Code walked up to the frantic girl and went straight to the point.
“Hello, Nellie!” he said. “Where do you cal’late little Bige might be? I hear you’ve lost him.”
“Yes, I have, Code. I stood him under that cherry-tree and told him not to move. When I got back he was gone. He was seven, and just old enough to run around by himself and investigate things. Oh, I’m so afraid he’s gone––”
“Listen!” Code’s sharp, masterful tone put a sudden end to her sobbing. “Was there anything in the house he valued much?” Suddenly she drew in her breath sharply.
“Yes, yes,” she cried, “his mechanical train. He asked me if I had got it and I said I had. He must have gone over to the furniture and found it hadn’t been brought down. Oh, Code, Code––”
“What’s the matter, Nellie?”
It was Nat Burns’s hard voice as he elbowed roughly past Code and bent solicitously over the girl. He had heard her last words and the pleading 23 in them, and his brow was dark with question and anger.
“Did you find him, Nat?” queried Nellie in an agony of suspense.
“No, I don’t know where the little beggar can be,” he replied; “I’ve––” The girl screamed and fainted.
“What’s the matter here?” shouted Burns. “What’s the matter with her?”