“Perhaps he knows,” thought Betsy. She turned and followed him across the clearing and into the forest.
And Van did know. Many a time he had scoured those woods with Thatcher, and even if he had never had been there before, he could have followed his own trail back. With his nose to the ground, he started into a gully, looking back to see that his mistress was coming; then down a rocky hill into a place so dark that it seemed as if the twilight had already come. Now up and out, through some burned ground, over a brook, through a long stretch of unbroken wood, and then, before them lay the Reservoir, its gray mirror broken into millions of tiny ripples by the falling raindrops.
Beyond lay the field of the cedar soldiers, on guard. Betsy knew the way now, although the dusk was gathering. Across the valley she could see the Hospital buildings looming, and the lights as they flashed up in the corridors.
Something was coming! Was it her father returning? She must hide. Crouching behind a boulder and holding Van’s muzzle she waited.
A man bearing a pack on his back slouched past, and went on up the road they had just traveled. Betsy’s heart stopped pounding as he disappeared. She started once more on her journey, but drew back as another sound was heard. Listen! That was a carriage, surely. In the waning light Betsy peered from behind a tree, and then leaped to meet the coming vehicle.
They were both there, Uncle Ben and Aunt Kate, bundled up in mackintoshes. Aunt Kate sprang to the ground, and straight into her arms ran a bedraggled, wet little figure, while Van leaped in ecstasies.
“My darling! My own child!”
“Auntie Kate, Uncle Ben! Oh, Auntie Kate, Pa tried to get me, and he shut me up and Van scratched me out.” In a flame of words, tears, and laughter the whole story was poured out.
They drove home through the gathering night and falling rain, Betsy tucked in the middle, and Van at her feet. Presently Betsy asked,
“He couldn’t have me, could he, Auntie Kate?”