With the help of the improvised cane, and with a lad on either side of him, they managed to get Old Hanson down the stairs, though they were in fear lest every step would bring the whole flight down about them, so rickety was it.
“What were you doing up there?” asked Blake, as they led him out of the door, and toward his own little shack.
“Oh, just looking around—looking around,” he murmured. “I used to work in this mill when I was a boy, and it has memories for me—memories—yes memories. Some happy and some sad. I’m an old man!”
They got him to his hut, and then took off his shoe. His left ankle was much swollen, though it appeared to be more of a cut than a sprain that had caused the injury. Under the direction of Mrs. Bonnell they bandaged it with rags they found, wringing them out of hot water, for Blake made a fire in the old stove.
“It’s kind of you—right kind—to bother with an old hulk like me,” went on Old Hanson. “That feels a lot better. I had a daughter once,” he said, looking fixedly at Natalie. “She was like you, in a way. That’s why I was so startled by your face the first time I saw you. But she’s gone—gone.”
“Where?” asked Jack.
“How should I know?” came the rather angry retort. “I don’t know. I only go up in the old mill when I want to think about her. I was there to-day. I stepped in a hole—the old mill is falling apart, just as I am—it’s getting old like me, only I’ll never be as old as that.
“It’s older than the Indians. The Indians were here once. They killed some settlers in the mill. Sometimes in the night I hear cries—cries of——”
“That’ll do!” interrupted Blake a bit sternly, seeing that the old chap was getting on the nerves of the girls who stood outside the shack. “You’ll work into a fever if you’re not careful. Never mind about the past.”
“It’s all I live in,” said the hermit simply. “But I won’t say anything more. I wonder how I’m to get about?”