"Oh, Miss P'tricia! Miss P'tricia!"

"She'll go back presently, if she doesn't hear us," Patricia whispered
with elaborate caution; "then we must get to the house as quickly and as
quietly as possible and secure the re--the booty. Oh, go away!" she
added sternly, as Custard came sniffing about them.

But Custard only wriggled and danced about and over them, urging them as
eloquently as he could to get up and continue their way indoors. Wasn't
the pantry indoors? Custard could have told his mistress long ago that
it was quite supper time.

At half-past six, the doctor and Miss Kirby drove into the yard.
As the gig drew up before the side door, Sarah, voluble and indignant,
appeared. From the mass of information she hurled upon them, one fact
only was quite clear--Patricia was missing.

She was so often missing, that the announcement failed to excite any
great apprehension in the mind of either her father or her aunt.

"But the party--" Miss Kirby began.

"She done take the party with her!" Sarah wailed.

Miss Kirby looked more indignant than surprised; to have come home and
found that nothing untowards had happened would have been the surprising
thing.

"I ain't laid my eyes on her since them six gingham aprons came
gavorting up the walk!" Sarah proclaimed dramatically. "That young-un's