"What!"
"Lucy and I had a tiff last night and she went to her room in a temper."
"Nothin' new about thet."
"Holley and I have had our troubles holding her in. Don't you forget that."
Bostil laughed. "Wal, call her an' tell her I'm home."
Aunt Jane did as she was bidden. Bostil finished his breakfast. But Lucy did not come.
Bostil began to feel something strange, and, going to Lucy's door, he knocked. There was no reply. Bostil pushed open the door. Lucy was not in evidence, and her room was not as tidy as usual. He saw her white dress thrown upon the bed she had not slept in. Bostil gazed around with a queer contraction of the heart. That sense of something amiss grew stronger. Then he saw a chair before the open window. That window was rather high, and Lucy had placed a chair before it so that she could look out or get out. Bostil stretched his neck, looked out, and in the red earth beneath the window he saw fresh tracks of Lucy's boots. Then he roared for Jane.
She came running, and between Bostil's furious questions and her own excited answers there was nothing arrived at. But presently she spied the white dress, and then she ran to Lucy's closet. From there she turned a white face to Bostil.
"She put on her riding-clothes!" gasped Aunt Jane.
"Supposin' she did! Where is she?" demanded Bostil.