For more than an hour we visited one part of the farm after another,
without discovering the missing men. We found them at last near the
outskirts of a small wood, sitting, talking together, on the trunk of a
felled tree.

Silas rose as we approached, and walked away, without a word of
greeting or apology, into the wood. As he got on his feet, I noticed
that his brother whispered something in his ear; and I heard him
answer, "All right."

"Ambrose, does that mean you have something to keep a secret from us?"
asked Naomi, approaching her lover with a smile. "Is Silas ordered to
hold his tongue?"

Ambrose kicked sulkily at the loose stones lying about him. I noticed,
with a certain surprise that his favorite stick was not in his hand,
and was not lying near him.

"Business," he said in answer to Naomi, not very graciously--"business
between Silas and me. That's what it means, if you must know."

Naomi went on, woman-like, with her questioning, heedless of the
reception which they might meet with from an irritated man.

"Why were you both away at prayers and breakfast-time?" she asked next.

"We had too much to do," Ambrose gruffly replied, "and we were too far
from the house."

"Very odd," said Naomi. "This has never happened before since I have