As Malachi delivered himself of this bit of Calvinistic philosophy, a sound of voices was borne in on the two men from the vale below, and looking in the direction whence it came, the old man and Mr. Penrose saw a group of dark figures thrown into relief on the background of snow.

The sounds were too distant to be distinctly heard, but every now and then there was mingled with them the short, sharp bark of a dog.

‘I welly think that’s Oliver o’ Deaf Martha’s dog,’ excitedly cried Malachi.  ‘Surely he’s noan poachin’ a neet like this?  He’s terrible lat’ wi’ his wark if he is.’

‘If I’m not mistaken, that is Moses Fletcher’s voice,’ replied Mr. Penrose.  ‘Listen!’

‘You’re reet; that’s Moses’ voice, or I’m a Jew.  What’s he doin’ aat a neet like this, wi’ Oliver’s dog?  I thought he’d bed enough o’ that beast to last his lifetime.’

The two men were now leaning over a stone wall and looking down into the ravine below.  Suddenly Malachi pricked up his ears, and said: 

‘An’ that’s Amos’s voice an’ all.  By Guy, if it hedn’t bin for Oliver o’ Deaf Martha’s I should ha’ said it wur hevin’ a prayer-meetin’ i’ th’ snow.  What’s brought owd Amos aat wi’ Moses—­to say naught o’ th’ dog?’

Just then an oath reached the ears of the listening men.

‘No prayer-meeting, Malachi,’ said Mr. Penrose, laughing.

‘Nowe—­nobbud unless they’re like Ab’ o’ th’ Heights, who awlus swore a bit i’ his prayers, because, as he said, swearin’ wur mighty powerful.  But him as swore just naa is Oliver hissel—­I’ll lay mi Sunday hat on’t.’

By this time the moving figures on the snow were approaching the foot of the hill whereon the two men stood, and Malachi, raising his hands to his mouth, greeted them with a loud halloo.

Immediately there came a reply.  It was from Oliver himself, in a loud, importuning voice: 

‘Han yo’ fun him?’

‘Fun who?’ asked Malachi.

‘Why, that chilt o’ mine!  Who didsto think we wur lookin’ for?’

‘Who knew yo’ were lookin’ for aught but—­’

‘Which child have you lost?’ cried Mr. Penrose, for Oliver had a numerous family.

‘Little Billy—­him as Moses pooled aat o’ the lodge.’

’Come along, Malachi, let us go down and help; it’s a search party.’

* * * * *

Everybody in Rehoboth knew little Billy o’ Oliver’s o’ Deaf Martha’s.  He was a smart lad of eight years, with a vivid imagination and an active brain.  His childish idealism, however, found little food in the squalid cottage in which he dragged out his semi-civilized existence; but among the hills he was at home, and there he roamed, to find in their fastnesses a region of romance, and in their gullies and cloughs the grottoes and falls that to him were a veritable fairy realm.  Child as he was, in the summer months he roamed the shady plantations, and sailed his chip and paper boats down their brawling streams, feeding on the nuts and berries, and lying for hours asleep beneath the shadows of their branching trees.  He was one of the few children into whose mind Amos failed to find an inlet for the catechism; and once, during the past summer, he had blown his wickin-whistle in Sunday-school class, and been reprimanded by the superintendent because he gathered blackberries during the sacred hours.