The hermit proved to be a very uncommunicative person. Ruth tried to get him to talk about himself as they crossed the rocky spit, but all that he said of a personal nature was that his name was "John."
His shack was certainly a lonely looking hovel. It faced the tumbling Atlantic and it seemed rather an odd thing to Ruth that a man who was so afraid of the sea should have selected such a spot for his home.
The hermit did not invite them to enter his abode. He promised Ruth that he would make a hot drink for himself and remove his wet garments and lie down. But he only seemed moderately grateful for their assistance, and shut the door of the shack promptly in their faces when he got inside.
"Just as friendly as a sore-headed dog," remarked Tom, as they went back to the bay side of the Point.
"Perhaps the others have played so many tricks on him that he is suspicious of even our assistance," Ruth said.
Thus speaking, she stooped to pick up a bit of paper in the path. It had been half covered by the sand and might have lain there a long time, or only a day.
Just why this bit of brown wrapping paper had caught her attention, it would be hard to say. Ruth might have passed it a dozen times without noticing it.
But now she must needs turn the paper over and over in her hands as she watched Tom, with the help of the rather abashed practical jokers, haul the water-logged skiff ashore.
She had forgotten the fishing poles they had abandoned on the rocks, and sat down upon a boulder. Suddenly she discovered that there was writing on the bit of paper she had picked up. It was then that her attention really became fixed upon her find.
The characters had been written with an indelible pencil. The dampness had only blurred the writing instead of erasing it. Her attention thus engaged, she idly scrutinized more than the blurred lines. Her attitude as she sat there on the boulder slowly stiffened; her gaze focused upon the paper.
The blurred lines became clearer to her vision. It was the wording of the phrase rather than the handwriting that enthralled her. This that follows was all that was written on the paper:
"As in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be----"
To the ordinary observer, with no knowledge of what went before or followed this quotation, the phrase must seem idle. But the word "flash" is used by scenario writers and motion picture makers, indicating an explanatory phrase thrown on the screen.