Asa wandered off until such time as he could recover from his emotion and Dick continued his examination of the boat’s bottom. After all, he was glad the other had spoken as he had, because somehow it seemed to clear the air.
“And,” he told himself, humorously, “I’m beginning to get a hunch that before a great while we’ll find some way of explaining this mystery. If that was a wild man Nat and the others saw, surely he must be a lunatic who’s escaped from some asylum. We may be the means of capturing him, and restoring him to his quarters. He’ll be frozen to death if he has to stay on Bass Island all winter.”
The idea pleased Dick exceedingly, and when he once more joined the others by the fire some of the boys wondered what could have happened to make him appear so cheerful again.
He took the first favorable opportunity that arose to get Mr. Holwell aside. Asa had not yet returned to the camp, though they could see him sitting on the end of a fallen tree that jutted out over the water, possibly a hundred yards further along the shore of the island.
“I had a pretty bad scare a short time ago, sir,” was what Dick started to say, which caused the gentleman to start, and look at him strangely.
“Have you been seeing things too, Dick?” he asked. “Would the wild man become so bold as to approach our camp in broad daylight?”
“No, but I’ve been hearing things that gave me a bad turn at first, though it came around all right pretty soon,” and with that Dick repeated what Asa had said to him near the boat landing when they were alone.
Mr. Holwell was of course stunned at first, but as Dick went on with his story his eyes grew moist, and he shook his head as though he felt exceedingly sorry for the boy whose past haunted him so persistently.
“Poor Asa,” he said, later on, when he had heard all, “it must be terrible to feel as he does, and be compelled to fight so desperately to keep from doing things that other boys have no fear they will be tempted to do. I give him all credit for his gallant fight, and if he wins, as I firmly believe will be the case, I shall be proud of him. You must continue to help him in every way you can, my boy.”
“I certainly will, sir,” declared Dick, with a strong remembrance of the moist eyes Asa had turned on him when he made that humiliating confession that after all had proved to be only a dreadful suspicion, and not a reality.