Reaching home, they found their parents just beginning to get alarmed about them, fearing there had been some accident on the ice. The boys told of their adventure, but in their own homes, with the lamps lighted, and warm fires glowing, the encounter with the hermit did not seem so terrible as it had at the time it happened.
"If I see him again I'm going to speak to him," declared Sammy. "I'm going to ask him why he doesn't want anybody on that part of the island."
"Better not," advised Sammy's father. "He may be harmless if let alone, but his mind may be diseased, and if you annoy him he might do you some harm."
"Well, I'll ask Mr. Jessup, the hunter, about him then," decided Sammy, and his father thought this might be all right.
There were happy days in Fairview now. Winter had set in to stay, it seemed, and there was skating and coasting enough to satisfy everyone.
Sammy and his chums told their friends of their trip to Pine Island, and of having seen the hermit, and several of the smaller boys of their acquaintance shivered with fear. A number of the larger boys, including Jed Burr, at once said they were going up and see if they could not find the hermit themselves.
Jed Burr, I might say, was quite a different boy now. He no longer was a bully, tormenting those younger or weaker than himself. His suspension, and the apology he had had to make, seemed to have taken good effect on him.
Then, too, he was looked upon somewhat as a hero, from having gone back to rescue the little boy at the time when it was thought the school was going to be toppled over by an earthquake.
"I like Jed now," said Sammy, one day.
"So do I," added Bob.
