On regaining the few wits I could lay
claim to, I fully expected to find myself in the hands of the irate
laird, who would seize me by the scruff of the neck and belabour me to
pieces. Consequently, too frightened to move, I lay absolutely still
with my eyes shut. But as the minutes glided by and nothing happened,
I picked myself up. All was quiet and pitch dark--not a vestige of the
"Lady in White"--not a vestige of Sir E.C.
It did not take me very long to get out of the wood and home. I ran
all the way, and as it was still early--far too early for any of the
household to be astir, I crept up to my bedroom unobserved. But not to
sleep, oh dear me, no! not to sleep, for the moment I blew the candle
out and got into bed, reaction set in, and I suffered agonies of fear!
When I went to school in the morning, my equilibrium restored, and,
bubbling over with excitement to tell the boys what had happened, I
received another shock--before I could ejaculate a word of my
experiences, I was told--told with a roar and shout that almost broke
the drum of my ears, that "the auld laird deil" was dead! His body had
been found stretched on the ground, a few feet from the hollow oak, in
the avenue shortly after sunrise. He had died from syncope, so the
doctor said, that had probably been caused by a shock--some severe
mental shock.
I did not tell my companions of my night's adventure after all. My
eagerness to do so had departed when I heard of "the auld laird's"
death.
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