“But——­”

“You see, I’m not a bit hurt,” insisted Ruth.  “And the less we talk about the matter the less likely we shall be to drop something that may lead to the discovery of Jerry Sheming’s hiding place.”

“Oh, well, if you put it that way,” agreed Ralph.  “I suppose mother will have all the trouble she wants.  And maybe if she knew, she’d keep you girls away from this end of the island.”

They tramped home to a late luncheon.  It was so very cold that afternoon and evening that they were only too glad to remain in the house and “hug the fire.”

The inclement weather drove Lem Daggett and the men indoors, too.  The constable had to go back to Logwood without his prisoner, and he evidently feared the anger of Rufus Blent.

“I want to warn ye, Mis’ Tingley,” he said to the lady of the lodge, shaking his head, “that when Blent sets out ter do a thing, he does it.  That boy’s got to be found, and he’s got to be kep’ off this island.”

“I will see what my husband says when he comes,” replied Mrs. Tingley, firmly.  “I will not allow our men to chase the poor fellow further.”

“You’d better ketch him and signal us at Logwood.  Run up that flag on the pole outside.  I’ll know what you mean.”

“Mr. Tingley will decide when he comes,” was all the satisfaction the lady gave the constable.

After he had gone, Mrs. Tingley told Ruth she hoped no harm would come to the poor boy, “sleeping out in the cold alone.”

“Oh, Mrs. Tingley!  I know he has a warm, dry place to sleep, and plenty of firewood—­heaps and heaps of it.”

“You seem to know a good deal about him,” the lady commented.

“Yes, I do,” admitted Ruth, honestly.  “More about him and where he is hiding than he would care to have me tell you.”

So Mrs. Tingley did not catechise the girl further upon the subject of the fugitive.

Just because they were shut in was no reason why the house party on Cliff Island should not have an extraordinarily good time.  They played games and had charades that evening.  They had a candy pull, too, but unlike that famous one at Snow Camp the winter before, Busy Izzy Phelps did not get a chance to put the walnut shells into the taffy instead of the kernels.

The wind died down and it grew desperately cold during the night.  The mercury soon left the zero point so far above that it threatened to be lost for the rest of the winter.

They awoke the next morning to find the island chained fast to the mainland by old Jack Frost’s fetters.  A sheet of new ice extended for some hundreds of yards all around Cliff Island.  Farther out the ice was of rougher texture, but that near at hand was clear and black.

Out came the skates soon after breakfast, and everybody but Mercy went down to the lake.  Later the boys made the lame girl and Mrs. Tingley come, too, and they arranged chairs in which the two non-skaters could be pushed over the smooth surface.