“Then get dressed!”
And to keep up Volodia’s courage, Tchetchevitsin began singing the praises of America. He roared like a tiger, he whistled like a steamboat, he scolded, and promised to give Volodia all the ivory and gold they might find.
The thin, dark boy with his bristling hair and his freckles seemed to the girls to be a strange and wonderful person. He was a hero to them, a man without fear, who could roar so well that, through the closed door, one might really mistake him for a tiger or a lion.
When the girls were dressing in their own room, Katia cried with tears in her eyes:
“Oh, I’m so frightened!”
All was quiet until the family sat down to dinner at two o’clock, and then it suddenly appeared that the boys were not in the house. Inquiries were made in the servants’ quarters and at the stables, but they were not there. A search was made in the village, but they could not be found. At tea time they were still missing, and when the family had to sit down to supper without them, mamma was terribly anxious and was even crying. That night another search was made in the village and men were sent down to the river with lanterns. Heavens, what an uproar arose!
Next morning the policeman arrived and went into the dining-room to write something. Mamma was crying.
Suddenly, lo and behold! a posting sleigh drove up to the front door with clouds of steam rising from its three white horses.
“Volodia is here!” cried some one in the courtyard.
“Voloditchka is here!” shrieked Natalia, rushing into the dining-room.