Nat nodded, tucked his musket under his arm, and strode out of the churchyard with Mr. Badcock at his heels. By the gateway he halted a moment and listened; but the voice sang no longer from the ridge.
We watched the pair as they went up the glade, and turned to our breakfast. The meal over, my father proposed to me to return to the creek and fetch up a three days' supply of provisions from the ship, leaving Mr. Fett and Billy Priske to guard the camp. (In our confidence of finding the valley inhabited, we had brought but two pounds of ship's biscuit, one-third as much butter, and a small keg only of salt pork.)
We were absent, maybe, for two hours and a half; and on our way back fell in with Billy, who, having suffered no ill effects from his breakfast of mushrooms (though he had eaten them under protest), was roaming the meadow in search of more. We asked him if the two explorers had returned.
He answered "No," and that Mr. Fett had strolled up into the wood in search of chestnuts, leaving him sentry over the camp.
"And is it thus you keep sentry?" my father demanded.
"Why, master, since this valley has no more tenantry than Sodom or Gomorrah, cities of the plain—" Billy began confidently; but his voice trailed off under my father's frown.
"You have done ill, the pair of you," said my father, and strode ahead of us across the meadow.
At the gate of the enclosure he came to an abrupt halt.
The hogs had returned and were routing among our camp-furniture.
For the rest, the churchyard was empty. But where were Nat Fiennes
and Mr. Badcock, who had sallied out to follow them? And where was
Mr. Fett?
We rushed upon the brutes, and drove them squealing out of the gateway leading to the woods. They took the rise of the glade at a scamper, and were lost to us in the undergrowth. We followed, shouting our comrades' names. No answer came back to us, though our voices must have carried far beyond the next ridge. For an hour we beat the wood, keeping together by my father's order, and shouting, now singly, now in chorus. Nat, likely enough, had pressed forward beyond earshot, and led Mr. Badcock on with him. But what had become of Mr. Fett, who, as Billy asseverated, had promised to take but a short stroll?