"Have you looked along the road?" I suggested. "He may have wandered out there. He did so the day I arrived."
"I've walked half a mile along each way," she answered, with a hopeless sigh.
"But the garden, Briggs!" Granny exclaimed, in her anxiety hardly knowing what to say. "How could you be so thoughtless, so forgetful as not to search the garden before you went into the road?"
"But I did, mum; it was the very first thing I did do," she replied tearfully, and with something of an injured expression at this unnecessary censure.
"Have you looked over the house? He may be hiding there," I said.
"Everywhere in the house and out of it," she answered with gloomy conviction. "Not a stone have I left unturned."
We glanced from one to the other with perplexity. What could have become of the little beggar? Where could he have hidden himself, thus to escape this vigilant search?
"Wouldn't it be as well to let Mr. Wyndham know?" I said. "I think I hear him practising billiards."
"Of course, of course!" Granny answered with relief. "Why didn't I think of that at once? Briggs, go at once and ask Mr. Wyndham to speak to me."
"Well, what is it?" he said cheerfully, when he arrived upon the scene. "The youngster disappeared? There is no need for worry. Depend upon it he is hiding somewhere not very far off, and we'll soon unearth him."