"Well, yes," admitted Archie, with a sidewise glance at the girl. "We were stopping over yonder at a cabin—"
"Where I found you last fall."
"Yes. And anyhow—Alison left the other day, saying she was restless and was going for a walk." The boy shot a furtive look towards his sister. "She didn't come back, as she had promised, and so I started out that same night to hunt for her."
"Over this direction?" asked Dexter.
"It was dark," was the answer, "and I somehow lost the trail, and I've been just wandering the last couple of days—lost, I guess.
"Anyhow," Archie went on, wriggling a little under the corporal's iron scrutiny, "I happened into this neighborhood to-day, and discovered some tracks leading up the slope. I followed, just to see what there was to find out, and I came on this cave. I was looking around, trying to decide who had been here, and I caught sight of you two coming towards me. I saw you would pass this place, and I hid, and—" He smiled ruefully. "Well, you know the rest."
The boy faced about to survey his sister. "What became of you, Alison?" he asked somewhat pettishly. "If you hadn't gone running off that way we wouldn't have gotten into this mess."
"I'm sorry, Archie," she returned gently. "It was my fault, and yet—I couldn't foresee that this would happen."
"But how did it come about?" he persisted. "Where did you go?"
"Down the valley a distance," she answered evasively, and Dexter gathered from her manner that she did not wish her brother to know all that had taken place.