“Please d’ye ken anything about Thora Kinlay?” said she; and I recognized Ann, the servant woman of Crua Breck.

“Anything about Thora?” I asked, surprised at the inquiry.  “Why, Ann, what’s gone wrong wi’ her?”

“We’re feared she’s lost,” said the woman.  “She went outby in the forenoon, and she hasna come back yet.”

“Did she not say where she was going to?” I asked.

“No; and we’ve heard nothing o’ her.  We canna think what can hae come ower her.”

“But where are Carver and Tom, and the boat’s crew?” I asked.  “Have they not been out seeking for the lass?”

“No; they’re all away in the St. Magnus; and the mistress is ill in her bed.  The shepherd and me has been seekin’ Thora all the night, and I’ve come to Lyndardy, thinkin’ ye might hae seen her yestreen.”

“No; I havena seen Thora these nine or ten weeks past,” I said.  “But if she be out in this storm she must be looked for; so bide here a wee, Ann, and I’ll come out and help ye.”

I thereupon hastened within for my sea boots and oilskins.  I had next to procure a lantern from the byre; and this was somewhat difficult, for the snow had drifted in a high bank against the door, and I had to remove it before I could effect an entrance.  Lighting the lantern, and taking down my long staff, I noticed that my climbing lines had been taken from the peg where they usually hung.  My gun, too, was amissing.  No one but myself had any use for either the ropes or the gun, and I thought it curious that they were removed; but at the moment I did not concern myself about so apparently trivial a circumstance.

I soon rejoined the woman, and with her I made diligent search for Thora.  Backward and forward we tramped for many weary miles in the wind and snow.  We went by every road and footpath that we knew, yet not even a footmark but our own could we find.

I questioned Ann and the shepherd, who had joined us, as to where they had searched before I came out.  The shepherd had been to a cottage where lived an old woman named Mary Firth, but Mary was not at home, and there was no one in the cottage—­no trace of Thora.

“Has either o’ ye been across at Jack Paterson’s croft?” I then asked.

“No,” said the shepherd.

“Weel, then, that’s the only place she can have been to, that I can think of.  So you two had better get back to Crua Breck and wait till daylight.  I’ll gang to Jack Paterson’s, and if they ken nothing of Thora there, we can only wait till the morning.”

The two returned to the farm, therefore, and I tramped through the storm to the croft of Clouston, past the ghostly standing stones of the Druids, and along the dreary, snow-covered road.

The cottage was in darkness, with a great drift of snow against the door.  I knocked with my stick several times, and presently I heard Jack Paterson’s gruff voice demanding who was there.