spouted Skeeter.
The youth stood still in his path but went on with his weird near-tune. Skeeter approached him and the others followed, although poor Lil found herself limping painfully.
“Please, we are lost!”
“Oh, no, not lost, for I have found you uns. We uns is always findin’.” His voice had an indescribable softness and gentleness and his blue eyes a far-away look as though he lived in some other world. “Only t’other day we uns ’most found a great bird floating in the sky, but it flew away. We uns thought at first it was lost but it wasn’t. If it had a been lost, we uns would have found it. A great big bird, bigger’n a bald-headed eagle, bigger’n a buzzard.”
“Now that you have found us, what are you going to do with us?” asked Lil.
“Oh, what we uns finds, we uns hides ag’in. Thar’s a hole in the mounting whar we uns puts things.”
“Uhhh—a brigand, sure enough!” whispered Lucy.
“But you wouldn’t put us there, because we are alive. You have a home somewhere near here, haven’t you?” asked Frank. But the half-witted fellow shook his head sadly.
“We uns ain’t got no mo’ home since they came and found my maw—they came and found her and hid her in the ground. We uns must have lost her and never can find her—but there are lots of other things to find,” and his blue eyes that had looked all clouded at the sad thought of never finding his mother, now began to sparkle. “Only this evening we uns found the prettiest light in the sky—it’s gone now—gone—before we uns could hide it in the hole, but we uns will find another.”
“Where do you live?”