“Well, I’ll give them a good scare, anyhow,” muttered the boy, his sportive instincts getting the better of his tender-heartedness at last. He dashed up noisily from the underbrush, swung his arms, and shouted, “Boo!” Instantly deer and fawn, with two or three tremendous bounds, were out of the little valley and far away on the prairie, skimming over the rolls of green, and before the 145 boy could catch his breath, they had disappeared into one of the many dells and ravines that interlaced the landscape.
But another animal was scared by the boy’s shout. In his excitement he had slipped the bridle-rein from his arm, and the old sorrel, terrified by his halloo, set off on a brisk trot down the road. In vain Sandy called to him to stop. Free from guidance, the horse trotted along, and when, after a long chase, Sandy caught up with his steed, a considerable piece of road had been covered the wrong way, for the horse had gone back over the line of march. When Sandy was once more mounted, and had mopped his perspiring forehead, he cast his eye along the road, and, to his dismay, discovered that the sheep-tracks had disappeared. What had become of the sheep? How could they have left the trail without his sooner noticing it? He certainly had not passed another fork of the road since coming into this at the fork below.
“This is more of my heedlessness, mother would say,” muttered Sandy to himself. “What a big fool I must have been to miss seeing where the sheep left the trail! I shall never make a good plainsman if I don’t keep my eye skinned better than this. Jingo! it’s getting toward sundown!” Sure enough, the sun was near the horizon, and Sandy could see none of the familiar signs of the country round about the Fork.
But he pushed on. It was too late now to 146 return to the fork of the road and explore the other branch. He was in for it. He remembered, too, that two of their most distant neighbors, Mr. Fuller and his wife, lived somewhere back of Battles’s place, and it was barely possible that it was on the creek, whose woody and crooked line he could now see far to the westward, that their log-cabin was situated. He had seen Mr. Fuller over at the Fork once or twice, and he remembered him as a gentle-mannered and kindly man. Surely he must live on this creek! So he pushed on with new courage, for his heart had begun to sink when he finally realized that he was far off his road.
The sun was down when he reached the creek. No sign of human habitation was in sight. In those days cabins and settlements were very, very few and far between, and a traveller once off his trail might push on for hundreds of miles without finding any trace of human life.
In the gathering dusk the heavy-hearted boy rode along the banks of the creek, anxiously looking out for some sign of settlers. It was as lonely and solitary as if no man had ever seen its savageness before. Now and then a night-bird called from a thicket, as if asking what interloper came into these solitudes; or a scared jack-rabbit scampered away from his feeding-ground, as the steps of the horse tore through the underbrush. Even the old sorrel seemed to gaze reproachfully at the lad, who had dismounted, and now led the animal through the wild and tangled undergrowths.
Lost!