Boarding schools -- Juvenile fiction; Boys -- Juvenile fiction; Football -- Juvenile fiction
"What I'm afraid of," said Mr. Cobb, "is that he has met with an
accident of some sort. Seems to me that if he had the use of his limbs
he would have reached the school before this, or at least have
communicated with us. Well, we'll have to make the best of things until
the light comes. Better take a nap, fellows, if you can."
But they were in no mood for napping. The leaping flames lent their
tinge of romance to a situation already sufficiently out of the common
to be exciting and the boys wanted to live every moment of it. The
uncertainty as to Roy's fate added a qualm of uneasiness, but when once
Warren had got well into his story of the Wyoming outlaws who lived in a
cave and robbed trains and stage coaches, even Chub forgot the purpose
of the expedition for whole minutes at a time. I think Harry
unconsciously dozed several times, although she always denied it
indignantly. Now and then one of the party would mend the fire and then
crawl back to the protection of the ledge and the waving bushes. Mr.
Cobb followed Warren with some stories of Cornwall wreckers which he had
read, and after that every member of the party save Harry, who happened
to be very quiet about that time, contributed some tale of dark deeds.
Presently Jack made the discovery that it was possible to see the
branches of the wind-whipped bushes behind them. Chub climbed to the
summit of the ledge and announced that there was light away down on the
horizon toward the east. Then followed an hour of waiting during which
the world gradually turned from black to gray. The fire died out for
lack of fuel and the boys snuggled into the collars of their sweaters,
for it seemed to grow more chill each moment. Then, when objects a few
yards away could be distinguished, Mr. Cobb suggested that they "break
camp." So they spread out in a line and took up the search again,
calling as they went. The light grew quickly and in the east the sky
took on a tinge of rose. Mr. Cobb stopped once and picked something from
the ground.
"Must be slate quarries about here," he said. "There's a lot of broken
pieces here and loose gravel. Yes, here's a hole," he went on, walking
forward, "but they only went down a few feet. I wonder if there are more
of them?"
Suddenly there was a cry from the other end of the line.
"Mr. Cobb, come see what I've found!"
It was Harry's voice and Mr. Cobb made his way to her where she stood at
the edge of a thicket of leafless brambles.
"What is it, Harry?" he asked.
For answer she held up a tiny bit of crimson yarn.
"What do you make of this?" asked the instructor, looking at it in a
puzzled way.
"I think it came from his sweater!" declared Harry triumphantly. "It was
on that branch there."
"Good for you, Harry!" cried Chub, who had joined them ahead of the
others. "Roy had his red sweater on and it's money to muffins that
thread was pulled out as he went by."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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