him somethin' to do, an'
Jim is a sight better off when he has to work. He ain't got no time fur
foolishness."

"An' you can tan its hide," growled Jim Hart, "although your own needs
tannin' most."

A few minutes later the two were amicably dressing the body of the stag,
but Paul was already asleep. He assisted the next morning at a conference,
and then he learned what Henry and Ross intended to do. The powder for
Marlowe, as Paul had surmised, must be left for the present in its hidden
place while they spied upon the great northern confederacy, now being
formed for the destruction of the white settlements, and they would do
what they could to impede it. Henry, Ross, and Sol would leave that night
on an expedition of discovery, while Paul and Jim Hart held the haunted
island. Paul, in this case, did not object to being left behind, because
he had, for the present at least, enough of danger, and he knew that he
was better suited to other tasks than the one on which the three great
woodsmen were now departing.

Jim Hart was to row them over to the mainland, and they were to signal
their return with three plaintive, long-drawn cries of the whip-poor-will.
They departed at the first coming of the dusk with short good-bys, leaving
Paul alone on the island. He stood near the margin under the foliage of a
great beech and watched them go. The boat, as it left a trailing wake of
melting silver, became a small black dot at the farther shore, and then
vanished.

Paul turned back toward the center of his island, inexpressibly lonely for
the while. Again he was a solitary being in the vast, encircling
wilderness, and, in feeling at least, no one was nearer than a thousand
miles away. He walked as swiftly as he could to the cove, where the supper
fire still smoldered, and he sought companionship in the light and warmth
that came from the bed of coals. No amount of hardship, no amount of
experience could change Paul's vivid temperament, so responsive to the
influences of time and place. He sat there, his knees drawn up to his
chin, and the ring of darkness came closer and closer; but out of it
presently arose the tread of footsteps, and all the brightness and
cheeriness returned at once to the boy's face.

Jim Hart walked into the rim of the firelight, and his long, thin,
saplinglike figure looked very consoling to Paul. He doubled into his
usual jackknife formation and, sitting down by the fire, looked into the
coals.

"Well