ame Clare, in
Chester-le-Street, and promised to take care both of her and her future
child. One evening in the end of November, this man, in company with
Mark Sharp, an acquaintance of his, came to Dame Clare's door, and told
her that they had made arrangements for removing her niece to a place
where she could remain in safety till her confinement was over. They
would not say where it was; but as Walker bore, in most respects, an
excellent character, she was allowed to go with him; and he professed to
have sent her off with Sharp into Lancashire. Fourteen days after, one
Graeme, a fuller, who lived about six miles from Lumley, had been
engaged till past midnight in his mill; and on going downstairs to go
home, in the middle of the ground floor he saw a woman, with dishevelled
hair, covered with blood, and having five large wounds on her head.
Graeme, on recovering a little from his first terror, demanded what the
spectre wanted. "I," said the apparition, "am the spirit of Anne
Walker"; and proceeded accordingly to tell Graeme the particulars which
I have already related to you. "When I was sent away with Mark Sharp, he
slew me on such a moor," naming one that Graeme knew, "with a collier's
pick, threw my body into a coal-pit, and hid the pick under the bank;
and his shoes and stockings, which were covered with blood, he left in a
stream." The apparition proceeded to tell Graeme that he must give
information of this to the nearest justice of peace, and that till this
was done, he must look to be continually haunted. Graeme went home very
sad; he dared not bring such a charge against a man of so unimpeachable
a character as Walker; and yet he as little dared to incur the anger of
the spirit that had appeared to him. So, as all weak minds will do, he
went on procrastinating; only he took care to leave his mill early, and
while in it never to be alone. Notwithstanding this caution on his part,
one night, just as it began to be dark, the apparition met him again in
a more terrible shape, and with every circumstance of indignation. Yet
he did not even then fulfil its injunction; till on St Thomas's eve, as
he was walking in his garden just after sunset, it threatened him so
effectually that in the morning he went to a magistrate and revealed the
whole thing. The place was examined; the body and the pickaxe found; and
a warrant was granted against Walker and Sharp. They were, however,
admitted to bail; but in August, 1681, thei