Geoffrey has run away! So that was what he meant by promising to go to school till Saturday! Oh, I feel as if I were partly responsible;—and yet, how could I have suspected?

He was over here late yesterday afternoon. I did not have a chance to see him, as mother was out, and Robin rather feverish and fretful; but Ernie and he talked together in the workshop for nearly a couple of hours, and after he went Ernie came down to dinner with such red eyes.

“What is it, dear?” I asked, at last, when she and I were undressing together in our little room. “Was Geof in one of his moods again?” For Ernie had been on the verge of tears all the evening.

She dropped upon the bed then, with a little wail, and buried her face in the pillows. “I should say he was,” she sobbed. “I couldn’t do a thing with him. That hateful military camp! It’s enough to drive anybody to desperation!”

“Is it settled?” I asked. “Must Geof really go?”

“Oh, don’t bother, Elizabeth,” returned Ernie, almost crossly. “He’s going to talk to Uncle George to-night. He gets his allowance Fridays, you know; and to-morrow we’ll hear.”

Then she turned her face to the wall and pretended to go to sleep; but she was restless for hours, and once she cried out wildly in her dreams:

“Geoffrey! you mustn’t! You mustn’t, I tell you!”

No wonder she was anxious, poor child; for it seems that Geoffrey, after having first obtained a promise of secrecy, confided his plans to her yesterday afternoon. She is the only person who knows where he is now, and entreaties and arguments are equally of no avail. We simply cannot get her to tell.

The first alarm reached us this morning, just as we had risen from the breakfast table. There was a sharp ring at the door-bell; and Rose, answering the summons, found Maria, one of Aunt Adelaide’s maids, outside.

“Is Master Geoffrey here?” asked Maria, rather breathlessly. And, upon receiving Rose’s denial, she cried out:

“Then Lord-a-mercy knows what’s become of him! For he ain’t been home all the morning, not even to his breakfast, and missis and the boss, too, are in a great taking!”

Mother and I, who were on our way upstairs, overheard the exclamation and turned back.

“What is it, Maria?” asked mother, after having sent Rose down to the kitchen again. “Master Geoffrey has not been here since yesterday. You say he was not home to breakfast?”

“No, ma’am,” answered Maria; and proceeded to pour forth her tale. It seems that Geoffrey has been in the habit of over-sleeping recently, which indulgence greatly irritated Aunt Adelaide.

“Mrs. Graham thinks it’s only manners for the family to sit down to meals together,” Maria explained. “So this morning when Master Geoffrey did not come, she sent Jennie up to knock at his door, and Jennie, she knocked, and knocked again, and got no answer. So after a bit she came down, and said she could not make Master Geoffrey hear, and Mr. Graham jumped up.

“‘I’ll wake him myself,’ he says. ‘We’ve had enough of this sort of nonsense.’ And he went and called very angry-like at the foot of the stairs; but still there was no reply;—and I was rather sorry for Master Geoffrey when his pa snatched off one of his slippers and ran upstairs and threw open the bedroom door.

“‘He’s going to catch it, sure enough, like any babby,’ I thought; but he didn’t, because the room was empty. The bed had not even been slept in.

“‘Hello!’ says Mr. Graham, in a disturbed sort of way. And he put on his slipper and came downstairs again; and directly breakfast was over they sent me here.”

“Can Ernie know anything of this?” asked mother, turning to me. “She is Geoffrey’s usual confidante. Run upstairs and get her, Elizabeth. I believe she has taken Robin his tray.”

All the colour died out of Ernie’s face when she saw me enter the nursery; but it flooded back again in a crimson wave as she listened to mother’s message. However, she settled Bobsie to his breakfast, and quietly followed me downstairs.

“Have you any idea where Geoffrey is, Ernie?” asked mother, gravely.

Ernie’s long lashes swept her cheeks. “Isn’t he at home?” she returned, in a tone that was intended to sound innocent.

Mother smiled, just a little. “Don’t be foolish, dear,” she replied. “If you know anything about Geoffrey it is only right for you to tell us. We are not his enemies.”

For a moment Ernie stood silent; then she said, very low, “I know, but I can’t tell. I’ve promised.”

At that instant there sounded a second peal at the bell. This time it was Uncle George. Never before in my life have I seen him so upset, though it was evident he tried to appear indifferent.

His first words were addressed to Maria.

“Go home to your mistress, my good girl,” he said.

Then, turning to mother,—“It does not answer to send servants on such errands. They simply stand and gossip.”

Mother flushed a little. “Maria is quite blameless,” she replied. “I desired to hear all she knew in regard to Geoffrey. Have you any further news?”

Uncle George laid his hat carefully upon a chair, and felt in his coat pocket.

“It seems the young scamp left a note,” he said, in a voice that was husky, despite his assumption of unconcern. “It was not in his room, or we would have found it earlier. He gave it to Georgie last night, telling him to give it to me this morning as soon as he had finished breakfast in the nursery.” And Uncle George handed mother a folded sheet of paper.

“Dear father,” we read,—I was looking over her shoulder,—

I wanted to cry as I read it. Poor, blundering, affectionate Geof, with his atrocious spelling and his “inherited bran.”

Mother handed the note to Uncle George again, without a word.

“Well?” he asked, shortly.

“It is very like Geoffrey,” she said; “though I never could have supposed he would run away. What are you going to do?”

“I, myself,” returned Uncle George, “would prefer to wait and give the young beggar a chance to grow tired of his experiment. That’s the medicine he needs. A chap who can throw over a good home such as Geoffrey has, ought to be made to rough it a bit. But the women folk won’t hear of it. Meta and her mother are in a great taking. They imagine all sorts of foolishness, and it’s on account of them, more especially, that I have come over to interview your Ernie. Come, young woman! What have you got to say for yourself? Do you know anything of Geoffrey’s whereabouts?”

Again Ernie flushed crimson, lowered her eyelids, and remained silent.

“I have already questioned Ernestine,” said mother. “She undoubtedly knows certain facts which would be very useful. I hope that I shall be able to convince her it is her duty to tell us.”

Uncle George looked from mother to Ernie in blank amazement. “Do you mean to say she won’t tell?” he demanded. “Then there is only one way out of it. She must be made to.”

“I shall try to show Ernie that it is the only way in which she can be of any help to Geoffrey,” answered mother, quietly.

Uncle George frowned impatiently.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said, after a moment’s thought. “I’ll give her a five-dollar gold piece for the first bit of information she has to give us. What’s more, I’ll make it twenty-five dollars, if it leads to Geoffrey’s capture before night. What do you say to that, my girl?”

It would be impossible to describe the look of horror depicted in Ernie’s features. Betray Geof, her dear chum, her more than brother, for a sordid money reward! If Uncle George had only known it, our last chance of winning Ernie was lost when he uttered those hateful words. But he did not know, and it would have been impossible to make him understand. On the contrary, he picked up his hat with a satisfied expression of having set things on the right track, at last, and after a final injunction “to keep him informed,” left us.

Mother and I looked hopelessly at one another as the front door closed behind him.

“Ernie, dear,” said mother, very gently, “setting aside all thought of Uncle George’s offer, for, of course, it is out of the question that you should accept any money,—I expect you to tell me at once all you know in regard to Geoffrey’s plans. It may be the means of saving him great hardship, and discomfort.”

“Yes, Ernie,” I urged. “And everybody is agreed that it is much better to break a bad promise than to keep it. Doesn’t your own common-sense tell you that?”

But reason, command, entreat as we might, Ernie remained obdurate.

She sat on the top stair leading down to the basement, the big tears welling in her blue eyes and trickling along her nose till they dropped from the tip with a little splash into her lap; listening plaintively to all we said, replying nothing,—a moving picture of stubborn misery.

At last mother desisted.

“Ernie,” she said, “I want you distinctly to understand that I am both disappointed and displeased with you. You are the one person who can be of any help to Geoffrey; but I shall ask you no further questions. When your own good feeling and sense of right prompt you to follow my wishes, I shall be ready to listen to you.”

Then mother dressed and went to see Aunt Adelaide; I ran up to the nursery to Robin; and Ernie locked herself in the workshop, where she set to work painting a gorgeous family of Japanese paper dolls for Mary Hobart’s birthday,—spattering their beflowered kimonos ever and again with a salty drop. She was very forlorn, poor darling;—distressed beyond measure to feel that her family disapproved of her. Yet she had given her word to Geof.

So the morning passed. Lunch time came, and still there was no news. The afternoon dragged even more heavily; and when Hazard came home from the office in the evening he told us that Uncle George had three detectives looking for Geof, but as yet they had found no clue.

Dinner was somewhat of an ordeal. I had the head of the table, as mother did not feel she could leave Aunt Adelaide, who is in a very apprehensive and nervous state. We tried to keep the conversation to general topics, but the anecdotal vein of the boarders was not to be stemmed. It seems that Geoffrey’s escapade reminded everybody of some long-forgotten incident in his or her own family, or the family of a friend, or even a friend’s friend.

Nothing was too far-fetched to be appropriate, every possible climax to the adventure was predicted, and the same heartening conversation continued when we gathered in the parlour after dinner to wait for news. Till, finally, about half-past ten or so, the boarders began to disperse to their rooms;—yet not before Mr. Lysle had made a brief, though painful, effort to win Ernie’s confidence; for she is a favourite with the kind “Hippopotamus,” and it grieved him to know her in disgrace.

Therefore, interrupting his sister, who was condoling with Miss Brown over the sad fate of a nephew of the latter’s mother’s aunt, who eloped with a sea captain’s daughter some sixty years ago, and was finally eaten up by whales off the Cape of Good Hope (I believe it was thus the thrilling story ran), Mr. Lysle, with a sly wink at his wife over the top of his newspaper, began:

“Miss Ernie! ahem!”

Ernie looked up from her “home-work,” and the “Hippopotamus” continued ponderously:

“I suppose you are familiar with the famous anecdote of George Washington and his hatchet? How, when still a young boy, the Father of Our Country found it impossible, even with the fear of stern chastisement before him, to tell a—er—a—lie?”

Ernie cautiously refusing to commit herself to any previous acquaintance with the incident, Mr. Lysle continued blandly:—

“Now, my dear child, a similar opportunity is presented to you,—an opportunity such as you may never meet again—a grand opportunity! a great one! The path of truth is a path of roses, for all that it has its thorns,—even, if I may say so, because of them!”

He paused impressively, and looked Ernie firmly in the eye. We, the audience, waited breathless, but still Mr. Lysle did not speak. So, supposing, at last, the homily must be concluded, we were about to return to our various avocations, when he positively thundered forth:

“Where is your Cousin Geoffrey? Where is that wilful lad? Speak! I command you!”

Everybody in the room jumped, and Miss Lysle, who is nervous, uttered an hysterical little squawk, like a frightened hen.

Ernie alone remained undaunted. The poor “Hippopotamus” continued to gaze at her, triumph fading to chagrin, till, finally, he turned to his wife with such a disappointed air:—

“I thought I could surprise it out of her,” he said; “but, evidently, I—er—couldn’t!” And a few moments later he bade us a subdued “good-night” and was soon followed upstairs by the rest of the boarders.

It seems too strange to be sitting here writing these things, with no idea where Geoffrey may be! If only I did not feel my own responsibility so keenly! I can see now that I should have told mother last Tuesday when first I heard of Geof’s trou——. There is the bell! It may be news....

Yes! and good news, too. Geoffrey is found! He was brought home about eleven o’clock by one of Uncle George’s detectives, who ran across him in a little out-of-the-way cottage in Elizabeth, where he had spent the day with a German woman, who was once a cook at Uncle George’s when Geoffrey’s own mother was alive. She is married now, and has a neat little home of her own, with three fat German babies.

There Geoffrey arrived late last night, and to-morrow morning he had planned to set out again on his travels and beat his way to South Dakota, where Mrs. Prendergast, the German woman, has a brother who works on a cattle ranch! Think of it!

Dear little Ernie broke down completely when she heard of Geoffrey’s capture. She threw herself into mother’s arms, sobbing convulsively:—

“I didn’t mean to be naughty, mother dear! I didn’t! And, of course, you know best—only I had given my word, you see, and then Uncle George might have made me take that hateful money! Oh, what are they going to do to Geoffrey!”

“There! there, dear!” said mother. “Don’t cry so. It is all over now. And as to Geoffrey, you need not worry. Aunt Adelaide and Uncle George are only too anxious to forgive him. He has acted very wrongly, and given us all a great fright; but it has been a lesson to everybody concerned, and I don’t think Uncle George holds Geoffrey entirely responsible.”

And later, after Ernie had snuggled down in bed, where she dropped at once into an exhausted sleep, mother confided to me that she, as well as Aunt Adelaide, fears that Geoffrey is going to be ill.

He seemed quite unlike himself this evening—indifferent and almost dazed, and he still complained of headache. Aunt Adelaide sent him at once to bed, and this morning, if he is not better, he is to see a doctor.

I say this morning, because it is already nearly two o’clock. My eyes are sticky with sleep. I cannot write another word, except to add that even if Geof is to be ill, we are all thankful!