Fred looked back. A turn in the road had already hidden the sleigh from sight.
“I don’t believe he is hurt a bit,” said Jess stoutly. “Artie doesn’t get hurt easily. Remember the time he fell off the bluff?”
“He’s always falling off some place,” declared Fred, gloomily. “I never saw such a boy for mooning around when he ought to be paying attention.”
Artie was rather given to meditation at the wrong time, none of them could deny that. In school he often chose a recitation period in which to think, and as he seldom thought about the lesson which was being recited, he had often been marked “zero” for questions to which he really knew the answers.
“Well, we just have to find him,” said Polly. “That’s all there is to that. A boy can’t disappear off the face of the earth.”
But by the time they had tramped along for the length of another turn, they began to think that almost anything could happen to a boy. There was no sign of Artie anywhere, and no trace that might suggest what had become of him.
“Listen!” said Fred suddenly, holding up his hand.
A twig cracked under Ward’s foot and Fred frowned.
“Do be still, can’t you?” he asked quickly.
Jess sneezed at this point. Perhaps you’ve noticed that when one is trying to have perfect silence, a flood of little noises seems to be let free.