When it was discovered that Loka was nowhere in the immediate vicinity, Tontine was furious. "_Pas possible_ she's walk to Laballière, with Bibine!" she exclaimed. "I'll saddle the hoss an' go see, Tontine," interposed Baptiste, who was beginning to share his wife's uneasiness. "Go, go, Baptiste," she urged. "An' you, boys, run yonda down the road to ole Aunt Judy's cabin an' see." It was found that Loka had not been seen at Laballière's, nor at Aunt Judy's cabin; that she had not taken the boat, that was still fastened to its moorings down the bank. Then Tontine's excitement left her. She turned pale and sat quietly down in her room, with an unnatural calm that frightened the children. Some of them began to cry. Baptiste walked restlessly about, anxiously scanning the country in all directions. A wretched hour dragged by. The sun had set, leaving hardly an afterglow, and in a little while the twilight that falls so swiftly would be there. Baptiste was preparing to mount his horse, to start out again on the round he had already been over. Tontine sat in the same state of intense abstraction when Francois, who had perched himself among the lofty branches of a chinaberry-tree, called out: "Ent that Loka 'way yon'a, jis' come out de wood? climbin' de fence down by de melon patch?" It was difficult to distinguish in the gathering dusk if the figure were that of man or beast. But the family was not left long in suspense. Baptiste sped his horse away in the direction indicated by Francis, and in a little while he was galloping back with Bibine in his arms; as fretful, sleepy and hungry a baby as ever was. Loka came trudging on behind Baptiste. He did not wait for explanations; he was too eager to place the child in the arms of its mother. The suspense over, Tontine began to cry; that followed naturally, of course. Through her tears she managed to address Loka, who stood all tattered and disheveled in the doorway: "W'ere you been? Tell me that." "Bibine an' me," answered Loka, slowly and awkwardly, "we was lonesome--we been take lit' 'broad in de wood." "You did n' know no betta 'an to take 'way Bibine like that? W'at Ma'ame Laballière mean, anyhow, to sen' me such a objec' like you, I want to know?" "You go'n' sen' me 'way?" asked Loka, passing her hand in a hopeless fashion over her frowzy hair. "_Par exemple!_ straight you march back to that ban' w'ere you come from. To give me such a fright like that! _pas possible_." "Go slow, Tontine; go slow," interposed Baptiste. "Don' sen' me 'way frum Bibine," entreated the girl, with a note in her voice like a lament. "To-day," she went on, in her dragging manner, "I want to run 'way bad, an' take to de wood; an' go yonda back to Bayou Choctaw to steal an' lie agin. It's on'y Bibine w'at hole me back. I could n' lef' 'im. I could n' do dat. An' we jis' go take lit' 'broad in de wood, das all, him an' me. Don' sen' me 'way like dat!"