"Wonder 'f Eph's got back; they say his sentence run out yisterday."

The speaker, John Doane, was a sunburnt fisherman, one of a circle of
well-salted individuals who sat, some on chairs, some on boxes and
barrels, around the stove in a country store.

"Yes," said Captain Seth, a middle-aged little man with earrings; "he
come on the stage to-noon. Wouldn't hardly speak a word, Jim says.
Looked kind o' sot and sober."

"Wall," said the first speaker, "I only hope he won't go to burnin' us
out of house and home, same as he burnt up Eliphalet's barn. I was
ruther in hopes he'd 'a' made off West. Seems to me I should, in his
place, hevin' ben in State's-prison."

"Now, I allers bed quite a parcel o' sympathy for Eph," said a short,
thickset coasting captain, who sat tilted back in a three-legged chair,
smoking lazily. "You see, he wa'n't but about twenty-one or two then,
and he was allus a mighty high-strung boy; and then Eliphalet did act
putty ha'sh, foreclosin' on Eph's mother, and turnin' her out o' the
farm, in winter, when everybody knew she could ha' pulled through by
waitin'. Eph sot great store by the old lady, and I expect he was putty
mad with Eliphalet that night."

"I allers," said Doane, "approved o' his plan o' leadin' out all the
critters, 'fore he touched off the barn. 'Taint everybody 't would hev
taken pains to do that. But all the same, I tell Sarai't I feel kind o'
skittish, nights, to hev to turn in, feelin' 't there's a convict in the
place."