Yes, there could be no doubt about it, for look! there was the wire, and strange it seemed to me that I should live to behold it again.

Curiosity led me to push the door open just to ascertain if my memory served me aright about the exact locality of the room.

Next moment I regretted it for I fell straight into the arms of either Polly or Dolly.
"Oh!" said she, "I've just been sewn up." I reflected that this was my case also in another sense, but asked feebly if she knew the way downstairs.
She didn't; neither of us did, till at length we met Mrs.Smith coming to look for her.
If I had been a burglar she could not have regarded me with graver suspicions.

But at any rate _she_ knew the way downstairs.

And there to my joy I found my old friend Scroope and his wife, both of them grown stout and elderly, but as jolly as ever, after which the Smith family ceased to trouble me.
Also there was the rector of the parish, Dr.Jeffreys and an absurdly young wife whom he had recently married, a fluffy-headed little thing with round eyes and a cheerful, perky manner.