“But everything went against me, and now I have nothing left.  I am sorry I had to rip your Teddy bear apart, little girl, to get the wires on the batteries.  And as for your cars, little boy, I hid them in farms and various places.  I don’t know where they are now, but the engine is all right and in running order.”

He quickly loosened the wires, and the toy locomotive ran around the table on part of the stolen track.

“But my poor dear Sallie Malinda is dead!” cried Sue.

“No, I can sew her together again, if the batteries are all right,” said Mrs. Brown.

“And the batteries are all right,” said the hermit, who had heard what was said.  “See, I’ll make the eyes shine!”

He quickly did something to the wires and again the eyes of Sue’s Teddy bear shone out bravely.

“I realize how wrong I was to take the children’s things,” went on the hermit, “but I knew no other way to get the batteries I needed.  I only had my cow to sell, and I dared not part with her, for she gave me milk to live on.  All the while I kept hoping my luck would be better.

“When Tom ran away I did not know what to do.  I did not imagine the little electricity I gave him would hurt him.  A few of the Indians seemed to like it.”

“Yes, me hear um talk of heap big medicine that sting like bees,” said Eagle Feather.  “But me no think hermit did it, what has my horse.”

“I’m sorry I took it,” said Bixby.  “I’ll give up my cow to pay for all I took.  Then I’ll go away.”

“Wait a minute,” said Mr. Brown.  “We’ll decide about that later.  You have done some wrong things, but you have tried to do what was right.  We’ll try to find a way out of your troubles.  Stay here for a few days.”

Bunny Brown and his Sister Sue took with them that night their toys so strangely found, and in a few days the playthings were as good as ever, for Mrs. Brown sewed up the ripped Teddy bear and Bunny had some new cars for his electric engine.  The track the hermit had kept, so that was all right.

“Does electricity feel like pins and needles?” asked Bunny Brown one day.

“I’ll show you,” said his father, and he did by a little battery which he owned.  This was after their return from camp.

“Is it like needles, or your foot being asleep,” said Bunny.

But before this Mr. Brown had talked with some of his neighbors, and they decided to give the hermit another chance.  Tom would go back to work for him on condition that no more electricity be used.  The hermit had a good garden and he could sell things from that.  Eagle Feather was given back his horse, and Mr. Bixby was not arrested for taking it.  And the mystery of the electrical toys being solved, life at Camp Rest-a-While went on as before for a time.

Bunny and his sister had fine times, and once in a while Tom had a day’s vacation, and came over to see them.

“But I s’pose we can’t stay here forever,” said Bunny to Sue, one day.  “I wonder where we’ll go next?”