Sentence The Sevenhundredandtwentieth

 

When Poll began to shiver, Rose drew an epitrachelion around her, and Milly resumed her note-taking while Isa asked the questions; which was when Rose became tetchy: "can't you see how distressed she is?" and Isa changed her tone, not oleaginous, but still a calming attempt to build a bridge over troubled waters, and the change in Poll became apparent; the gentle questions seemed disconnected but even Milly could sense the scene fructifying: she saw the group of old men at a table scattered with dominoes, each one far more individual than the term 'old men' implied, rather they were distinct characters, but it was the tale they wove that had captured the young Poll's imagination; it concerned a cache of documents that had been concealed in a cairn. which, struck by lightning one night, had cracked and revealed a hidden chamber; the five old men (for Poll's Uncle Norman was one of their number) were all amateur drystane dykers and had volunteered to rebuild the Cairn; they had gathered photographs which included the Cairn – along with walkers and ramblers of every nationality – and all sides were visible in them, and would be the model from which they would work, for they did not propose to replace the old cairn but rather re-build it, as much like it had been as humanly possible: but the hollow interior was a surprise, nay, a shock, and it's contents a Revelation!