. Grimm!
He's finished his dinner already and is going back to the hay-fields.
Please excuse me, I'll run ask him if he's seen her."

"Best not delay longer yourself, Dorothy--" called Miss Greatorex, but
for once her charge did not pause at this tone of reproof; and a first,
faint feeling of alarm rose in her own breast.

"Molly, lassie? No, indeed! I haven't seen her to-day. I was off to work
before she came down stairs, but I've been wishing for her and you, too,
the livelong day. The wild-roses that you love are blooming wonderful.
All my far-away meadows are hedged with them as perfect as if they'd
been set out a-purpose. Miles of them, I fancy, are on this old farm;
but little golden-haired Molly's the sweetest wild-rose I've seen this
summer. For you're no wild rose, lassie. You're one of those
'cinnamons,' home-keepers, close by the old house and that the Missus
claims are the prettiest in all the world. So there's a compliment for
the pair of you! Wait till I whistle! Mistress Molly knows that it
means: 'Come! I'm waiting for your company!' 'Twill fetch her, sure, if
she's within the sound of it."

So he put his hands to his lips and whistled as only he could do, a
long, musical note of call that reached far and wide and that the
missing girl had often likened to the sound of Melvin's bugle.

[Illustration: "QUEENIE TOO, HAD HEARD."
_Dorothy's Travels._]

But there came no answer of Queenie's footfalls over the gravel nor
their soft thud-thud upon the grass, and the farmer felt he could delay
no longer. Yet, could he go? While his little "comrade" was missing?
Silly, to feel a moment's alarm at such a trivial thing. A thoughtless
lassie, sure she was, this little maid of the far-away southland; but
oh! so "winsie." No. Let the hay wait. He'd tarry a bit longer and be
on hand to scold Fair-Hair when she came galloping back with a string of
merry excuses tumbling off her nimble tongue, her ready "I forgots" or
"I didn't thinks"--the teasing, adorable witch that she was!

"Fetch me my pipe and my paper, Dorothy, girl. I'll wait under this
apple tree till she comes. But do you all get your dinners and not so
many go hungry because one wild child loiters. A whisper! The missus is
getting a trifle crisp, in the kitchen yon. She's missing the nap that
is due her as soon as her people are fed. Best make haste. It's
pleasanter for all on the Farm when Missus is left to go her gait
regular, without hindrance from