"I have said all along as how it had got you," declared Tommy, with ingenuous disappointment, looking Wade up and down for marks of conflict. "But it may be that the ha'nts want only woods folk and are afraid of book-learnin'! So you're back, and the girl ain't, nor Christopher, nor--" "We're all back," explained Wade, calculating on Tommy's news-mongering ability to relieve him of the need of circulating information. "We found the--the one that was lost. That was all! She was lost, and we found her, and we even found Foolish Abe, and he came back with us last night. There was no mystery, Tommy. They were simply lost, and we found them. They're asleep." Tommy fingered the wrinkled skin of his neck and stared dubiously at Wade. "You'll see Abe whittling shavings just the same as usual this morning," added the young man. "By-the-way, you and he may be interested to know that Lane, the old fire warden, died at Withee's camp the other day." For reasons of his own Wade did not care to make either the news of the rescue or its place too definite. "Then," declared Tommy, hanging grimly to the last prop left in his theory, "that accounts for it. 'Ladder' Lane is dead, and has turned into a ha'nt. It was him that called out the fool. And he'll be making more trouble yet. You'd better send for Prophet Eli, Mr. Wade, because the prophet is a charmer-man and can take care of old Lane." "He has taken care of him already," said the young man. "We saw Prophet Eli, and he started right away to attend to the case." And Tommy's face displayed such eminent satisfaction that Wade had not the heart to destroy the man's belief that his book-learned boss had adopted a part of the woods creed of the supernatural. It was a day on which he felt very gentle towards the dreams of other persons, for his own beautiful dream shed its radiance on all men and all of life. That she was there, safe, brought by amazing circumstances into the depths of the woods, and under his protection, seemed like a vision of the night as he walked back and forth and watched the morning grow. When the sun was high and the men had been gone for hours, he put his dream to the test. He rapped gently on the wangan door, and her voice, a very real and loving voice, answered. With his own hands he brought food for the two girls and spread a cedar-splint table, and served them as they ate, and ministered in little ways, through the hours of the day, and watched Elva's pallor and weariness give way before tenderness and love. With the poor shifts of a lumber-camp he, not intending it, taught her heart the lesson that love is independent of its housing.