This done Jack made his way as well as he could guess to the house of his uncle, the baker.  Not having noticed the way by which Peg had led him to the house, he wandered at first from the straight course.  At length, however, he came to Chestnut Street.  He now knew where he was, and, fifteen minutes later, he was standing before his uncle’s door.

Meanwhile, Abel Crump had been suffering great anxiety on account of Jack’s protracted absence.  Several days had now elapsed, and still he was missing.  He had been unable to find the slightest trace of him.

“I am afraid of the worst,” he said to his wife, on the afternoon of the day on which Jack made his escape.  “I think Jack was probably rash and imprudent, and I fear, poor boy, they may have proved the death of him.”

“Don’t you think there is any hope?  He may be confined.”

“It is possible; but, at all events, I don’t think it right to keep it from Timothy any longer.  I’ve put off writing as long as I could, hoping Jack would come back, but I don’t feel as if I ought to hold it back any longer.  I shall write in the morning, and tell Timothy to come right on.  It’ll be a dreadful blow to him.”

“Yes, better wait till morning, Abel.  Who knows but we may hear from Jack before that time?”

The baker shook his head.

“If we’d been going to hear, we’d have heard before this time,” he said.

He did not sleep very soundly that night.  Anxiety for Jack, and the thought of his brother’s affliction, kept him awake.

About half-past two, he heard a noise at the front door, followed by a knocking.  Throwing open the window, he exclaimed, “Who’s there?”

“A friend,” was the answer.

“What friend?” asked the baker, suspiciously.  Friends are not very apt to come at this time of night.”

“Don’t you know me, Uncle Abel?” asked a cheery voice.

“Why, it’s Jack, I verily believe,” said Abel Crump, joyfully, as he hurried down stairs to admit his late visitor.

“Where in the name of wonder have you been, Jack?” he asked, surveying his nephew by the light of the candle.

“I’ve been shut up, uncle,—­boarded and lodged for nothing,—­by some people who liked my company better than I liked theirs.  But to-night I made out to escape, and hero I am.  I’ll tell you all about it in the morning.  Just now I’m confoundedly hungry, and if there’s anything in the pantry, I’ll ask permission to go in there a few minutes.”

“I guess you’ll find something, Jack.  Take the candle with you.  Thank God, you’re back alive.  We’ve been very anxious about you.”

CHAPTER XXII.

Mr. John Somerville.

Peg had been thinking.

This was the substance of her reflections.  Ida, whom she had kidnapped for certain purposes of her own, was likely to prove an (sic) incumbrance rather than a source of profit.  The child, her suspicions awakened in regard to the character of the money she had been employed to pass off, was no longer available for that purpose.  So firmly resolved was she not to do what was wrong, that threats and persuasions were alike unavailing.  Added to this was the danger of her encountering some one sent in search of her by the Crumps.