"He's real kind," said Frank. "Yesterday I had to bring home from the store a heavy basket of potatoes. Jed met me and carried it for me."
And Jed himself was glad that he had "turned over a new leaf." He was finding out that it is more fun, in the end, to be good than to be bad. And Jed's teacher was glad, too, for he gave her less trouble.
So, as I say, Jed and some of the bigger boys in the school, having heard of the experience of Sammy and his chums, had decided to go to Pine Island, to see if they could not find the hermit.
"Will you come along, Sammy, and show us where you saw him?" asked Jed.
"I will, if Bob and Frank will," was the answer.
But Bob and Frank would not go, and Sammy would not go without them. So Jed and his chums set off by themselves on their skates for Pine Island. They were gone nearly the whole of one Saturday, but when they came back they were disappointed, for they had seen nothing of the hermit.
"I guess you fellows dreamed it," said Jed, with a laugh. "Or else you saw shadows on the snow."
"We did not dream it!" declared Sammy.
"And can shadows holler at you?" Bob wanted to know.
"No, but maybe you heard an echo," suggested Jed.
"There couldn't be any echo unless somebody said something," spoke Frank, "and we heard that hermit speak as plain as anything, and we weren't saying a word."
"Well, it's queer we didn't see him," returned Jed.
Several days passed—days filled with many winter joys. Sammy and his two chums made themselves skate-sails. They took some sticks, and stretched cloth over them, something between the sail of a boat and a kite in shape. Then, holding these sails in their hands, they would let the wind blow them
