Frank was contemplating the taking of a little tramp up the stream on the following day. He had not forgotten what one of his informants had told him concerning the hermit's place, and was more than curious to meet Aaron Dennison.
Will had not ceased to remember his loss. He brooded over it at times, and even broke out into occasional lamentations. His greatest fear seemed to be that Gilbert might destroy the films in his sudden disgust on discovering what a wretched blunder he had committed in his haste.
Will had wandered forth after lunch on this day. From the fact that he carried his camera along with him, the rest of the boys judged he meant to secure some view that had appealed to him as especially fine.
It was some hours later that Frank noticed that he had not returned. Will was a fair woodsman by now, and there did not seem to be much chance of his allowing himself to become lost. Still Frank found himself wondering just where the boy had gone, and why Will had not taken any of them into his confidence.
When it was but an hour from sunset he mentioned the matter to the rest.
"Does anybody happen to know where Will set out for?" was his question.
No one did, for both Bluff and Jerry shook their heads in the negative, while the last named remarked:
"He was busy working at something or other this morning. I didn't get on to it, and meant to ask him, but forgot all about it. I saw him fasten a piece of rope around him and enclose a tree out there. It made me laugh at the time, and only that Bluff called me just then I would have joshed him about trying to play Indian, and tying himself face on to a tree."
Frank chuckled at hearing that.
"You've given me a clue already, Jerry," he observed. "I remember that Will seemed set on getting a picture of that osprey nest he had discovered. You know the old trick some South Sea islanders practice when climbing cocoanut trees is to have a loop around the trunk and their own body, then barefooted hoist themselves bit by bit, always raising the loop as they go."