Snow was on the ground; every footstep showed like a blot of ink on white paper. He was surprised to see that someone had crossed the flower-beds. Then he was startled by a thought. Perhaps the police, or the man whom Mr. Grace called 'the spotter,' had guessed. He listened. No sound. He entered the yard; the footprints led into the stable. He called softly, “Are you there?” No one answered. With fear in his heart he climbed into the loft: Uncle Waffles had vanished. CHAPTER XXI--STRANGE HAPPENINGS Had they caught him? Ever since the beginning of the adventure Peter had wondered interminably how it would end. He hadn't been able to see any ending. It had seemed to him that, if nothing was found out, Uncle Waffles might go on hiding in the loft forever and he might go on pilfering for him. Peter had watched his uncle carefully; he knew much more about him now. He knew that he was a great disreputable child, much younger than himself, who would always be dependent on somebody. He came to realize that through all those years of large talking his uncle had never been a man--never would be now; that he was just a large self-conscious boy, boastful, affectionate and unreliable, whose sins were not wickedness but naughtiness. The odd strain of maternity in Peter, which prompted him always to shelter things weaker than himself, made him love his uncle the more for this knowledge. And now he was distracted, like a bantam hen which has hatched out a swan and lost it. He set to work searching in the coach-house, under the tandem tricycle, in the harness-room. He went out into the yard, following the footprints. They led through the door into the garden, under the pear trees, across a flower-bed to a neighbor's wall and there terminated abruptly. What could have happened? The night about him was spectacular and glistening as a picture on a Christmas card. Everything in sight was draped in exaggerated purity. Like cotton-wool, sprinkled with powdered glass, snow lay along the arms of trees and sparkled in festoons on withered creepers. The march of those countless London feet, that invisible hurrying army, always weary, yet never halting, came to him muffled as though it moved across a heavy carpet. “Be quiet. Be quiet,” said the golden windows, mounting in a barricade of houses against the stars. “Be quiet. Be quiet,” whispered the shrouded trees, as their burdened branches creaked and lowered. But he could not be quiet. Cold as it was, sweat broke out on his forehead. What had happened? A crunching sound--a mere rumor, seeming infinitely distant! A head appeared above the wall, right over him. A man lumbered across and fell with a gentle thud almost at his feet. “Oh, how could you? How could you do that?” The voice which answered was thick and truculent. It made no pretence at being secret. “And why shouldn't I? That's what I ask. I was tired of sticking up there. It's no joke, I can tell you.” “Shish! Where've you been?”