“There is nothing to be done but for me to go and look for him.”
It sounded like a miserably forlorn hope, and the girls thought so; for they clung to him, crying, “Oh, Dick, Dick!” and almost unnerved him.
[p87]
“Well, I can do no good up here, and it seems heartless to hear that cry, and not to go a step to see what can be done. You know he ventured his life for us.”
“Yes; but throwing away your life wouldn’t save his if—if it isn’t lost,” faltered fond little Jenny.
“No,” returned her brother; “and, God willing, I don’t mean to throw away my life.”
They were silent for a moment, while the storm raved on. I think they all breathed a sort of wordless prayer, then Dick spoke.
“Now, you girls must stand by each other, and comfort each other; and, whatever you do, don’t sit down and give in to sleep. Good-bye.”
There was no wringing of hands; the three could not bear it with that scream of Oscar ringing in their ears.
He went away, his shadowy figure vanishing in the obscurity almost immediately, as Oscar’s had done. Then the two girls were alone. Shout after shout rang reassuringly back to them, and they screamed back theirs in reply. True, Dick’s shouts were farther away each time, but no screams followed; then there came a [p88] break, and they heard nothing. Very, very much alone they were now.
Well, down in the village people were shutting doors, closing shutters, and heaping up fires, and saying what a cold snowy ending it was to such a fair day, as they made themselves cosy, little dreaming there were two small wanderers up on the old Tor in the storm. The two children could picture it all, and wondered what was doing at the farm: whether they were in a great fright about them—Mrs. Grant, Dr. Willett, and Mr. Barlow. Jenny thought too of what they were saying and doing at her home, but oh! where was Dick, where was Oscar? How the minutes lengthened into hours in the cold, the weariness, ay, even drowsiness. But they must not yield to sleep—Dick had warned them of this; they knew that sleep up there in that extreme cold meant death. What should they do?