At that there was a heavy intaking of the breath, and then the man went on to say:
"No, hardly that. I would not like to give it so harsh a term. Say a friend from whom I have been estranged, and who I believed had wronged me; though of late my eyes have been opened to my own faults, and I have repented of many things done in the heat of temper."
"And you believe then that this friend may have engaged a guide—that it is at least possible they were not far away from here when the storm broke. You fear they may have been caught and made to suffer; is that it, sir?"
Phil was handling the affair wonderfully well, his chums thought, as they listened to all that was being said.
"That is what I have cause to fear," the other went on to say, quickly. "Through the livelong night of tempest I have fancied I heard their cries for help, and oh! how they crucified me! It would be a terrible punishment on my head if some tragedy had taken place in the pine woods last night; and Mazie—" his voice failed him in his emotion, and he did not finish his sentence.
"Do you want us to go out and see if there are any signs of strangers on the trail leading up here, the one we followed all the way from the village many miles off?" Phil asked; and his manner was so reassuring that the wounded man immediately nodded his head in the affirmative.
"It would be a fitting climax to all you and your fine chums have done for me and mine," he told them, with tears in his eyes.
"Shucks! that wouldn't be such a great job," Lub hastened to say, before any one else could talk; "and I volunteer to be one of the party right now."
"But you'd get all wet, Lub, you know," expostulated Ethan.
"What of that?" came the indignant response; "am I made of salt, or sugar? Haven't I been soaked before? If I could stand jumping into the lake with my clothes on, when the hornets tackled me, I ought to be able to take a little sprinkling, hadn't I?"