"Where is Benny?" asked little Fanny again and again. "O, where is Benny?" moaned his poor mother; and the question sank like lead into his father's heart. Grandma raised her gentle eyes and asked it of Heaven itself, and you, my children, by this time are asking it of me. I feel bound to tell you this much: Benny was--I shudder to say it--Benny was enduring the fate once proposed for Mr. Jefferson Davis. The sun was getting low, the shadows were long on the grass, and Benny's pitiful shadow as it lengthened, stretched nearer and nearer home. Ah, would he ever get there himself again? It was milking time. 'Bijah sat milking the cows in the barnyard, when in bounced Sandy. He hadn't come on Benny's account, that was plain. He was thirsty, and begged for milk, which he had frequently had from the hand of 'Bijah. He was no story-book dog--only quite a commonplace fellow, who hadn't the faintest idea that he ought to have arrived here hours ago, and won fame for himself by showing the way to Benny. However, you'll see presently that he wasn't to blame for that. [Illustration: THEY START IN SEARCH OF BENNY.] 'Bijah stopped milking and sprang to his feet. "Hello!" said he, "Sandy, I vum! That means 't Benny ain't fur off. You don't ketch that feller to stir a peg from Benny 'f he c'n help himself." 'Bijah gave Sandy some milk, feeling sure that if Benny was on earth, Sandy would go straight back again to where he had left him. Benny was not on earth, but Sandy, having finished his refreshment, without even waiting to return thanks, trotted off across lots at a great pace, 'Bijah following in hot pursuit. Away they splashed through the marshy meadows; jump, they went over the stone walls. "Land!" said 'Bijah. "Where _be_ you a-goin'?" as Sandy leaped across a ditch into the great Kingsbury orchard. Mr. Kingsbury had died a year before. His wife had closed the old homestead and gone to live with her daughter, and the farm had been for sale ever since. 'Bijah sprang over the ditch and came sprawling into the orchard. When he had picked himself up, Sandy was nowhere to be seen. The loneliness of the deserted farm and the soberness of approaching evening were all about him. "Hello!" he shouted, and he thought he heard a response. "Hello!" he repeated, and he was sure of a faint, faint cry, towards which he bounded, shouting, "Benny, Benny!" and presently directly over his head he heard a voice which seemed to come from Heaven, saying: "'Bijah, O 'Bijah, here, up here!" 'Bijah looked toward the sky, and behold, dangling from one of the topmost branches of a famous big sour apple-tree, a pair of sturdy boy's legs! And there was Sandy, lying on the ground beneath them.