THE PURSUIT
Neale O'Neil did not return to Mr. Con Murphy's with a creel of fish
until late afternoon. He was going to clean some of his fish and take
them as a present to the Corner House girls; but something the little
cobbler told him quite changed his plan.
"Here's a letter that's come to ye, me bye," said Con, looking up from
his tap, tap tapping on somebody's shoe, and gazing over the top of his
silver-bowed spectacles at Neale.
"Thanks," said Neale, taking the missive from the leather seat beside
Mr. Murphy. "Guess it's from Uncle Bill. He said he expected to show in
Durginville this week."
"And there's trouble at the Corner House," said the cobbler.
"What sort of trouble?"
"I don't rightly know, me bye; save wan of the little gals seems to be
lost."
"Lost!" gasped Neale anxiously. "Which one? Tess? Dot? Not _Agnes_?"
"Shure," said Con Murphy, "is that little beauty likely to be lost, I ax
ye? No! 'Tis the very littlest wan of all."
"Dot!"
"'Tis so. The other wan--Theresa--was here asking for her before
noon-time," the cobbler added.
Neale waited for nothing further--not even to read his letter, which he
slipped into his pocket; but hurried over the back fence into the rear
premises of the Corner House.
By this time the entire neighborhood was aroused. Luke had called up the
police station and given a description of Sammy and Dot. The telephone
had been busy most of the time after he and Ruth had returned from their
unsuccessful visit to the canal.
Agnes, red-eyed from weeping, ran at Neale when she saw him coming.
"Oh, Neale O'Neil! Why weren't you here! Get out the auto at once! Let
us go and find them. I _know_ they have been carried off--"
"Who's carried them, Aggie?" he demanded. "Brace up. Let's hear all the
particulars of this kidnapping."
"Oh, you can laugh. Don't you dare laugh!" expostulated Agnes, quite
beside herself, and scarcely knowing what she said. "But somebody must
certainly have stolen Dot."
"That might be," confessed Neale. "But who in the world would want to
steal Sammy? I can't imagine anybody wanting a youngster like him."
"Do be serious if you can, Neale," admonished Ruth, who had likewise
been weeping, but was critical of the ex-circus boy as usual.
"I am," declared Neale. "Only, let's get down to facts. Who saw them
last and where?"
He listened seriously to the story. His remark at the end might not have
been very illuminating, but it was sensible.
"Well, then, if Mrs. Kranz and Joe Maroni saw them last, that's the
place to start hunting for the kids."
"Didn't we go there?" demanded Ruth, sharply. "I have just told you--"
"But you didn't find them," Neale said mildly. "Just the same, I see
nothing else to do but to make Mrs. Kranz's store the starting point of
the search. The whole neighborhood there should be searched. Start
running circles around that corner of Meadow Street."
"Didn't Luke and I go as far as the canal!" and Ruth was still rather
warm of speech.
"But I guess Neale is right, Ruth," Luke put in. "I don't know the
people over there or the neighborhood itself. There may have been lots
of hiding places they could have slipped into."
"It's the starting point of the search," Neale declared dogmatically. "I
am going right over there."
"Do get out the auto," cried Agnes, who had uncanny faith in the motor
car as a means of aid in almost any emergency. "And I'm going!"
"Let's all go," Cecile Shepard suggested. "I think we ought to interview
everybody around that shop. Don't you, Luke?"
"Right, Sis," her brother agreed. "Come on, Miss Ruth. Many hands should
make light work. It isn't enough to have the constables on the outlook
for the children. It will soon be night."
Although Ruth could not see that going to Meadow Street again promised
to be of much benefit, save to keep them all occupied, she agreed to
Neale's proposal which had been so warmly seconded by Luke.
The boys got out the automobile and the two older Corner House girls,
with Cecile, joined them. The car rolled swiftly away from home, leaving
Tess in tears, Mrs. MacCall, Aunt Sarah, Uncle Rufus and Linda in a much
disturbed state of mind, and poor Mrs. Pinkney in the very lowest depths
of despair.
They had all had a late luncheon--all save Neale. He had eaten only what
he had put in his pocket when he left for his fishing trip to Pogue Lake
that morning. It was approaching dinner time when they reached Meadow
Street, but none of the anxious young people thought much about this
fact.
The news of the loss of Dot Kenway and Sammy Pinkney had by this time
become thoroughly known in the neighborhood of the Stower property on
Meadow Street. Not only were the tenants of the Corner House girls, but
all their friends and acquaintances, interested in the search.
Groups had gathered about the corner where Mrs. Kranz's store and Joe
Maroni's fruit stand were situated, discussing the mystery. Suggestions
of dragging the canal had been made; but these were hushed when the
kindly people saw Agnes' tear-streaked face and Ruth Kenway's anxious
eyes.
"Oh, my dear!" gasped Mrs. Kranz, her fat face wrinkling with emotion,
and dabbing at her eyes while she patted Ruth's shoulder. "If I had only
knowed vat dem kinder had in der kopfs yedt, oh, my dear! I vould haf
made dem go right avay straight home."
"De leetla padrona allow, I go right away queek and looka for
theem--yes? Maria and my Marouche watcha da stan'--sella da fruit. Yes?"
cried Joe Maroni to the oldest Corner House girl.
"If we only--any of us--knew where to search!" Ruth cried.
Neale and Luke got out of the automobile, leaving the girls surrounded
by the gossipy, though kindly, women of the neighborhood and the curious
children. Neither of the young fellows had any well defined idea as to
how to proceed; but they were not inclined to waste any more time merely
canvassing the misfortune of Dot and Sammy's disappearance.
Neale, being better acquainted with the dwellers in this neighborhood,
seized a half-grown youth on the edge of the crowd and put several very
pertinent questions to him.
Was there any place right around there that the children might have
fallen into--like a cellar, or an excavation! Any place into which they
could have wandered and be unable to get out of, or to make their
situation known? Had there been an accident of any kind near this
vicinity during the day?
The answers extracted from this street youth, who would, Neale was sure,
know of anything odd happening around this section of Milton, were
negative.
"Say, it's been deader'n a doornail around here for a week," confessed
the Meadow Street youth. "Even Dugan's goat hasn't been on the
rampage. No, sir. I ain't seen an automobile goin' faster than a
toad funeral all day. Say, the fastest things we got around here is
the canalboats--believe me!"
"Funny how we always come around to that canal--or the barges on it--in
this inquiry," murmured Luke to Neale O'Neil.
The two had started down the street, but Neale halted in his walk and
stared at the young collegian.
"Funny!" he exclaimed suddenly. "No, there isn't anything funny in it at
all. The canal. Canalboats. My goodness, Mr. Shepard, there must be
something in it!"
"Water," growled Luke. "And very muddy water at that. I will not believe
that the children fell in and were drowned!"
"No!" cried Neale just as vigorously. Then he grinned. "Sammy Pinkney's
best friends say he will never be drowned, although some of them
intimate that there is hemp growing for him. No, Sammy and Dot would not
fall into the canal. But, crickey, Shepard! they might have fallen into
a canalboat."
"What do you mean? Have been carried off in one? Kidnapped--actually
kidnapped?"
"Sh! No. Perhaps not. But you never can tell what will happen to kids
like them--nor what they will do. Whew! there's an idea. Sammy was
always threatening to run away and be a pirate."
"The funny kid!" laughed Luke. "But Dot did not desire such a romantic
career, I am sure."
"Did you ever find out yet what was in a girl's head?" asked Neale, with
an assumption of worldly wisdom very funny in one of his age and
experience. "You don't know what the smallest of them have in their
noddles. Maybe if Sammy expressed an intention of being a pirate she
wasn't going to be left behind."
He laughed. But he had hit the fact very nearly. And it seemed
reasonable to Luke the more he thought of it.
"But on a canalboat?" he said, with lingering doubts.
"Well, it floats on the water, and it's a boat," urged Neale. "Put
yourself in the kid's place. If the idea struck you suddenly to be a
pirate where would you look around here for a pirate ship and water to
sail it!"
"Great Peter!" murmured Luke. "The boundless canal!"
"Quite so," rejoined Neale O'Neil, his conviction growing. "Now, on that
basis, let's ask about the barges that have gone east out from Milton
to-day."
"Why not both ways?" queried Luke, quickly.
"Because most of the canalboats coming west go no farther than the
Milton docks; and if the kids had got a ride on one into town, they
would long since have been home. But it is a long journey to the other
end of the canal. Why, it's fifteen or eighteen miles to Durginville."
"How are you going to find out about these boats?"
Neale had a well defined idea by this time. He sent Luke back to the car
to pacify the girls as best he could, but without taking time to explain
to the collegian his intention in full. Then the boy got to work.
Within half an hour he interviewed the blacksmith and half a dozen other
people who lived or worked in sight of the canal. He discovered that,
although two barges had gone along to the Milton Lock at the river side
since before noon, only the old _Nancy Hanks_ had gone in the other
direction.
He came back to the car and the waiting party in some eagerness.
"Oh, Neale! have you found them!" cried Agnes.
"Of course he hasn't. Do not be so impatient, Aggie," admonished Ruth.
"I have an idea," proclaimed Neale, as he stepped into the car and
turned the starting switch.
"A trace of the children?" Cecile asked.
"It's worth looking into," said Neale with much more confidence than he
really felt. "We'll run up to the first lock and see if the lock-keeper
noticed anybody save the captain and his little girl on that barge that
went through this afternoon. Maybe Dot got friendly with the girl and
she and Sammy went along for a ride on the _Nancy Hanks_. They say this
Bill Quigg that owns that canalboat isn't any brighter than the law
allows, and he might not think of the kids' folks being scared."
"Oh! it doesn't seem reasonable," Ruth said, shaking her head.
But she did not forbid Neale to make the journey to the lock. The road
was good all the way to Durginville and it was a highway the Corner
House girls had not traveled in their automobile. At another time they
would have all enjoyed the trip immensely in the cool of the evening.
And Neale drove just as fast as the law allowed--if not a little faster.
Agnes loved to ride fast in the auto; but this was one occasion when she
was too worried to enjoy the motion. As they rushed on over the road,
and through the pleasant countryside, they were all rather silent. Every
passing minute added to the burden of anxiety upon the minds of the two
sisters and Neale; nor were the visitors lacking in sympathy.
After all, little folk like Sammy and Dot are in great danger when out
in the world alone, away from the shelter of home. So many, many
accidents may happen.
Therefore it was a very serious party indeed that finally stopped at
Bumstead Lock to ask if the lock-keeper or his wife, who lived in a tiny
cottage and cultivated a small plot of ground near by, had noticed any
passengers upon Cap'n Bill Quigg's barge.
"On the _Nancy Hanks_?" repeated the lock-keeper. "I should say 'no'!
young lady," shaking his head emphatically at Ruth's question. "Why, who
ever would sail as a passenger on that old ramshackle thing? I reckon
it'll fall to pieces some day soon and block traffic on the canal."
Ruth, disappointed, would not have persevered. But Luke Shepard asked:
"Is there much traffic on the canal?"
"Well, sometimes there is and sometimes there ain't. But I see all that
goes through here, you may believe."
"How many canalboats went toward Durginville to-day?" the collegian
inquired.
"Why--lemme see," drawled the lock-keeper thoughtfully, as though there
was so much traffic that it was a trouble to remember all the boats.
"Why, I cal'late about _one_. Yes, sir, one. That was the _Nancy
Hanks_."
"She ought to be a fast boat at that," muttered Neale O'Neil. "_Nancy
Hanks_ was some horse."
"So that was the only one?" Luke persevered. "And you spoke with Cap'n
Quigg, did you?"
"With Bill Quigg?" snapped the lock-keeper, with some asperity. "I guess
not! I ain't wastin' my time with the likes of him."
"Oh-ho," said Luke, while his friends looked interested. "You don't
approve of the owner of the _Nancy Hanks_?"
"I should hope not. I ain't got no use for him."
"Then he is a pretty poor citizen, I take it?"
"I cal'late he's the poorest kind we got. He ain't even wuth sendin' to
jail. He'd gone long ago if he was. No. I've no use for Cap'n Bill."
"But you saw there was nobody with him on the boat--no children?"
"Only that gal of his."
"No others?"
"Wal, I dunno. I tell you I didn't stop none to have any doin's with
_them_. I done my duty and that's all. I ain't required by law to gas
with all the riffraff that sails this here canal."
"I believe you," agreed Luke mildly. He looked at Neale and grinned.
"Not very conclusive, is it?" he asked.
"Not to my mind. Bet the kids were on there with this little girl he
speaks of," muttered Neale.
"Oh, do you believe it, Neale?" gasped Agnes, leaning over the back of
the seat.
"I am sure we are much obliged to you, sir," Ruth said, sweetly, as the
engine began to roar again.
"What's up, anyway?" asked the crabbed lock-keeper. "You got something
on that Bill Quigg?"
"Can't tell, Mister," Neale said seriously. "You ask him about it when
he comes back."
"Now, Neale, you've started something," declared Ruth, as the automobile
sped away. "You just see if you haven't."