skates, which they had received amongst
their presents.

The youngsters were altogether too busy enjoying their rare sport to pay
heed to their baby sister, and when darkness approached they scampered
back to the house where they told their mother of the good time they had
had. Her first question, however, was concerning the whereabouts of
little Helen, as she quickly noted her absence from the returning
children. "Boys, where have you left your little sister?" "Why, mother,"
readily replied Donald, her eldest son, "Helen must have been back to
the house long ago, as we have not seen her since she watched us put on
our new skates."

Tormented by a mother's instinct which told her that all was not well
with her child, Mrs. McDonald, assisted by her sons, made a thorough
search of the house, thinking that perhaps the baby might have toddled
back to its home, tired of watching her brothers skate upon the pond,
and had, unobserved by her mother, entered one of the bed rooms and gone
to sleep. Carefully she looked through every room and then she searched
the whole building from cellar to garret, all the while loudly calling
for her missing darling, but the search proved futile.

Then she lit lanterns, one for herself and one for each of her boys, and
together they searched through the bunk house, the tool house and every
other out-building on the reservation, but all their hunting was of no
avail, as they found no trace of the child.

Up and down the right-of-way they searched, hoping to find the tracks in
the soft snow showing the direction the tot might have taken, but every
effort was in vain, and they had almost reached the garden gate of the
house, all of them broken-heartedly weeping, having given up all hope of
ever hearing again of their Helen, when "Spot", the shepherd dog, the
playmate of the children, came racing towards them, swinging a rag, that
he held between his sharp teeth, playfully about his head. He had been
awakened by his mistress's calls for her child, and the lighted lanterns
they carried had fooled the intelligent canine into reasoning that this
was to be a prolongation of the Christmas festivities of the preceding
night, and he had promptly entered into the spirit of the game.

Mrs. McDonald called the dog to her side, and examined the supposed rag
the beast had played with, and found it to be the first clue that she
had thus far discovered, as it was little Helen's red flannel
undergarment. R