It must have been after three o’clock by the time I fell asleep in a queer little room where you had but to sit up in bed and stretch out your arm to reach anything you wanted.  I dreamed of journeying through the night with the Boy, but I forgot his lost bag:  nor when I waked in full morning light, did I recall its tragic disappearance.  I found that it was nearly eight, and bounded out of bed, performing my toilet with maimed rites, since baths were not comme il faut at Orsieres.

“The kid will be asleep still, I’ll bet,” I said to myself; but looking out of the window at that moment, I saw him in conversation with Joseph, Innocentina, and—­apparently—­half the inhabitants of the village.

I hurried down, and learned that the bag—­still a lost bag—­had set all Orsieres on fire with excitement.  The searchers had returned empty-handed, having gone back as far as the Cantine de Proz; and on the oath of Innocentina (more than one, alas!), the ruecksack and its contents had been secure on the grey back of Souris when we passed the Cantine.  Desolate as was the Great St. Bernard at night, late as had been the hour when the bag vanished, evidently someone had found and gone off with it.  Nevertheless, many young persons of both sexes were eager to try their luck in a second quest.

The Boy, who had been up for hours, had it in mind to wait at Orsieres until his treasure should be found, or hope abandoned; but I suggested going on at once to Martigny.  There, we could have handbills printed, offering a large reward, and these could be distributed over the country.  The diligence drivers would help in the work, and we could also advertise in a local paper.  To this proposal the Little Pal consented; and we started off again upon our way, a sadder if not a wiser party.

It was late afternoon when we straggled into Martigny.  Now, our far away Alpine Rome with its crumbling towers and castles, our remote heights where a grey monastery was ever mirrored in the blue eye of the mountain lake, seemed like phases of a dream.

Friends of the Boy’s (nameless to me, like all links with his outside life) had stopped lately at the hotel where Molly, Jack, and I had stayed; he therefore proposed to go to the same house, and this jumped with my inclination:  for the hotel had a cheerful and home-like individuality which I liked.

Pitying the Little Pal’s distress, though I chaffed him for it, I undertook the business of getting out the handbills I had suggested, and arranging for an advertisement in a paper with a local circulation.  I had to visit the post-office, engaging in a long discussion with the officials who controlled the diligence, and the business occupied more than an hour.  In mercy to Boy, I had not delayed for any selfish attention to personal comfort, and tramping back through an inch of white dust to the hotel, I was still as travel-worn as on our arrival in the town, nearly two hours ago.  I had forbidden the tired child to accompany me, and by this time he would no doubt be refreshed with a bath and a change of clothing, as, fortunately, not all his personal belongings had been contained in the ill-fated bag.  He would be impatiently waiting for me at the hotel door, perhaps; and I quickened my steps, in haste to give him details of my doings.