l to be seen by the monument. I scrambled down the
slope and investigated the base of the hill and came back another way
through the woods. I saw no one. I stopped continually and whistled
loudly. If he is anywhere near at hand, I thought, and in trouble, he
will hear that and answer me. I did not call him by name. I did not know
what name to call. It would have seemed absurd to have called "Victor."
No one ever addressed him by name.

My return route brought me back to the south edge of the Common, the
point most remote from the farm. There I met a labourer whom I knew by
sight, a man named Hawke. He was carrying a stick, and prodding with it
foolishly among the furze and gorse bushes. The bracken was already
dying down.

"What are you looking for?" I asked.

"It's this 'ere Master Stott, sir," he said, looking up. "'E's got
loarst seemingly."

I felt a sudden stab of self-reproach. I had been taking things too
easily. I looked at my watch. It was a quarter to four.

"Mr. Challis 'ave told me to look for 'un," added the man, and continued
his aimless prodding of the gorse.

"Where is Mr. Challis?" I asked.

"'E's yonder, soomewheres." He made a vague gesture in the direction of
Pym.

The sun had come out, and the Common was all aglow. I hastened towards
the village.

On the way I met Farmer Bates and two or three labourers. They, too,
were beating among the gorse and brown bracken. They told me that Mr.
Challis was at the cottage and I hurried on. All the neighbourhood, it
seems, was searching for the Wonder. In the village I saw three or four
women standing with aprons over their heads, talking together.

I had never seen Pym so animated.

III

I met Challis in the lane. He was coming away from Mrs. Stott's cottage.

"Have you found him?" I asked stupidly. I knew quite well that the
Wonder was not found, and yet I had a fond hope that I might,
nevertheless, be mistaken.

Challis shook his head. "There will be a mad woman in that cottage if he
doesn't come back by nightfall," he remarked with a jerk of his head.
"I've done what I can for her."

I explained that I had been over to Deane Hill, searching and calling.

"You didn't see anything?" asked Challis, echoing my foolish query of a
moment before. I shook my head.

We were both agitated without doubt.

We soon came up with Farmer Bates and his men. They stopped and touched
their hats when they saw us, and we put the same silly question to t