“Who have won, father?”
“What’s the use of asking that? What could you expect, when it was three to one? Plenty of killed and wounded, and not a man escaped. Yes; there they are, two or three hundred of them, and all prisoners.”
“Will they bring the wounded here, father?”
“I don’t know, Polly. Where are we to put them, if they do?”
“Ah!” sighed the girl, rising and wiping her eyes, “it is very dreadful, and I nearly swooned away when they brought the first wounded men here; but I must be about and ready to help when they come. They’ll want all we can do.”
She smoothed down her apron in a calm, matter-of-fact way, and then moved over the rustling straw, as if ready for any duty; but she seemed to recollect something, and came back to where Fred lay.
“It’s your side that has won, sir,” she said. “You will not be a prisoner any longer, and—”
“Yes?” said Fred, for she stopped short.
“You heard what my father said, sir? You know he likes the Royalists, and if he fought would fight for the king?”
“Yes, I could see all that from his manner. I had no need to hear his words.”