Solomon in a Rage.—Flight of Pat.—The Explorers penetrate the Forest.—The missing Companions.—New Fears and Anxieties.—A baffled Search.—Onward.—The Recesses of the Forest.—An open Space.—Halt!
YAR, Hyar! you dar! Whar Mas’r Bart?” The cry at once arrested Pat. He stopped short, and turning round he found himself face to face with Solomon.

“Whar Mash Bart?” said Solomon again. He was excited and agitated, and looked all around, and peered into the forest ahead with most anxious curiosity.

“Bart?” said Pat, in a dejected tone; “sure an I don’t know.”

“Warn’t you follerin him?” cried Solomon, in an excited voice.

“Sure an I wor,” said Pat; “but I lost sight of him iver an iver so long ago. An wheriver he is now, it ud take more’n me to tell.”

At this Solomon made a gesture of despair, and looked wildly all around.

“Mas’r Bart lost! Mas’r Bart lost!” he murmured, clutching his wrinkled hands together.

“Och, you needn’t bother about him. Sure an he’s follerin the praste an the Frinchmin, an he’s all safe an right. The last time I see him he was close on the hails of the praste.”

Solomon did not seem to have heard him. His eyes rolled wildly. He looked all around eagerly, wistfully, with unspeakable anxiety in his face.

“Mas’r Bart lost! Mas’r Bart lost!” he murmured, still wringing his hands.

“But I till ye he ain’t lost,” cried Pat. “He’s wid the praste, so he is. Didn’t I see him?”

“Don’t see no use,” cried Solomon, angrily, “for de likes ob you to go foolin round dis yer way, leadin folks eberywhar, out ob de right track. I bound to foller Mas’r Bart, an heah you go a foolin an a gittin lost. What’s de sense ob dis yer proceedin? What do you mean, anyhow? Ef you tink I’m goin to stan any such tomfoolery, you precious mistaken. You better begin now and go ahead, and find out whar Mas’r Bart is.”

Solomon’s tone was full of a certain angry menace, which was so utterly unlike his usual manner that Pat stared at him in wonder.

“Ah, howl yer whist,” he exclaimed, at last; “sure I ain’t the only one that’s got lost in these wuds, so I ain’t. You can find him yerself bether’n me, so ye can, if ye want to. How can I find him! Sorra one of me knows the way anywheres out of this; and I’m fairly broken-hearted, so I am, and that’s all about it.”

And saying this, Pat flung himself down, and buried his face in his hands. He felt overwhelmed by his troubles. His fears of the leprosy were still strong within him, and in addition to this he felt a keen sense of self-reproach at his desertion of Bart. Had it not been for Solomon he might not have thought of this; but the sight of the old man’s anxiety about Bart brought before him in the plainest manner the fact that he had been disloyal to his friend, and had deserted him, in this hour of need.

As for Solomon, he took only one look at him, and then turned away. In his faithful heart there was only one feeling, one desire; and that was, to get back to Bart. He had no idea of the actual state of the case. He did not know what a circuit Pat had made, but merely supposed that they had got off the track that the others were following. With this idea in his mind, he proceeded to call after Bart, so as to open up a communication with him. This he strove to do by means of a series of the most unearthly yells, shrieks, and howls that ever echoed through the recesses of a harmless and unoffending forest. Yell followed yell; howl succeeded howl; and a long series of hoots, halloos, shrieks, whoops, and hullaballoos followed in swift succession. After each effort Solomon stood listening attentively, waiting for a response before beginning again. But his listening and his waiting were all unavailing, for no response came, and all his unearthly cries only echoed through the dim forest aisles, without bringing back any answer from the one whom they were intended to reach. And no wonder: for by this time Bart was very far indeed out of hearing.

At last Solomon gave up in utter discouragement. He stood for a time in deep dejection, and then turned towards Pat, who had all this time remained in the same attitude, sitting with his head buried in his hands.

“How long ago is it,” asked Solomon, “sence you lost sight ob Mash Bart?”

“O, iver so long,” said Pat; “more thin an hour, surely.”

“Why didn’t you call?”

“Sure an how did I know?” said Pat, evasively; “wasn’t I bothered out of my life, an fairly heart-broke? so I was. An sure an it’s been a bad time for us all intirely. Bad luck to the day whin we came out to this leper place,—an me goin a bathin in the leper wather, an aitin their leper dinners; the more fool I was for that same. Sure an the praste’s the desayver, so he is, for laydin a poor feller in this way.”

Not one word of this did Solomon understand, nor did he try to understand it. He had other things to think about. His one idea was to find Bart once more. He did not think that he was far away, but believed that he had been going on in the same general direction, though he had swerved, to some extent, from the true course. So he now determined to go on, and hoped that he might find Bart before long.

“No use waitin in dis yer place, dis yer way,” said he. “I’m a goin to hunt up Mas’r Bart.”

And with these words he left Pat, and went onward into the woods, continuing the same course which Pat had been leading. As to asking Pat to go with him, the thought never entered his head,—partly on account of his deep disgust at Pat for losing sight, as he believed, of Bart, but principally from the fact that his mind was so filled with the desire of reaching Bart, that there was no place in it for any thought of any other person. And so the poor old fellow plunged into the woods, and took up a course which was about as far away from that in which Bart was going as it well could be.

At Solomon’s last words Pat raised his head and saw him go. He watched him till he was out of sight, with varied emotions. He supposed that Solomon was now on his way to Tracadie, while believing himself to be following after Bart into the depths of the woods. There seemed, therefore, no danger before him, and Pat had no fears for his safety. Had Solomon taken another direction, Pat would probably have told him all; but as it was, he saw no necessity for doing so. He would get back, he thought, in the course of time, to Tracadie, and on finding himself there, he would probably wait for Bart’s return, and all would be well.

He sat there motionless, until Solomon was out of sight, and then began to think of himself. One thing only was in his mind, and that was, the desire to fly, as soon as possible, far away from this abhorrent place, to some other place, where he might be safe, and where he could watch to see if the terrible disease had really taken hold of him or not. So with this purpose he arose, and after a look all around, he chose his course, and went on through the woods.

Meanwhile the others had been walking diligently onward; first the guides leading the way, next the priest, and then Bart. Not a word was spoken by any one of them; the guides were too intent upon maintaining a correct course; the priest was too much absorbed in watching the movements of the guides, and in observing the scenes through which he was passing; and Bart was too much occupied with conjectures about the probable course of Phil’s wanderings to think anything about the members of their own party. Bart had a perfect conviction that Pat and Solomon were behind him; so perfect, in fact, that it remained in his mind as a foundation underlying all his other thoughts; so perfect that those thoughts never reverted to those behind him, but turned only to that one who was at a distance—the object of their present search.

Deeper and deeper, and farther and farther, they advanced into the forest, encountering every variation of woodland scenery, and every alternation of forest travelling; sometimes finding it easy, again finding it difficult, yet at no time encountering any very serious obstacle. Their pace was somewhat rapid, for the guides led them on without much regard to the possible weakness or clumsiness of their followers; and judging them by themselves, they maintained a pace which soon began to tell very seriously upon Bart, and forced him to put forth his utmost strength and energy in order to keep the priest in sight.

At last, after a walk of several hours, the guides stopped, and offered to rest. They were coming, they said, upon a more difficult part of the forest, where greater exertion would be required, and it might be well to rest for a time. The priest approved of this, and mentioned it to Bart. He also approved of it most heartily, for he was almost exhausted, and then turned to mention it to Pat. To his surprise, however, Pat was not behind him, nor was there any sign of Solomon.

This discovery gave him a great shock, and the priest also was equally amazed; but both he and Bart supposed that they could not be far away, and so they looked back through the woods to gain sight of their advancing figures. Not perceiving any signs of them, they listened to find out if they were approaching. No sounds, however, arose of any kind; no crackle of dry twigs announced coming footsteps; and as they listened, there was nothing perceptible to their hearing save the intense and drear silence of a vast solitude.

At this Bart threw a look of anxious inquiry at the priest.

“They were following you?” said the priest, in an inquiring tone.

“Yes,” said Bart, doubtfully.

“Have you noticed that they fell back?”

“I didn’t notice them at all. I took it for granted all the time that they were behind me.”

“How long is it since you saw them last?”

“Well, really, I don’t believe I have looked behind me once since we started.”

“I hope they haven’t lost sight of us. I hope they haven’t lost their way,” said the priest.

The evident anxiety of his tone affected Bart very seriously. His own experience in the woods, as well as the loss of Phil, made him quite ready to believe the worst; and though it puzzled him greatly to conceive how Pat and Solomon could quietly lose them, and go off on a strange course, without a single word, at the same time he began to fear that such must have been the case.

“Well,” said the priest, “we may as well sit down and rest. There’s nothing else to be done. Perhaps they’ll be along presently. I’ll make the guides call for them. They can do it better than we can.”

He then spoke to the guides; and the latter, as soon as they understood the state of the case, began to call for their lost companions. They did this by setting up a series of cries so loud, so shrill, and so sharp, that Bart actually started. He had never in all his life heard such sounds. Pitched upon a high and very peculiar key, they seemed to have a far-penetrating power which would suffice to carry them for an incredible distance.

Again and again the guides uttered these cries, and after each cry they listened; but though they listened long, there came not the slightest response. At length, at a suggestion from the priest, one of them went back along the track which they had traversed. He returned after about half an hour. He came back alone, and reported that he had seen no sign whatever of either of those who were lost.

The priest now looked worried and uneasy. He sat for some time in silence, thinking over this fresh difficulty.

“Well,” said he, at length, “they seem to have lost us—most mysteriously; and now the only question is, shall we go back to try to find them, or shall we go on? Which needs our help most, the one who has been lost for two or three days, or those who have just left us?”

“O, as to that,” said Bart, “they are both better able to take care of themselves than Phil is; and besides, they are nearer to the settlements, and they must know the way back, for the woods have not been very thick, and we have been going in a straight course, and so it seems to me that we had better go on and try to find poor Phil.”

“I think so too,” said the priest. “At any rate we shall rest for an hour yet, and perhaps before we start they will find us.”

They remained for an hour longer, but there was no sign of the lost ones. No sound of crackling twigs, no calls for help, awakened the deep silence that reigned in the surrounding forest.

At length they rose to resume their journey in accordance with Bart’s decision. This new calamity broke up that cheerfulness and hopefulness which he had been maintaining since the priest had spoken to him those encouraging words; and the thought of Pat and Solomon wandering about, without food and without guides through this trackless forest, gave him more than his former anxiety. It seemed a succession of misfortunes that was destined to end in some kind of a tragedy, and there arose within his mind the dark anticipation of some inevitable calamity as the natural termination of all these pieces of ill-fortune.

Struggling as well as he could with these gloomy forebodings, Bart once more set out after his guides on what he now began to think a hopeless errand. But now there came other things to distract his mind from the anxieties that were harassing it in the shape of the difficulties of the way. The guides were right in their warning about the toil and labor that now lay before them. There were dense underbrushes to penetrate—so dense and so close that every step was a struggle; there were streams to ford, in which they sank to the armpits; there were swamps to cross, where there was nothing but one long struggle from one extremity to the other; and added to this there were long pathways that led over fallen trees, and through tangled weeds, and tall ferns, which impeded the feet at every step, and necessitated the most painful and the most unremittent exertion. In his progress through the woods before, Bart had found nothing like this, except for very short periods of time, and he thought that if such a journey as this had been before him he could never have escaped.

Thus far the heat had been very great. There was no wind. The air was still and stagnant; and the effort of walking, even when the walk had been easy, as at first, had been somewhat exhaustive. But now the exertion required was far greater, and what was worse, the heat far more intense. There was a torrid heat in the atmosphere that exceeded anything which he had thus far experienced, and made all exertion doubly toilsome and exhaustive. Yet in spite of all this, his deep anxiety about Phil seemed to sustain him, and though he felt ready to drop, yet he managed to maintain his march, and follow on after his guides.

At length they emerged from a tangled thicket which had offered extraordinary obstacles to their progress. They came suddenly into a wide, open place, quite bare of trees, and overgrown with low brush and trailing evergreen vines. Here there burst upon them an extraordinary sight,—so extraordinary, indeed, that they all stopped with one common impulse, and gazed in silence upon the scene before them.

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