“Good gracious!” gasped Hugh, starting to his feet, “that is bad; do you know,” he added, turning to Tom and speaking with a slight tremor, “that that little girl Dollie is about the age my Jennie was when she died?”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” replied Tom.

“And,” continued Hugh, swallowing a lump in his throat, “she looks so much like Jennie that I’ve often felt as if I would give all I have—­which ain’t much—­to hold the little one on my knee as I used to hold my baby.  She is a sweet child and likes me; we’ve had many a talk together that no one beside us knows about.  She’s so gentle, so innocent, so good that it seems to me I see my own darling before me when she looks up in my face.  Come, boys,” he added, decisively, as he walked to the farther end of the room, picked up a lantern and lit the candle inside.

“Come where?” asked Tom, in amazement.

Hugh turned half angrily toward him.

“Do you think that I could rest while that child is lost in the mountains?  Mr. Bradley hasn’t acted right toward us and I bear him no good will, but this isn’t he—­it’s a little child—­she looks and acts like my Jennie, that’s dead and gone.”

“But, Hugh, you forget—­what about the place?”

“Let it go to the dogs for all I care!  What does it amount to against the life of the little one?  But we’ll let Jack stay; if any of the boys come, send them out to help in the hunt; it’ll do them more good than to break the law.”

“Suppose some that are strangers come?” said Jack with a grin.

Hugh O’Hara gave a hollow laugh.

“Send them out, too, to help in the search; we’ll be sure to find her when the whole country gets to work.  If I was down in the village I would have every man, woman and child in the woods, and wouldn’t let them eat or drink or sleep till she’s found.  Tom, there’s no one that knows the woods better than we and Nero.  Let’s be off!”

The door was drawn inward, and Jack Hansell was left alone.  He lit his pipe, smoked it out, refilled it and was in the act of refilling it, when Harvey Bradley came in—­as has been made known in another place.  While the man sat smoking and alone in the cabin, he fell to brooding over the troubles at the mills.  Thus it came to pass that his feelings were so bitter at the time the superintendent entered that he kept back every hint that the absent men were engaged in the most “honest” business in the world—­that is, they were looking for the missing child.

Meanwhile Hugh and Tom went at the task not only with zeal, but with a sagacity that gave promise of good results.  As Hugh had said, they knew every foot of the mountains for miles, they were free from the flurry that at first ran away with the judgment of the superintendent, and they were used to prowling through the woods.  Still further Nero had been trained to follow the faintest footprints.

“Now, Tom,” said the leader, when they had walked a short ways, “we can’t do anything till we get on the trail of the little one.”