"I believe you're right, neighbor."
"Right? I know I am: I could tell him among a thousand."
They both started towards the stranger, who stopped, and stood leaning on his rifle, evidently fatigued.
"God bless you, Ned Rangely! Is that yourself?" cried Holdness, seizing one hand, while McClure laid his hand upon his shoulder.
"How are you, old stand-by?" cried McClure. "It does a man good, these ticklish times, to look on your old face. Haven't you come in a good time? We've plenty to eat, nothing to do; and you've got to stay here with us all the rest of your life."
"Wish I could; but the fact is, we came on business, and must do it and be off."
"Not a word of business till morning," said McClure, clapping his hand on Rangely's mouth: "come, go home with me."
"Let him go with me to-night," said Holdness, "because he's tired and foot-sore, and you can come with him: and he can go to your house to-morrow."
To this McClure assented. One taking Rangely's rifle, and the other his pack, they marched off, leaving the rest to get in the corn.
Holdness did not lack for company that evening; all the young people coming in to listen to the talk of these old comrades, Rangely's in particular, whose whole life had been a scene of perils and hair-breadth escapes.