Someone tapped at the door, turned the handle, and stood irresolutely there peering into the darkness.
"Yes?" said Roger, advancing.
"Ah!" it was the surgeon's voice—"I beg your pardon, but finding you in darkness—Yes, it's all right—a fine boy, and the mother, I should say, doing well. Do you wish to go up?"
"God forbid!" said Roger, and led him to the kitchen, where the whisperers started up at his entrance. In the middle of the room, on a board across two trestles, lay something hidden by a white sheet—Trevarthen's body, recovered from the ruins of the barn.
"He was my friend," said Roger simply, pausing by the corpse. Then he turned with a grim smile on the malcontents. "Where's the brandy?" he asked. "The doctor'll have a drink afore he turns out into the night."
"No, I thank you, Mr. Stephen," said the young surgeon.
"Won't take it from me? Well, I thank ye all the same." He led his guest forth, let him out by the wicket, and returned to the kitchen.
"Lads," said he, "the night's foggy yet. You may slip away to your homes, if you go quiet. Step and tell the others, and send Malachi to me. I—I thank ye, friends, but, as you've been arguing to yourselves, the game's up; we won't stand another assault to-morrow."
They filed out and left him, none asking—as Trevarthen would have asked— concerning his own safety. By Trevarthen's body Malachi found him standing; and again, and in the same attitude, found him standing by it a quarter of an hour later, when, having muffled the horses' hoofs in straw, he returned to announce that all was ready, and the lane clear towards the moors. In so short a time the whole garrison had melted away.
"He was my friend," said Roger again, looking down on the sheet, and wondered why this man had loved him. Indeed, there was no explanation except that Trevarthen had been just Trevarthen.