way," where suicides were
buried in times past. This road was the old high-road, where the mail
coach ran, and along which, on such a night as this, a hundred years
ago, a horseman rode his last ride. As he passed the church on his
fatal journey did anything warn him how soon his headless body would
be buried beneath its shadow? Bill wondered. He wondered if he were
old or young--what sort of a horse he rode--whose cruel hands dragged
him into the shadow of the yews and slew him, and where his head was
hidden, and why. Did the church look just the same, and the moon shine
just as brightly, that night a century ago? Bully Tom was right. The
weathercock and moon sit still, whatever happens. The boy watched the
gleaming high road as it lay beyond the dark aisle of trees, till he
fancied he could hear the footfalls of the solitary horse--and yet,
no! The sound was not upon the hard road, but nearer; it was not the
clatter of hoofs, but something--and a rustle--and then Bill's blood
seemed to freeze in his veins, as he saw a white figure, wrapped in
what seemed to be a shroud, glide out of the shadow of the yews and
move slowly down the lane. When it reached the road it paused, raised
a long arm warningly towards him for a moment, and then vanished in
the direction of the churchyard.

What would have been the consequence of the intense fright the poor
lad experienced is more than anyone can say, if at that moment the
church clock had not begun to strike nine. The familiar sound, close
in his ears, roused him from the first shock, and before it had ceased
he contrived to make a desperate rally of his courage, flew over the
road, and crossed the two fields that now lay between him and home
without looking behind him.

CHAPTER III.

"It was to her a real _grief of heart_, acute, as children's
sorrows often are.

"We beheld this from the opposite windows--and, seen thus
from a little distance, how many of our own and of other
people's sorrows might not seem equally trivial, and equally
deserving of ridicule!"

HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN.

When Bill got home he found the household busy with a much more
practical subject than that of ghosts and haunted yew-trees. Bessy
was ill. She had felt a pain in her side all the day, which towards
night had become so violent that the doctor was sent for, who had
pronounced it pleurisy, and had sent her to bed. He was just coming
downstairs as Bill b