make
it out."

The mother lost heart then.

"Oh, my God! oh, blessed Virgin! some flying beast has got her. I'll
never see her again!"

"Ah, don't give up," said Archy. "We'll find her--don't give up."

"God bless you for the words, Archy Stillman!" and she seized his hand
and kissed it fervently.

Peterson, the new-comer, whispered satirically in Ferguson's ear:

"Wonderful performance to find this place, wasn't it? Hardly worth
while to come so far, though; any other supposititious place would have
answered just as well--hey?"

Ferguson was not pleased with the innuendo. He said, with some warmth,

"Do you mean to insinuate that the child hasn't been here? I tell you
the child has been here! Now if you want to get yourself into as tidy a
little fuss as--"

"All right!" sang out Stillman. "Come, everybody, and look at this! It
was right under our noses all the time, and we didn't see it."

There was a general plunge for the ground at the place where the child
was alleged to have rested, and many eyes tried hard and hopefully to
see the thing that Archy's finger was resting upon. There was a pause,
then a several-barrelled sigh of disappointment. Pat Riley and Ham
Sandwich said, in the one breath,

"What is it, Archy? There's nothing here."

"Nothing? Do you call that nothing?" and he swiftly traced upon the
ground a form with his finger. "There--don't you recognize it now? It's
Injun Billy's track. He's got the child."

"God be praised!" from the mother.

"Take away the lantern. I've got the direction. Follow!"

He started on a run, racing in and out among the sage-bushes a matter
of three hundred yards, and disappeared over a sand-wave; the others
struggled after him, caught him up, and found him waiting. Ten steps
away was a little wickieup, a dim and formless shelter of rags and old
horse-blankets, a dull light showing through its chinks.

"You lead, Mrs. Hogan," said the lad. "It's your privilege to be first."

All followed the sprint she made for the wickieup, and saw, with her, the
picture its interior afforded. Injun Billy was sitting on the ground;
the child was asleep beside him. The mother hugged it with a wild
embrace, which included Archy Stillman, the grateful tears running
down her face, and in a choked and broken voice she poured out a golden
stream of that wealth of worshiping endearments which has its home in
full richness nowhere but in the Irish heart.

"I find her bymeby it is