"Then if you have a wagon, why do you come on horseback?"
"Lor's marster, I couldn't no ways get a wagon through this here thicket."
The sheriff felt that that was true, and that he had been making a fool of himself. He made a great many more inquiries, but received no satisfaction from astute Joe. He asked no question about the little dog, considering her of no importance. And at length, having no pretext to stop the negro, he let him pass and go on.
Joe, glad to be relieved, touched up his horse and trotted briskly through the thicket, and through the graveyard, to the ruined door of the old chapel. Here he dismounted, tied his horse to a tree, and put down the little Skye terrier, who no sooner found herself at liberty, than she bounded into the church and ran with joyous leaps and barks, and jumped upon her master, licking, or kissing, as she understood kissing, his hands and face all over with her little tongue, and assuring him how glad she was to see him.
"Nelly, Nelly, good Nelly, pretty Nelly," said Mr. Berners, caressing her soft, curly brown hair.
But Nelly grew fidgety; something was wanting—the best thing of all was wanting—her mistress! So she jumped from her master's lap, not forgetting to kiss him good-by, by a direct lick upon his lips, and then she ran snuffing and whining about the floor of the chapel until she came to the mattress and blankets, where she began wildly to root and paw about, whining piteously all the while.
"Nelly, good dog," said Mr. Berners, taking the blanket and holding it to her nose. "Sybil, Sybil! seek her, seek her!"
The little Skye terrier looked up with a world of intelligence and devotion in her brown eyes, and re-commenced her rooting and pawing and snuffing around the bedding, and for some little time was at fault; but at length, with a quick bark of delight, she struck a line of scent, and with her nose close to the floor, cautiously followed it to the door of the vault, at which she stopped and began to scratch and bark wildly, hysterically—running back to her master and whining, and then running forward to the door, and barking and scratching with all her might and main.
"There she is, Marster. Mistess is down in that vault, so sure's I'm a livin' nigger," exclaimed Joe, who now came up to the door.
"Good Heaven! she could not live there an hour; the very air is death! But if there, with a breath of life remaining, she must hear and answer us," exclaimed Lyon Berners, in breathless haste, as he went to the door of the vault; and putting his lips close to the bars, called loudly: