And help came, though not from the children.
There were running footsteps behind him and many cries.
“Hold well! Hold fast! We are here!”
And in a moment Pavlo was surrounded by linen-clad, white-capped officers, and someone’s arms had lifted him off the prostrate shepherd, and stronger, though not braver hands than his had securely tied the arms of the struggling man behind his back.
VIII
In the meantime the hours had gone by, and the afternoon was drawing towards evening, and the grown people in the Red House, the father and the mother of the Four, and Pavlo’s uncle, who had arrived that morning and was to leave the next day, had been getting very anxious; for there was no sign of the children, though they had promised to be home early. And the Four got into plenty of mischief, but they kept their promises.
So the mother of the Four walked from one window to another and could not keep still, and Kyria Penelope wrung her hands and shook her head, and Deko rushed about after them; whining and yelping and limping on his bad foot, till they shut him up in a room upstairs, and he had to stay there; and Athanasia the cook stationed herself at the gate near the sea to watch for the children, and Anneza the serving maid tore up through the pines to the top gate to see if they were in sight on the hill.
The doctor and the master of the Red House were pacing nervously up and down the terrace.
Suddenly the latter sent up a big shout.