Читать книгу Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders on the Lost River Trail - Josephine Chase - Страница 7

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“Grace! Oh, Grace!”

After several hours of hard work assisting the women of the village to untangle the confusion of their homes, the contents of most of which were in the streets, Nora came running in search of Grace Harlowe.

“What is wrong, Nora?” begged Grace a little fearfully.

“Have you seen Stacy?”

“No. Come to think of it, I have not. Why, I haven’t seen him since last night, either.”

“Neither has anyone else, so far as I have been able to learn.”

“Are you positive that he did not go out with the men this morning?” asked Grace.

“They say he did not.”

“Chunky”—as his companions sometimes called him—“is probably asleep somewhere about,” suggested Emma Dean. “You know what a wonderful sleeper he is.”

“I doubt it,” answered Grace reflectively. “Was he in the creek?”

Nora said she did not know.

“That makes two of our party that are missing. What are we going to do?” begged Nora, tears of anxiety springing to her eyes.

“We will search for him in the vicinity of the village. That is all we can do. If we do not find him we simply shall have to wait until the men return to-night,” decided Grace.

“If Hamilton were only here he would know what is best,” complained Emma.

Grace gave her a look of rebuke.

“Mr. White probably will find the boy. He will leave nothing undone, of that we girls are certain, and we shall have to make the best of a bad situation, which may not be nearly so bad as it seems,” comforted Grace. “Come, let us take different directions and search the village and its immediate vicinity.”

“I have another one to demonstrate over now. I don’t want to demonstrate over Chunky, but I suppose it wouldn’t be honest not to,” complained Emma. “This is terrible.”

The girls separated and made a careful search about the village and out among the trees, as far from the village as they dared to go. There were still many little smouldering fires, but there was so little for them to feed upon that they could not spread.

Not a trace of the missing boy did the girls find, though there was plenty of tragic evidence of the deadly work of the forest fire everywhere they went. The girls returned, giving up the task.

“We must wait, and go on with our work. It will help to keep our minds from our worries. My husband would be a great comfort if he were here, for Tom is ever ready and resourceful,” murmured Grace.

“He is no better than Hamilton,” protested Emma indignantly. “What Hamilton doesn’t know about everything up here isn’t worth knowing.”

The girls laughed at Emma, who turned away, face flushed and eyes moist. They busied themselves all the rest of the day, but when night came on, the searchers had not returned. Shortly after nine o’clock, however, a shout told the anxious Overlanders that someone was approaching. It proved to be Hippy Wingate and his party. Hippy reported that they had not found a trace of Elfreda Briggs. He was shocked when he learned that Stacy also was missing.

It was an hour later when Hamilton White and his party of searchers came in. They were leading a bunch of horses.

“We got them all but one, folks,” he cried as the villagers and the Overlanders crowded about him and his party.

“But Miss Briggs!” wailed Nora Wingate. “Don’t tell me that—”

“She was not found on the left-hand side of the river. We followed Roaring River down to a point about fifteen miles below here. As you see, we got all the mounts but one, and that one evidently was swept away, else he would have been with his mates.”

White was speaking more rapidly than was his wont, and Grace was regarding him keenly.

“Did you know that Stacy Brown is missing also?” she asked.

The guide regarded her for a moment.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “Don’t be disheartened, Mrs. Gray. To-morrow I shall take the other side of the river and stay out until I get a definite line on what has happened. It would have been useless to remain out longer to-night.”

After a little, when he had answered many questions, White beckoned Grace aside.

“You are a level-headed woman, Mrs. Gray, so I think it best to tell you what I have discovered. I—”

“I knew you were keeping something back. Tell me. The truth is better than the suspense.”

“No, I don’t agree with you. I found Miss Briggs’ hat and her handkerchief on my side of the river. The men with me do not know this. The current on my side of the stream set into a bend at one point, then switched over to the right-hand side. That is why I am going down the right-hand side to-morrow. To me the finding of the hat is proof that our missing woman was really swept downstream, but my confidence in Miss Briggs’ cool-headedness is so strong that I believe she found a way to get out of the river.”

“I hope so,” replied Grace quietly. “By the same token, I think we shall find Stacy. If he succeeds in finding something to eat, he will remain where the food is until it is exhausted,” she added with a little smile.

“Just so,” agreed the guide. “I am more disturbed about possible peril to Miss Briggs after she escaped from the river.”

“Meaning what?” demanded Grace.

“That there is danger to the north of us—a peril worse than forest fires or wild beasts.”

“Yes, yes!” urged Grace.

“I mean the Murrays.”

Grace said she never had heard of them.

“They are notorious bandits, cutthroats, robbers, everything that is vicious. Did Miss Briggs wear any jewels?”

“She did—a diamond ring that is quite valuable, and a jewelled watch that was presented to her by the French government after she finished her work there with our college unit in the war.”

“They would kill for less than that!” was the disturbing announcement of Hamilton White, as he turned abruptly away.

Ham White did not wait until morning to resume his search. After taking a light supper, and packing some “grub” in his kit bag, he quietly forded the creek with one of the Overland ponies, then disappeared in the darkness, headed downstream. Only Lieutenant Hippy Wingate knew that he had gone. Ham White was headed towards an adventure that proved to be a thrilling one, both for himself and others.