And what an almost hopeless and interminable tramp he took! Back and forth across the section of country she was likely to follow for weeks and weeks, halting a day in every village and two or three in each city, asking the same question over and over again, until his indomitable courage and almost deathless faith slowly ebbed away.
Autumn came, the leaves grew scarlet and brown, snow followed, and winter locked all streams, and still Old Cy journeyed on. Spring and sunshine once more warmed the earth into life, the fields grew green, and yet he paused not.
With June and the real beginning of summer, however, came a new inspiration, which was to go at once by rail and stage to Chip's native town and learn if, perchance, she, or any news of her, had reached this village.
Another thought also came with this,--that Martin might soon again visit the woods and perhaps he could intercept him.
A little satisfaction was obtained by this advance move, for when this village was reached, Levi was found waiting.
"I've been watchin' for the gal over eight months now, under pay from Mr. Frisbie," he assured Old Cy when they met. "I also sent word to Old Tomah late last fall, 'n' he came out o' the woods 'n' stayed here two months, but nothin's been heard o' poor Chip by any one, 'n' I doubt ever will be."
"Mebbe not yet," answered Old Cy, "but thar will be some day, an' here, too. She hadn't a cent when she left Greenvale--only grit, 'n' it's a long ways here fer a gal what's got to arn her vittles while she's trampin'. It may be one year, it may be two, but some day Chip'll show up here, if she lives to do it. I callate I'd best wait here a few weeks tho', an' then, if nothin' turns up, I'll start ag'in."
Nothing did, however; but during his stay, Old Cy learned that Chip's entire history, from the night she left Tim's Place until she ran away from Greenvale, was known at this village. This fact was of no value whatever, except to prove the universal interest all humanity has in the fate and fortune of one another.
"I never told what happened in the woods," Levi responded when Old Cy questioned him, "an' didn't need to, for it got here 'fore I did. I jest 'lowed it was true, 'n' that I was hired to wait and watch here for Chip. It's curis, too, how everybody here feels 'bout it. They're a poorish sort here, families o' lumbermen, men that work in the sawmills, some farmin', an' all findin' it hard work to git a livin'. An' yet they're so interested in Chip 'n' so sorry for her, if she shows up now she'd be carried 'round the village like some queen 'ud be, with everybody follerin'. Thar's 'nother curis thing happened since I've been here that I'd never believed o' these people neither. I told them, of course, who I was, 'n' what I was here for, 'n' who was payin' me, when I come, an' then as time kinder went slow, I began huntin' some 'round here. Wal, thar's a little graveyard up back o' the village 'n' all growed up to weeds 'n' bushes, an' one day last fall I happened to be lookin' it over 'n' somebody come 'long. It was a man that keeps store here, an' I asked him if 'twas here Chip's mother was buried. He said 'twas, an' pointed out the spot 'way up in one corner, 'thout any stone, 'n' the mound most hid in a tangle. I didn't say nothin'--jest looked, an' went on, 'n' that was all. Wal, the curis part is last spring they sot a couple o' men to work cleanin' up the graveyard o' bushes an' laid out walks 'n' built a new fence 'round it. That one unmarked grave got the most attention o' all, for they turfed it over nice and built a little fence 'round it. I kinder callated how 'n' why it all come 'bout, 'n' feelin' I oughter do suthin, I had a little stun sot up with Chip's mother's name on it."