u know, D'Arcy and Ashby and Fisher minor and--"

"Fisher minor," said Rollitt, suddenly becoming interested; "up there?"

"Yes--he's the lame horse of the party--not up to it. What's up, I
say?"

Rollitt had suddenly deposited his rod under the wall, and quitting the
path was beginning to strike up the base of the hill.

"Go, and bring guides," he growled.

"You'll get lost, to a dead certainty. I say, can't I come too?" said
the boy, looking very miserable.

"No. Fetch guides. Come with them. Quick."

There were no guides to be had nearer than Penchurch, four miles off,
and Wally, very cold and wet and hungry and footsore, with a big load on
his heart as he thought of Percy, pulled himself together with an effort
and stumped off.

Rollitt strode on up the slope in the gathering night. Cold and weather
mattered little to him, still less did danger. But Fisher minor
mattered very much. For Percy or any of the rest he might probably have
stayed where he was; but for the one boy in Fellsgarth he oared about he
would cheerfully go over a precipice.

Every now and again he stood still and shouted. But in the wind and
rain it was impossible to say if any one heard him or called again.

After an hour or more he found himself on the first ridge, where for a
few yards the ground is level before it rises again. Here he called
again, once or twice. Once there came, as he thought, a faint distant
whistle, but by no manner of calling could he get it to come again. He
started off in the direction from which it seemed to come, calling all
the way, but never a voice came out of the darkness. For a couple of
hours he doggedly haunted the place, loth to leave it while a chance
remained. Then he gave it up, and started once more up the steep slope.
He looked at his watch by the light of a match. It was eleven o'clock.
He shuddered, but not with the cold, and went on.

Something--who could say what?--told him that fee must go higher yet.
Once last year, in company with Wisdom, he had been as far as the upper
bog, and had wanted to go to the top. But Wisdom had dissuaded him.
Now, even in the darkness the ground seemed familiar, and he tramped on
up the swampy steep till presently he found himself near the sound of
rushing water at the foot of the great ravine.

The stream had grown so strong since the afternoon that to shout against
it was more hopeless than ever. Yet Rollitt shouted. Had a voice
replied, h