"Were you in the hut?"
"Yes, with father."
"Whew! What did he say?"
The question was answered by loud words from the minister talking to his wife in the dining room.
"I tell you," said his voice, ringing out so that the two listeners could hear, "those squatters have got to go. I'm not the only one who thinks that way. If they had the instincts of decency I wouldn't say a word, but they haven't. I say it's time to make a move."
"You know," continued the minister, "that their hut is in direct line with our view. There's no buying them off ... I've tried that. Now that Skinner is arrested it won't be hard to frighten the girl away, for she can't stay there alone."
"I'm not so sure," mused Mrs. Graves; "those people are not easily frightened."
"She's afraid of me," shouted the Dominie, "and she will be more so before I get through with her and her father. If Skinner is hanged, she shan't stay there."
Later there was a long discussion between the father and son upon the rights of squatters, which ended in Frederick's going to bed before it was half finished more disgusted and unhappy than he had ever been before. He looked out upon the lake. The wind was still rolling the water into white crested waves, and his eyes could scarcely outline the small hut under the willow tree. Into the boy's life something had come—a new something he could not explain, while out of it another something as hard to define had gone forever.