"But don't you think you ought to at least listen to what Ruth's father has to say? All he wants you to do is to hear his story."
"Did he tell you that?"
"Ruth told me. She said both her father and her mother are very much upset over the way you have treated them. They want to be friends with you, and her father is willing to do whatever is right regarding what took place years ago. She said her folks would like nothing better than to have you give up your lonely life on this island and come down and make your home with them."
"What! Me go down there and live with them after all that has happened! I couldn't do anything like that!" and the old lumberman sprang up and began to pace the cabin floor.
"You could do it if you tried, Uncle Barney. By the way, don't you remember Ruth?"
"Sure I do—as pretty a little girl as ever I set eyes on. I never had anything against her. It was her father I had my quarrel with."
"And you liked Ruth's mother, too, didn't you?" went on Jack slowly.
"Oh, yes. Helen Dean always was a nice girl. I knew her long before Fred Stevenson married her."
"And you liked Ruth's father, too, didn't you, before this quarrel took place?"
"Of course. We were very chummy up to that time." The old lumberman took several turns across the cabin floor. "But that's all over now. He didn't treat me fair—that's all there is to it! He didn't even come to my wife's funeral!"