"I had rather not tell even such an old friend of the Lawsons as you are, Geordie; only I am humbly thankful that we have not found him there."
"Well, well, you needn't say it; for I have had my heavy doubts about what was a'foot for a good bit o'time. But 'twasn't for an old friend of the lad's, his father's servant and his grandfather's before him, to say aught against the good name of the family. But I have been sore sorry for the mistress when the poor lad has been out o'nights, and slighting the land by day. I've done my best to keep things together, and taken more upon me than I should, like enough. But it is an evil case when the master takes to bad ways."
"What is your advice now Geordie?" asked the schoolmaster. "For I am quite at sea again."
"I thought so. Well, it's my counsel that we go home round by way of Scarf Beck, and see if they know aught about him, there."
"That is it," said Mark, with a gleam of revived hope; "round by way of Scarf Beck, lads, as fast as legs can carry us. My watch to whoever finds him first."
[CHAPTER V.]
HOME AGAIN.
"Thou wilt not be weary of me;
Thy promise my faith will sustain;
And soon, very soon I shall see
That I have not been asking in vain."
A. L. WARING.
Hours had passed at the Yews, and there was no sign of the seekers or of the sought. Alice and Mat had been making expeditions in all directions excepting that one which had been taken by Mark and the farm servants; but not a trace could they find. Old Ann had half buried herself in the snow in her attempts to reach the furthest of the Beck meadows, and had tottered home half dead with cold. Even Mr. Knibb had saddled Madam, and attended by young Mat, had made a bold dash at the road which led out of the dale at the end opposite to the Green Gap. But Madam's shoes had become so completely balled with snow, that it was with much ado, he had led her back to the farm; while Mat had bravely made his way to the little hamlet in the adjoining dale, along roads less blocked by snow than the taken by the schoolmaster and his party, but still formidable to any but a shepherd lad.
At last, the suspense had become intolerable to Alice, and watching her opportunity when she saw old Ann settled in by the warm fire beside her mother's rocking chair, she called Laddie, and set forth.