"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Theodora. "I suppose he has dragged himself away somewheres. I know he was hit by the way he cried out."
"I did not aim right at the bush," said Tom; "but I suppose the gun may have scattered."
"Plague take him!" exclaimed Willis. "I don't much care if he is hit."
"Oh, don't talk so!" cried Ellen.
"No; don't talk so," said Catherine. "If he is hit and has crept away, we must find him if we can."
"Of course," said Addison who was peering about on the ground, "we will do all we can to find him and care for him, if it really was he."
"Halse! Halse!" Tom shouted, as loudly as he could. "Answer, Halse, if you are hurt! We will take care of you!"
There was no reply.
"He may be dead by this time!" lamented Theodora.
Then we began searching in earnest; we rekindled the fire, and taking brands, looked the ground all over for twenty rods or more from the cabins, in that direction. Not a trace could be discovered.
"I guess he wasn't hurt much," Willis said privately to me.
But that wild outcry had taken a dreadful hold on Theodora's fancies.
With the tears starting constantly to her eyes, she searched and implored the rest of us to keep looking about. I half expected we might come upon Halse in the bushes; for I knew that if one of those heavy shot had struck him, it might cause a fatal wound.
Tom, too, felt very badly and very nervous; so did Kate.
At last we went back to the cabin, for it seemed of no use to search longer. Theodora was so wrought up, that she even wanted to start off for home in the darkness, to notify the Old Squire. Nothing could persuade her that Halse was not wounded or killed.
But Addison said at once that we could not think of making such a trip in the night; that we would wait till morning and see what could be discovered then; and he advised the girls to go to sleep and get as good a night's rest as they could.
"It will do no good to cry, or keep awake, Doad," he said. "We can do nothing till daylight."
Accordingly we went to our own cabin and left the girls to shut themselves into theirs and sleep if they could. We all felt very much disturbed; yet I, for one, fell asleep and slept through the rest of the night quite soundly. I doubt whether Theodora slept, however. She was awake and out with Addison long before I roused up. Catherine and Ellen, too, were astir, and they had all four been searching, ever since it had grown light enough.
Willis had gone to fish for trout; he came back with a fine string of them, just as I was waking up. As he sat dressing them to fry for breakfast, he declared again that he was not at all afraid that Halse was much injured.
But all the rest of us had our fears, and not much interest was felt in breakfast or anything else, save to get ready to start for home, as quickly as possible. For Addison had decided that the best thing to do, under the circumstances, was to go home and see what could be learned there of Halse's movements.
We therefore ate a breakfast of such food as could be most quickly prepared, then packed up our luggage, and began our long trip back home, through the woods. It was far from being a pleasant walk. The zest and anticipation of our outing had departed. We plodded drearily on and reached Clear Pond at about one o'clock. Here, after a hasty lunch, Addison ran on ahead, to reach home and come back with the team. The entire burden of the baskets, guns, etc., now fell on Tom, Willis and me; the girls were tired, and we got on slowly.
At last, after two or three hours, we heard Addison coming along the winter road with the horses and wagon, while still at a considerable distance. The girls sat down to wait for him to come near enough to speak. Theodora, in particular, feared the worst.
But as soon as Addison came in sight, where we were sitting on a log by the side of the trail, he swung his hat, and shouted, "All right!"
"Thank Providence!" burst from Theodora's lips; and we all jumped up and shouted for joy.
"But was it Halse?" exclaimed Tom and Kate and I, all in a breath.
"Yes, it was," replied Addison with a touch of scorn in his voice. "He and Alf Batchelder."
"And he isn't hurt?" Theodora asked.
"Well, no, not by _us_," said Addison dryly. "The Old Squire has held a private interview with him out at the west barn. Halse may not be quite as comfortable now as he might be."
"Good enough!" shouted Willis, Tom and Kate in chorus; and I am afraid that Ellen and I joined in the sentiment. Theodora only looked unhappy.
"Halse has confessed," Addison continued, after we were all in the wagon, jogging on homeward. "The Old Squire made him tell everything and disciplined him afterwards. It was like this. After dinner yesterday, Halse pretended that he was sick and went up-stairs. Gram followed him up there with the Vermifuge bottle. She found him in bed. He wouldn't say what ailed him. After she went down-stairs, he got out on the ell roof and ran away, over to Batchelder's. Alf and he then put their heads together and started for the old slave's farm, intending to play they were Cannucks and frighten us nearly to death. That was old Hewey's moose-horn that they were _booing_ through; they borrowed it of the old man, on their way up, pretending they were going moose-hunting."
"Then Halse wasn't hit after all," said Kate.
"No; it was Alf. We were all wrong about that voice. One of Tom's little partridge shot struck Alf on his wrist. It did not injure him much, but drew blood and frightened him.
"They then cut sticks for home; and Halse tried to get into his room over the ell roof at about three o'clock this morning. But our folks had already discovered that he had run away. The Old Squire heard him on the roof and nabbed him just as he was crawling in at the window.
"He was quite a subdued, tearful-eyed, peaceable-looking boy, when I saw him an hour ago," Addison concluded, with a curl of his lip.
"But let's not say a word to plague him any further," said Theodora.
"Oh, I shall not speak of it," replied Addison.
"Nor I," said Willis. "But I would like to have had hold of the Old Squire's whip a spell."
And thus, in this miserable way, our first camping trip terminated. It was raining the following morning and continued very wet for several days; we were not able to return to "the old slave's farm" that fall.
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE OLD SQUIRE'S PANTHER STORY
It seemed good, even after only three days' camping out, to sit down in the house again and see the supper table nicely set and Gram at the head of it. She welcomed us home as warmly as if we had been absent for weeks; the Old Squire was still a little disturbed, from his recent "interview" with Halstead.
Halse, himself, did not come to supper; and nobody mentioned his name during the entire evening.
Little Wealthy was plainly overjoyed to see us back and, despite the pout which she had worn when we went off without her, talked very fast to us and told us of all the occurrences during our absence.
"Aunt Olive" was with us for a week; she and Gram and Wealthy had begun to dry apples; and after supper, Aunt Olive brought in three bushel basketfuls of bruised Baldwins and Greenings, along with some natural fruit; she also produced the old paring machine, coring knives and a hank of stringing twine and needle, and in short made ready for a busy evening.
"Now, young folks," quoth she, "you've been off and had a fine time; and I s'pose you're all ready to make the apples fly! It will not take us long to do up these three bushels to-night, if you all work smart."
It was an invitation not to be refused, under the circumstances, though Theodora and Ellen made wry faces. They disliked to cut apples, it is such dirty, sticky work and blackens one's hands so badly. Addison took up the paring machine, good-naturedly.
"Here's my old friend of last year," said he, screwing it to the leaf of the kitchen table. "I pared bushels with it last fall, and I guess I'll pare them now, while the rest of you trim and core and string them. We must have dried apples, I suppose, for pies and sauce; at least, Gram says we must."
He fixed an apple on the fork of the machine and then in a moment had whirled the skin off it, in a long, thin ribbon which descended into the basket set beneath the table. I thought it looked to be fun;--but that was before I understood the business as well as I subsequently came to do.