“Yes,� said Mrs. Osborne. “She came running in and asked for Patsy. Patsy was away, at the Hights’, and Anne ran off, saying Patsy would know where she was going. As soon as Patsy came home, she followed, but she came back half an hour ago; she had looked and looked, and seen no sign of Anne—on the Old Plank Road, where she expected to find her.�
“Anne ought not to wander off that way,� said Mr. Blair.
“Indeed not,� agreed Mrs. Osborne.
“I’d send the boys to look for her,� suggested Mr. Blair.
“They’ve gone,� said Mrs. Osborne. “David and Steve and Dick. It’s Dick that made me so uneasy. When Patsy came back and found him at home, she asked him where Anne was. He said he hadn’t seen her. And Patsy said she had followed him, as far as the Old Plank Road, she was sure; and farther. He looked startled, positively frightened. And he asked what color her dress was; and when I said blue, a blue gingham, he said, ‘Oh, I’m afraid I saw her!’ He was off like a shot before I could ask a question. He seemed so upset and excited that—well, it frightened me.�
“Nonsense, Miranda!� laughed Mr. Blair. “You let your imagination run away with you. Anne ought not to roam the woods alone, but she is safe, perfectly safe.�
Dick had, as his mother said, gone hurriedly in search of Anne. He did not share Mr. Blair’s feeling of security; he was uneasy, alarmed.
On his way to the Old Sterling Mine that afternoon, he had seen two negroes going up the path from the creek toward the mine. He crept into the bushes and followed a little way, but the undergrowth was so straggling that he could not get near them. One of the negroes was Solomon Gabe, he was sure; the other negro, a stout, youngish figure, had his back toward him and was screened by bushes. Dick caught only a word here and there of their mumbled speech—“hide,� “get away,� and oaths and oaths.
He crept back to the road, and then, to avoid Isham Baskerfield whose oxcart was going up the hill, he went down the creek and cut through the woods. He ran to Larkland to tell his Cousin Mayo what he had seen and heard. The house was shut up. Perhaps he would find Cousin Mayo in The Village.
And so Dick ran home—to be greeted by the news that Anne was off alone somewhere; had followed him, Patsy said, along the Old Plank Road. Then he remembered something that filled him with vague terror; if that were Anne, and she should wander to the Old Sterling Mine, and encounter those men—— He turned and ran to seek her. It was nearly dark when he came to Isham’s cabin. The old negro was on the porch with his wife, who was talking in a rapid, excited voice.