"What then?" Matty went on asking.
"Why, we saw Elmer and Lil Artha coming, and went to meet 'em, that's all," replied Ty.
"Have any of you been inside the mill?"
"Why, no," Toby spoke up. "Elmer and Lil Artha sat down to rest, and you see we expected Nat to pop out on us any minute, so we just didn't say anything about it till they asked."
"And that was just about the time we first heard your voices close by," said Elmer, "so we made up our minds to wait till you joined us, when we could scatter and search."
"Search!" echoed Larry. "Good gracious! do you think Nat can be lost?"
"It doesn't seem possible," admitted Elmer, "but I blew the bugle, and sounded the assembly. If Nat heard that he is scout enough to know it was a command for him to come in—if he could."
"Whew! this is something we didn't expect to run up against—a mystery right in the start," remarked Matty, mopping his face with his big bandana handkerchief, which he wore about his neck, cowboy fashion, with the knot behind.
"You never can tell, suh!" said Chatz, in a solemn manner; and somehow none of the boys seemed quite as ready to scoff at the Southerner's superstitious belief, as usual.
"But hadn't we better be looking around?" remarked Matty. "Nat may have gone into the old mill, bent on investigating, and some accident have happened to him."