“Bad cess to you!” cried the giant, “but you’ve chosen rightly.”
Then all grew dark, but Robert Kelly kept tight hold of the boy he had chosen, and he could hear many voices about him, crying, “Happy Philip Renardy! Happy Philip Renardy!”
The next he knew the sun was shining, and he was lying on the grass at the top of the cliff, and the little lad was watching beside him.
“And are you of a truth the little Philip Renardy that’s been lost for so long?” asked Kelly.
“I am that one,” replied the lad, “and it is you that have saved me; and now let us be up and off, for my heart is aching within me for a sight of my mother.”
So the blacksmith rose up, and took the little lad’s hand and led him to the big house of the Renardys, and the lad seemed to know the way better than he did. And no sooner did Mrs. Renardy see him than she knew the lad as her son and was like to have gone distracted with the joy of it. That was a comfort to Bob Kelly, too, for all the time he had kept wondering whether by chance he might not have brought back the wrong boy with him.
When he at last left them and went back to his smithy, he found quite a crowd gathered there, talking about him, for when he hadn’t come back to the boat his friend had made sure the cliff had closed on him, and that mortal eye would never again behold him.
But when the people who had gathered heard his tale, there was great rejoicing, and all the bells of the village were rung, and a great crowd hurried away to the Renardy’s house, to get a glimpse of the boy who had been stolen by the giant.
Soon after his return, the boy began to grow again, but he never became very big, and there was always something a bit strange about him, though after a while he married and had children of his own who were fine stout fellows, and all of them were wonderful workers in metals.
As for Robert Kelly, his adventures were the making of him, for people came from everywhere to have him do their work for them, so as to have a chance to hear him tell his story. Moreover, Philip taught him some of the secrets of working with metal that he had learned in the giant’s house, so that he became quite famous.