"Well, yes, they are," the man replied.
"Then tell me how, and where."
"The boy is in Edinburgh, ill of the fever, but well cared for in a children's hospital. The girl is in London, in a place she won't be running away from in a hurry."
"You mean a prison, surely?" Mrs. MacDougall gasped. "Say the right word, man, and don't put your own gloss on things. It doesn't make them any the better."
"It isn't a prison exactly," the man replied, "except that she can't get free from it without the permission of them that put her there. She got in with some people who are now in custody, and as she will be an important witness, she will be, perhaps, detained there until the case comes before the magistrates; but she is safe and sound, according to our information."
"And can I no rescue her from that place?" Mrs. MacDougall asked.
"That depends upon many things," the officer answered cautiously. "I could not undertake to say."
In a very short time Mrs. MacDougall was ready for her journey. "Ye will nae gang outside the gate whiles I'm gone," she said to Robbie, "an' bless your heart for a good child, I know you will not disobey me." Then to her mother she added, "I will just ask our good neighbour Jarrett to look in an' see ye all right, an' that your wants are supplied." Then she bade them adieu, and departed.
They walked as far as Dunster, calling at the farm on their way, then hired a vehicle to convey them to Killochrie, the nearest place to which the trains ran—not by the circuitous route that Elsie and Duncan had found their way there, but by a direct road.
That night Mrs. MacDougall was in Edinburgh, and was mightily amazed and confused with the grandeur and bustle of the place, which she had never seen before. How her children could have found their way here, and still more, how they could ever have been discovered and identified in such a teeming, bustling, bewildering city, she could not imagine. She had yet to see London, to which Edinburgh could not compare for teeming multitudes, labyrinths of streets, and all the gigantic bustle and confusion of a vast city.