But in a few moments he came running back to her. "That's the way it always is with me! Him first! But after this it's you--and I was leaving you here in the lurch. But I don't know what to do!" He looked at her, then at the broken jumper; he gazed to the north and he stared to the south; in that emergency, his emotions stressed by what she had told him, he was as helpless as a child. Her own concern just then was for her grandfather as well as for herself. Those runaway horses appearing in the yard would rouse his bitter fear; they would also start a hue and cry which would follow her into the north country. "You must go back, at once!" she urged Dick. "Follow as fast as you can. The horses will quiet down; they'll walk. You may overtake them. You must try." "But you!" he mourned. She lifted the cant dog from the floor of the jumper. "I shall keep on toward the drive--somehow--some way. This will protect me; I'm sure of it." He puckered his face and shook his head and expressed his fears and his doubts. "Then I'm showing more faith than you in what this stands for," she said, rebukingly. "I believe in it. I trust to it. Haven't you the same kind of loyalty where my grandfather is concerned--after all your years with him?" She had appealed to zealous, unquestioning devotion, and it replied to her. "I reckon you're right. It wouldn't be showing proper respect if I didn't meet you halfway in the thing." He reached out his hand and patted the staff. "I'm only a poor old bent stick beside that one. I even let the horses run away. Yes, they have run away--and now it's all the long miles to the drive! How'll ye ever get there, Miss Lida?" "By starting!" she returned, crisply, with something of Flagg's manner. "There are tote teams going north. Anybody'll be glad to give you a lift. There are bateaus above here, ferrying supplies up the broad water, and you may see a canoeman----" He was wistfully grabbing at hopes. "I'm not afraid," she assured him bravely. He helped her with advice while he busied himself by hooking the handle of her bag over the staff; she carried it across her shoulder and had something cheerful to say about poverty making light luggage. In that fashion she fared toward the north, after she had forced a pledge from the old man that he would keep her secret until her work was done; she was guilelessly unaware that Flagg's perspicacity had penetrated her secret. Dick plodded toward the south. There, in the midst of the forest, dwarfed by the big trees, they seemed to be weak reeds for the support of the Flagg fortunes. Before a bend of the road shut them from sight of each other they turned and waved a farewell which renewed the pledge. CHAPTER TWENTY