Bromley sat back in his chair, and laughed aloud. "Here's the 'harnt' you saw," he exclaimed, slapping Philip on the shoulders.
"No, no!" cried the postmaster, getting onto his feet with a scared look in his face. "Yer funnin' with me, stranger, fur no human could 'a' got thar whar I viewed the harnt."
"But he did," said Bromley; and then he described how Philip fell, and how he got up again. "By the way," continued Bromley, looking around, "is the young woman present who used to live alone in the house under Sheep Cliff?"
At this question some of the neighbor women pushed forward a tall, stoop-shouldered girl with a sallow face, who struggled to avoid the gaze of the soldiers.
"What fur ye want 'o know?" she said in a sullen voice, still pushing to get back to her place against the wall.
"Oh, nothing," said Philip; "only we used to see you through the telescope."
The soldiers and the family sat for a time in silence after the most of the neighbors had gone.
"Well, I declare," said the postmaster, giving a twirl to the creaking table which caused the last guttering candle to approach him in a smoky circle, "how things do come round!"
The light reddened the postmaster's face for an instant, and gleamed on his glasses, as he blew out the candle and pinched the wick.
And so ends the history of the three soldiers who remained in voluntary exile for seven years, and were happily rescued at last.