"I was down to the Corners one day arter ye went to Christmas Cove, 'n' a feller--nice-lookin' feller, too, with honest brown eyes--was askin' if anybody had seen or heard o' a runaway girl by the name o' McGuire. Said she'd run away from Greenvale--'That's 'bout a hundred miles from here,' he said--an' he was huntin' for her. Nobody at the Corners knew about ye 'n' I kept still, believin' ye had reason fer not wantin' to be found out."
And now another tide--the thrill of love--surged in Chip's heart, and her face became glorified.
And so the clouds rolled away. That night Chip wrote a brief but curious letter, so odd, in fact, it must be quoted verbatim:--
[Illustration: "Quit takin' on so, girlie," he said.]
"Please send word at once to Mr. Cyrus Walker that his brother Judson, who lives in Riggsville, wants to see him. No one else must be told of this, for it's a secret.
But Chip's secret was a most transparent one, for when this missive reached Martin three days later, he recognized its angular penmanship and similarity to the note Aunt Comfort still treasured, and knew that Chip wrote it.
It startled him somewhat, however, for Old Cy's youthful history was unknown to him, and suspecting that some mystery lay beneath this information, he told no one, but started for Riggsville at once.
The tide of emotion that had upset the even tenor of Uncle Jud's home life slowly ebbed away, and a keen sense of expectancy took its place.
Chip, after giving him her letter, explained that Old Cy was most likely in the wilderness, and that the letter might not reach him for weeks.
And then one day a broad-shouldered, rather commanding, and somewhat citified man drove up to the home of Uncle Jud.
"Does Mr. Judson Walker live here?" he inquired of Aunt Mandy, who met him at the door.
Her admission of that fact was scarce uttered when there came a rustling of skirts, a "Why, Mr. Frisbie!" and Chip was beside her, at which Martin, collected man of the world that he was, felt an unusual heart-throb of thankfulness.
A little later, when Uncle Jud had been summoned into their newly furnished "keeping room," disclosures astonishing to all followed.
"We have been searching for you, Chip, far and near," Martin assured them, "and Old Cy is still at it. He left us at the camp, almost a year ago, came to Greenvale, found you had run away, and came back to tell us. It upset us all so that we broke camp at once, taking Amzi with us, and returned to Greenvale. Old Cy there bade us good-bye and started to find you. Ray also began a search as well. I've advertised in dozens of papers, have kept Levi on watch for you at Grindstone ever since, and now I hope you will return with me to Greenvale."