So Mrs. Tingley did not catechise the girl further upon the subject of the fugitive.
Just because they were shut in was no reason why the house party on Cliff Island should not have an extraordinarily good time. They played games and had charades that evening. They had a candy pull, too, but unlike that famous one at Snow Camp the winter before, Busy Izzy Phelps did not get a chance to put the walnut shells into the taffy instead of the kernels.
The wind died down and it grew desperately cold during the night. The mercury soon left the zero point so far above that it threatened to be lost for the rest of the winter.
They awoke the next morning to find the island chained fast to the mainland by old Jack Frost's fetters. A sheet of new ice extended for some hundreds of yards all around Cliff Island. Farther out the ice was of rougher texture, but that near at hand was clear and black.
Out came the skates soon after breakfast, and everybody but Mercy went down to the lake. Later the boys made the lame girl and Mrs. Tingley come, too, and they arranged chairs in which the two non-skaters could be pushed over the smooth surface.
Hockey was the game for the afternoon, and two "sides" were chosen to oppose each other, one of the boys and another of the girls. Although Ann Hicks had never had a hockey stick in her hand before, she quickly got into the game, and they all had a very merry time.
The day before Ruth had not been able to find the implement that Jerry Sheming had spoken about, nor could she find a mattock, or pickax, on this second day. If she went to the toolshed and hunted for the thing herself she was afraid her quest would be observed by some of the men.
She located the place where the tools were kept, but the shed was locked. However, there was a window, and that window could be easily slid back. Ruth shrank from attempting to creep in by it.
"Just the same, I told him I'd get it—at least, I told myself I'd get it for him," thought the girl of the Red Mill. "And I will."
Of course, Mrs. Tingley would have allowed her to borrow the tool, but it would have aroused comment had it become known that Jerry wanted it.