Dennis, whose joy rapidly increased, had now arrived at a point where his enthusiasm seemed to pass all bounds.
"I'll tell you what to do, yer Riverence," he said to the chaplain. "Just put Noel and me tin yards apart. Let one of us fire and then the other and you'll find Noel's bullet lodged in the barrel of my gun and my bullet in his. That is, if we don't fire at the same time. If we should fire at the same minute the bullets would meet midway and you wouldn't find anything but two flattened pieces of lead."
"Do you often have an experience like that?" inquired the chaplain with a smile.
"Oh, yis, very oftin," answered Dennis solemnly. "Sometimes Noel says to me,' Dennis, me boy, I'm a bit tired this mornin'. Just put a bullet in my gun, please'; and it's easier to shoot one in than it is to have to go through the whole process o' loadin'."
The chaplain said no more, but at once conducted the two young soldiers to the guard which was waiting outside the tent.
No word was spoken as the little band fell in, and at the word of the orderly started in the direction which to Noel's surprise led over the way by which he had come when he had been brought to the camp. As yet he had not been able to obtain from Dennis a connected story of the mishaps of the young Irish soldier, nor of the way by which he had avoided his enemies and at last had been taken as a deserter and confined in the guard-tent.
Noel somehow believed that not even Dennis would have been able to escape from the well in which he had been hidden unless he had received help from outside. But to all inquiries Dennis made evasive replies, and Noel was still unable to understand the mystery with which he had shrouded his doings.
The little band now was on the borders of the place where the division was encamped. The entire region was unfamiliar to Noel, but as he glanced at a low house on the side of the road over which they were passing he was startled when he beheld Levi standing by the little cabin. The little sutler's fingers were bandaged, and as Noel recalled the story which the chaplain related to him and the pleadings of the little Jew for two pensions because he had received a wound in the tips of two fingers, he smiled in spite of the seriousness of the errand upon which he and his companion were going.
Suddenly Levi recognized the two young soldiers in the midst of the little band, and with a scream of rage instantly started toward them.