It gave a kind of cry,
as any one of us might do, if something dreadful followed us in a dream,
and came upon us unawares; and then it died off: seeming to pass quite
round the church.'
'I don't see much in that,' said John, drawing a long breath, and
looking round him like a man who felt relieved.
'Perhaps not,' returned his friend, 'but that's not all.'
'What more do you mean to say, sir, is to come?' asked John, pausing in
the act of wiping his face upon his apron. 'What are you a-going to tell
us of next?'
'What I saw.'
'Saw!' echoed all three, bending forward.
'When I opened the church-door to come out,' said the little man, with
an expression of face which bore ample testimony to the sincerity of
his conviction, 'when I opened the church-door to come out, which I did
suddenly, for I wanted to get it shut again before another gust of wind
came up, there crossed me--so close, that by stretching out my finger
I could have touched it--something in the likeness of a man. It was
bare-headed to the storm. It turned its face without stopping, and fixed
its eyes on mine. It was a ghost--a spirit.'
'Whose?' they all three cried together.
In the excess of his emotion (for he fell back trembling in his chair,
and waved his hand as if entreating them to question him no further),
his answer was lost on all but old John Willet, who happened to be
seated close beside him.
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