The girl did not lose an instant. She consulted the post master who had enquired of everyone who had come in. He had no information to offer. Her father had stopped at every house except the parsonage, Miss Penny having cautioned him not to go there because of the invalid. Wherefore Seth Miller supposed that they had better be working over Wenham way. But Anna decided otherwise. Asking Walter to remain at the post office for possible tidings, she had her father drive her to the parsonage. Three minutes after she had let herself quietly in, she came running out to the buggy. “Mrs. Langley’s gone, too,” she said. “Dear me, isn’t it great luck that Mr. Langley’s way at the further end of the Hollow? We met him, and I suppose he’s talking school business with Mr. Phillips. He’d be perfectly crazy, you know.” She climbed into the buggy. “Did you look in the garret?” her father enquired. “I don’t know about that, but Bell went everywhere else,” Anna returned. Her father stared at her for she seemed less anxious. “Anna, someone may have kidnapped the two of ’em,” he said hoarsely. “I don’t know as you have heard, but they do say there’s a strange man around the village peering in windows at night and the like.” Anna almost laughed. “They’d bring Mrs. Langley back when daylight came,” she returned flippantly. She directed her father to drive down the Wenham road, beyond the house where they had lived when the boys were babies, to the bridge and to watch from there, dropping her at a point she would indicate. “Give me your bandana,” she ordered. “Now, Pa, if you see me waving it, you come straight towards it as far as you can come with a horse and wait. I’m going cross lots but you may see me later against the western sky line.” “O Anna, I don’t dare have you go off alone away from beaten tracks with strange men and kidnappers about,” he protested. “Let me hitch the horse and go with you.” But Anna laughed, reassured him, and disappeared. Making a bit of detour to avoid being seen, she headed for the cemetery. Anxious still, she was nevertheless relieved, and once on the direct path, ran all the way, leaping ditches, pushing through underbrush and taking the steepest part of the bank as if it were a plain. When she reached the top, she was hot and breathless. Throwing her jacket on top of the wall, she vaulted it lightly and made for a point whence she could see the Langley lot. Even while she caught her breath and wondered if she should dare look, she heard a little familiar sound.