“Oh, where can he have gone?” gasped Janet. “And mother told us to be so careful in watching him!”
“He can’t be very far off,” answered Ted. “He was here a little while ago. Come on, we’ll look!”
They went out of the barn, one of the horses calling, or whinnying, after them. The door had been left open when they went into the barn, and of course Trouble could have gone out that way.
But when Jan and Ted looked around the barn, near the corncrib, up past the smoke-house and in near-by hiding places, where they, themselves, often hid, they did not find Trouble.
“Oh, where can he be?” said Jan again and again.
“We’ll find him!” Ted declared.
But this time Trouble seemed to have hidden himself very carefully. Nor did he answer to the calls Jan and Ted gave. They did not want to call their father or mother, for they were not yet quite ready to give up and admit that they, themselves, could not find their little brother.
“Let’s look down in the lane,” said Ted after a bit.
This lane was a long, grassy one between two big meadows, and was a sort of driveway leading to a far-off part of Cherry Farm. Other farmers besides Grandpa Martin sometimes used it, though it belonged to him and came to an end near his barns.
So down the lane went Jan and Ted, calling for their little brother. They walked on a little way and then stopped to listen.