Tom, having lived all his life in the city, thought the birds and butterflies were most wonderful creatures.  Every time he saw a new one he would run up to it to get a close look.  He never tried to catch them, he just wanted to watch them fluttering about the flowers.

But, though they looked all around in the woods by the spring, there was no sign of Tom.  Up and down, back and forth, they walked, looking beside big rocks or stumps, behind fallen logs and under clumps of bushes they peered, but no Tom could they find.

“Oh, he’s losted, just like we was losted,” said Sue, sadly.

“Yes, I guess he is,” agreed Bunny.  “Splash, can’t you find Tom?”

The big dog barked:  “Bow-wow!” But what he meant by that no one knew.  Splash, however, could not find Tom.

“Let’s call his name,” said Uncle Tad.

So they called his name.

“Tom!  Tom!  Tom Vine!  Where are you?”

But Tom did not answer.

“This is queer,” said Mr. Brown.  “I don’t believe he’d run away and leave us.  He liked it too much at our camp.”

“Perhaps he saw that mean man,” said Bunker Blue.  “Tom may have seen the cross farmer who wanted him to come back to work, and Tom may have run away off and hid—­so far off that he can’t hear us calling.”

“Yes, that’s so.  He may have done that,” agreed Mr. Brown.  “We’ll go back to camp, and wait for him.  He may come when he thinks the man has gone away.”

Back to camp they all went.  Bunny and Sue felt bad about Tom’s being lost.  So did the others.  Every time Splash would stop in front of a clump of bushes, and bark, as he often did, Bunny and Sue would run up, thinking their friend had been found.

But it would be only a bird, a rabbit or a squirrel that Splash had seen, which made him bark that way.  Tom was not to be found.

They waited in camp all the rest of that day, only going out a little way for a row on the lake.  Night came, and there was no Tom.  It grew very dark, and still he had not come.

“Oh, dear!” cried Sue.  “Will he have to sleep out alone all night?”

“Perhaps he’ll come back before you are awake in the morning,” said Mother Brown.  “Anyhow, Tom isn’t afraid of the dark, and it is now so warm that anyone could sleep out of doors and not get cold.  I think Tom will be here in the morning.”

But morning came, and there was no sign of Tom.  A lantern had been left burning outside the tent all night, in case he should come.  But he did not.

“Well,” said Mr. Brown, after breakfast, “there’s only one thing to do, and I’m going to do it.”

“What is that?” asked his wife.

“I’m going over to Farmer Trimble’s, to see if Tom is there.”

“Oh, Trimble is the name of the man who wanted to take Tom away; isn’t it?”

“Yes, that’s the man who came here, and tried to get Tom.  It may be that Mr. Trimble saw Tom at the spring, getting water, and made him go away.  So I’m going over to the Trimble farm, and see.”