caught the young owl; Dicky may have wanted to try that little game again.’
So they went on, calling, listening, then struggling on again, more anxious every moment, but not so thoroughly dazed as Bell, who had rocked her baby-brother in his cradle, and to whom he was the embodiment of every earthly grace, if not of every heavenly virtue.
‘I might have known this would happen,’ she said, miserably. ‘He is so careless that, if we ever find him again, we must keep him tied to something.’
‘Take care of your steps, dear,’ said Geoff, ‘and munch this cracker, or you won’t have strength enough to go on with me. I wish it were not getting so dark; the moment the sun gets behind these mountain-tops the light seems to vanish in an instant.—Dick-y!’
‘Think of the poor darling out in this darkness—hungry, frightened, and alone,’ sighed Bell. ‘It’s past his bed-time now. Oh, why did we ever come to stay in this horrible place!’
‘You must not blame the place, dear; we thought it the happiest in the world this morning. Here we are by the upper pool, and the path stops. Which way had we better go?’
‘I’ve been here before to-day,’ said Bell; ‘we might follow the trail I made. But where is my string? Light a match, Geoff, please.’
‘What string? What do you mean?’
‘Why, I found a beautiful spot this morning, and, fearing I shouldn’t remember the way again, I took out my ball of twine and dropped a white line all the way back, like Ariadne; but I don’t see it. Where can it have disappeared—unless Jack or Phil took it to tease me?’
‘Oh no; I’ve been with them all day. Perhaps a snake has swallowed it. Come.’
But a bright idea had popped into Bell’s head. ‘I want to go that way, Geoff, dear; it’s as good as any other, and there are flowers just the other side, in an open, sunny place; perhaps he found them.’
‘All right; let’s go ahead.’
‘The trouble is, I don’t know which way to go. Here is the rock; I remember it was a spotted one, with tall ferns growing beside it. Now I went—let me see—this way,’ and they both plunged into the thick brush.
‘Bell, Bell, this is utter nonsense!’ cried Geoff. ‘No child could crawl through this tangle.’
‘Dicky could crawl through anything in this universe, if it was the wrong thing; he isn’t afraid of beast, bird, or fish, and he positively enjoys getting scratched,’ said Bell.
Meanwhile, what had become of this small hero, and what was he doing? He was last seen in the hammock, playing with the long-suffering terrier, Lubin, who was making believe go to sleep. It proved to be entirely a make-believe; for, at the first loosening of Dicky’s strangling hold upon his throat, he tumbled out of the hammock and darted into the woods. Dicky followed, but Lubin was fleet of foot, and it was a desperate and exciting race for full ten minutes.
At length, as Lubin heard his little master’s gleeful laugh, he realised that his anger was a thing of the past; consequently, he wheeled about and ran into Dicky’s outstretched arms, licking his face and hands exuberantly in the joy of complete forgiveness.
By this time the voice of conscience in Dicky’s soul—and it was a very, very still, small one on all occasions—was entirely silenced. He strayed into a sunny spot, and picked flowers enough to trim his little sailor hat, probably divining that this was what lost children in Sunday-school books always did, and it would be dishonourable not to keep up the superstition. Then he built a fine, strong dam of stones across the brook, wading to and fro without the bother of taking off his shoes and stockings, and filled his hat with rocks and sunk it to the bottom for a wharf, keeping his hat-band to tie an unhappy frog to a bit of bark, and setting him afloat as the captain of a slave-ship. When, at length, the struggling creature freed himself from his bonds and leaped into the pool, Dicky played that he was a drowning child, and threw Lubin into the water to rescue him.
In these merry antics the hours flew by unnoticed; he had never been happier in his life, and it flashed through his mind that if he were left entirely to himself he should always be good.
‘Here I’ve been a whole day offul good by my lone self; haven’t said one notty word or did one notty fing, nor gotted scolded a singul wunst, did I, Lubin? I guess we better live here; bettent we, Lubin? And ven we wunt git stuck inter bed fur wettin’ our feets little teenty mites of wet ev’ry singul night all the livelong days, will we, Lubin?’
But this was a long period of reflection for Master Dicky, and he capered on, farther and farther, the water sozzling frightfully in his little copper-toed boots. At length he sat down on a stone to rest himself, and, glancing aimlessly about, his eyes fell on a white string, which he grasped with alacrity, pulling its end from beneath the stone on which he sat.
‘Luby Winship, the anjulls gaved me this string fur ter make an offul splendid tight harness for you, little Luby; and you can drag big heavy stones. Won’t that be nice?’
Lubin looked doubtful, and wagged his tail dissentingly, as much as to say that his ideas of angel ministrations were a trifle different.
But there was no end to the string! How very, very curious! Dicky wound and wound and crept and crept along, until he was thoroughly tired but thoroughly determined to see it through; and Lubin, meanwhile, had seized the first
