“Them that’s outside!” repeated Hiram, smartly.
“That’s what I said. After the Judge come round into his senses they thought it was all right to leave him on the sofy till they got ready to take him home, and in the gen’ral confusion here he’s got away. Took both of Klebe’s young ones with him, the little boy and the little girl, and Lord only knows where he’s got to. I tell ye ’twa’n’t safe to leave him alone! An old man with the bang he got ’side of the head ain’t gittin’ back into his right senses all in a minit.”
“What are you standin’ around here for, all of ye?” indignantly demanded Hiram, raising his voice. “Why ain’t you out tryin’ to find the lost?”
“Why ain’t you?” retorted Uncle Lysimachus. “There’s fifty gone after ’em already and the ro’d is still open. They didn’t take it with ’em.”
The Squire had heard his brother’s voice in the yard and he came to the door, his face haggard and grief-stricken.
“It’s an awful thing, brother,” he murmured when Hiram hastened to him. “Myra is still insensible and the doctor fears a fracture of the skull. But my worst fear now is for Judge Willard and the children.”
He cast a troubled look at the sky.
“Doesn’t anyone get a word from them?” he asked wistfully.
“You hold the fort here, Phin,” returned Hiram with bluff assurance. “I’ll find ’em if I have to rake from here to Smyrna with a fine-toothed comb. I’m gittin’ to be the greatest finder you ever see, Phin. I found the Mayo girl, I found myself at last, I found a woman to-day who’ll have me, and now I’ll find the ones you want or die tryin’. Don’t you worry, Phin. It’s old Hime for ’em now.”
He started away on the trot, with no very clear idea of what he would do first, but anxious to be moving.