'Perhaps,' said Donald, 'he is dining with some of the shepherds, or having "a pick at a priest's," as he calls it.' 160
'Perhaps,' I said musingly. The afternoon wore away, and there were no signs of our brother coming, so I began to get rather uneasy, and spoke to Donald about it.
'He may have met with an accident,' I said, 'or fifty things may have happened.'
'Well,' replied Donald, 'I don't suppose fifty things have happened; but as you seem a bit anxious, suppose we mount our mules, take a Gaucho with us, and institute a search expedition?'
'I'm willing,' I cried, jumping up, 'and here's for off!'
There was going to be an extra good dinner that day, because we expected letters from home, and our runner would be back from the distant post-office in good time to let us read our epistles before the gong sounded and so discuss them at table.
'Hurry up, boys; don't be late, mind!' cried aunt, as our mules were brought round to the portico, and we were mounted.
'All right, auntie dear!' replied Donald, waving his hand; 'and mind those partridges are done to a turn; we'll be all delightfully hungry.'
The Gaucho knew all Dugald's trails well, and when we mentioned the small distant laguna, he set out at once in the direction of the glen. He made so many windings, however, and took so many different turns through bush and grass and scrub, that we began to wonder however Dugald could have found the road.
But Dugald had a way of his own of getting back through even a cactus labyrinth. It was a very simple one, too. He never 'loaded up,' as he termed it; that is, he did not hang his game to his saddle till he meant to start for home; then he mounted, whistled to Dash, who capered and barked in front of the mule, permitted the reins to lie loosely on the animal's neck, and—there he was! For not only did the good beast take him safely back to Coila, as we called our estancia, but he took him by the best roads; and even when he seemed to Dugald's human sense to be 161 going absolutely and entirely wrong, he never argued with him.