“Oh, they are sure to find out, for they will have the parchment.”
“The parchment,” echoed Audry, “the parchment; then you will not be able to write any more letters to Master Menstrie. Why, you must have had it last night when you read his letter.”
“So I must,” said Aline. “Well, that proves it cannot be out of the house, for I have not been out except to see Walter Margrove go, and I am certain I did not take it with me then. So it must be somewhere here in our room.”
They turned everything off the bed, they looked in the ambry, they lifted the movable plank and looked under the sliding panel, but the book had absolutely disappeared.
“It is very mysterious; do you suppose any one has been in and taken it, Aline; it is very small and thin, it is true, but it could not actually vanish.”
Aline sat down on the bed and could not keep back the tears. “There is only one comfort,” she said, “and that is that Master Menstrie told us how to make another parchment; besides I read his letter three times over last night and I think I could make a new one from that, for I believe I could remember it. But, oh, dear, I am certain some one has taken the book and it will be found out, and then they will see that the secret room has been used and will guess that that was how Master Menstrie escaped and that we helped him. It may even lead to their finding out where he is.”
Audry knelt down on the floor and put her head in her cousin’s lap, and her arms round her waist. The late Autumn sunshine flooded the room, but it brought no joy to the sorrowing children.
“Who can have been in the room?” Audry said at last.
“Elspeth, I suppose,” said Aline. “I think we must run the risk of asking her. She cannot read, but even if she has not seen it, she might tell some one that we had lost it. However, we must take our chance.”
So they went and found Elspeth and began to talk to her about the packman’s visit. Just as they were going Audry managed to say quite casually, “Oh, by the way, Aline, I suppose Elspeth cannot have seen your little book.”