“That sounds pleasant, I must say,” observed Elmer, with a half laugh.
The party once more returned to camp, and Mr. Bartlett told them not to sit around talking matters over, but to get back to their blankets. Indeed, the night air felt rather chilly, and the boys were not loath to take this advice.
“Plenty of time to talk it all over in the morning,” the camp director told them. “Perhaps by that time we may run across some sort of clue that will put us on the track of the poor fellow. It strikes me we ought to do our best to make him a prisoner while up here. If, as we suspect, he turns out to be a lunatic, it would be little short of a crime to leave him here to freeze in the winter time.”
One thing Dick noticed, and this was that while most of the boys thought the visit from the wild man almost a tragedy one of their number seemed to be particularly pleased over it.
This was Asa Gardner, who, from the time they first gathered after the alarm was given, had been smiling contentedly. Dick could give a pretty good guess why.
“Asa knows now,” Dick told himself, “that it couldn’t have been his fault those things disappeared from our camp. He was lying beside me sound asleep when the alarm came. So he figures that after all it must have been this strange being who crept into our camp and stole the bright things that caught his attention. Well, I’m glad for Asa’s sake, that’s all.”
Some of the boys were nervous as they lay down. They half anticipated a further visit from the unknown. The remainder of the night passed, however, without further annoyance.
Sunday morning found the boys up early, and taking their cold plunge. Mr. Holwell joined them, for from boyhood days a dip in the water on a fine summer morning had always been a delicious treat for the minister. The usual morning exercises were dispensed with, for Sunday is always conducted on strictly religious lines in every genuine Y. M. C. A. camp.
After breakfast had been eaten and everything cleaned up about the camp, the campers assembled to enjoy a little song service, after which Mr. Holwell had promised to deliver his famous “boys’ sermon.”
Asa Gardner sought out Dick. Plainly the sensitive boy was feeling much better than when he had had his last interview with his friend, Dick, a fact the latter was pleased to note.