, seeing he would have
been walking in the teeth of the wind, but it almost seemed he must
have done it.

The short day was already beginning to close in when they reached the
belt of pines. It had grown much colder; one could almost believe
there would be frost in the air by and by. The wind was lulling a
little; it still roared with strange rushings and half-demented
tearings at the tree-tops, almost like some great spirit prisoned
there, but it had spent its first strength. The rain clouds were
going, too; already in places the sky was swept clear so that a pale
light gleamed behind the trees.

Julia stood in the vibrant shelter of the pines, pushing back her
hair; she was bareheaded; a hat had been an impossible superfluity
when she started out.

"Johnny," she said, "we have come too far; father could not have got
to the trees in such weather as it was when he started; we must go
back. I expect he is somewhere nearer home; we have not half searched
the possible radius yet."

Johnny said "Yes." He was dog-tired, so tired that his anxiety was now
little more than dull despair animated by an unquestioning
determination to continue the search.

He would have done so somehow, and with his flagging energies been
more hindrance than help, had not Julia prevented him; as they neared
the house, now almost merged in the dusk, she said--

"I am going to fetch a lantern; the moon will be up soon, but until
then I shall want a light. I am just coming in to get it, then I shall
go out again; but you must stop at home; father may come back, and if
he found us both out after dark he would think something was wrong and
start to look for us; then we should be worse off than ever."

Johnny said "Yes"; but suggested, "I think we'd better look round
about the house once more. I think I'll take a light and look round
again."

Julia did not think it would be much use; however she consented,
though she had to go with Johnny; she did not trust him with a lantern
among the out-buildings. They looked round once more, in the sheds and
in the dark garden; afterwards they went out and looked beyond the
wall all round, on the side where the heather grew and also on the
side where the loose sand came close. It took time; Johnny was too
tired to move quickly or even to understand quickly what was said to
him. At last Julia stopped and spoke decisively.

"You had better go in now," she said; "it won't do for us both to be
out any longer