"No-o-o!" replied Tim, his answer rising and falling in a circumflex
through a half-dozen notes of the scale.

_"Then he is lost!"_

"What?" fairly shrieked the Irishman.

"He is lost in the woods."

Howard had little heart to go over the experiences of the afternoon. He
simply told his friend that he and Elwood had separated on their return,
and he had been unable to find him again.

"What did you separate for?" asked the listener.

"Because I was a fool; but O, Tim, there is no use of regretting what
has been done. If Elwood is lost, I shall never leave this place."

After a while Howard became more composed, and they conversed rationally
upon the best plan for them to follow. Tim O'Rooney was strenuous in his
belief that Elwood had wandered off among the hills, and finding it
growing dark, had sought some secure shelter for the night. He was sure
that he would give vigorous signs of his whereabouts as soon as day
dawned.

There was something in the daring nature of the boy that made it
probable that Tim was right. Tempted out of his path by some singular or
unexpected sight, he had wandered away until he found it too dark to
return, and so had made the best of the matter and camped in some tree,
or beneath the ledge of some projecting rock.

Such was the theory of Tim O'Rooney, and so ingeniously did he enforce
it that Howard could not avoid its plausibility. None knew better than
he the impulsive nature of the boy, and such an act upon his part would
be in perfect keeping with similar exploits.

There was but one thing that raised a doubt in the mind of Howard--and
slight as was this, it was enough to give him sore uneasiness, and at
times almost to destroy hope. At the time the boys separated, Elwood had
shown a great anxiety to reach Tim, and proposed his plan in the belief
that it would bring them together the more quickly.

This made it seem improbable to Howard that he would have allowed
anything to divert him from his course unless his personal safety caused
him to do so; but Tim said that if such were the case they would have
heard his gun.

"Do you s'pose he's the boy to lit a wild animal or any of them red
gintlemen step up to him without his tachin' thim manners? But he's the
youngster that wouldn't do the same. You'd hear that gun of his cracking
away as long as there was any lift for him to crack."

"It may be as you think, Tim, but I believe it is worse. Suppose he is
in the hands of