ne was peering forward: just before them the brook, or what still
remained of it, almost disappeared in a narrow little gorge between the
hills.

"Cheri," said she, "I shouldn't wonder if the stream gets wider again on
the other side of this little narrow place. Don't you think we'd better
try to pull the boat through, and then we might get into it again?"

"Perhaps," said Hugh. "We may try." So out the children got--Jeanne
pulled in front, Hugh pushed behind. It was so very light that there was
no difficulty as to its weight; only the gorge was so narrow that at
last the boat stuck fast.

"We'd better leave it and clamber through ourselves," said Hugh.

"But, O Cheri, we can't!" cried Jeanne. "From where I am I can see that
the water gets wider again a little farther on. And the rocks come quite
sharp down to the side. There is nowhere we could clamber on to, and I
dare say the water is very deep. There are lots of little streams
trickling into it from the rocks, and the boat could go quite well if we
could but get it a little farther."

"But we can't," said Hugh; "it just won't go."

"Oh dear," said Jeanne, "we'll have to go back. But how should we find
the door in the hillside to go up the stair; or if we did get up, how
should we push away the stone? And even then, there would be the forest
to go through, and perhaps we couldn't find our way among the trees as
Houpet did. O Cheri, what shall we do?"

Hugh stood still and considered.

"I think," he said at last, "I think the time's come for whistling."

And before Jeanne could ask him what he meant, he gave three clear,
short whistles, and then waited to see the effect.

It was a most unexpected one. Hugh had anticipated nothing else than the
sudden appearance, somehow and somewhere, of Monsieur Dudu himself, as
large as life--possibly, in this queer country of surprises, where they
found themselves, a little larger! When and how he would appear Hugh was
perfectly at a loss to imagine--he might fly down from the sky; he
might spring up from the water; he might just suddenly stand before them
without their having any idea how he had come. Hugh laughed to himself
at the thought of Jeanne's astonishment, and after all it was Jeanne who
first drew his attention to what was really happening.

"Hark, Cheri, hark!" she cried, "what a queer noise! What can it be?"

Hugh's attention had been so taken up in staring about in every
direction for the raven that he ha