"I don't know just how badly I'm hurt, young fellows, but I do know that I'm done with this miserable business. I've got just what I deserve, and it may be the best thing that ever happened to me. During the time I lay here and had my senses, I've made up my mind to ask my cousin Roland to forgive me, and let me make amends for the evil I've tried to do. I know now that it doesn't pay in the long run, for I've come near losing all my self-respect. Yes, get me to the camp, if you can. I want to face the music, and have it over with. Something seems to tell me that the boy isn't the one to hold a grudge against a chap who's been punished already for doing an evil deed." That sort of talk pleased Max immensely. He saw that Robert Chase must have been having a terrible conflict between his better nature and the insatiate craving for wealth; and now that a wise Providence had stepped in to nip all his plots in the bud, why things began to look very bright all around. It was found that with one of the boys on either side, Robert could manage to walk fairly well, although they often had to stop and let him rest. It took them a full two hours to get back to the cabin, where their arrival created considerable excitement. At the moment, Roland was out somewhere attending to his pets, and so the injured man was made as comfortable as possible by Toby and Bandy-legs, the latter of whom had just come in carrying a pretty fair mess of frogs' legs all dressed for the frying-pan. Then when Roland came along, to be told what had happened, and how his cousin was anxious to see him alone, he looked actually pleased at the queer turn affairs had taken. He went in and was with Robert for quite a long time. They must have had a good heart-to-heart talk, for when Roland appeared again, he was smiling broadly, and hastened to say: "We've not only patched up a truce, boys, but made an enduring covenant. After this there's not going to be any war in the Chase family; and now that Robert has humbled himself to confess his wrong-doing, I believe we're going to be the best of friends. I've promised him, without his asking it, that I'll never tell a single soul about what happened up here. You must agree to the same thing, for my sake. I feel sure you'll all like Robert, when you get to know him." "Who can tell," muttered Toby, as if to himself; "in time we might even g-g-get _familiar_ with him. Stranger things than that have happened. I only hope he won't hold a g-g-grudge against me when he sees the mark of all my f-f-fingernails down his face." "Just now, Toby, he isn't in a mood to bear anybody a grudge," Roland went on to say; "for he believes he didn't get half that he merited. But after all it's come out a thousand per cent better than I ever dreamed it would. And when I start off with my pair of grown cubs I needn't be afraid of any one waylaying me on the road."