ably, no sooner had he now turned into the
lane, than he began to think of Rachel. He would have preferred to think
of anything else in the world; but he found, as many others are obliged
to find, that unpleasant thoughts cannot be driven away at will. It was
not so much that the past night of misfortune was present to him, as
that he feared to meet the ghost of Rachel.

He went on, glancing furtively on all sides, his face and his hair
growing hotter and hotter. There, on his right, was the gate through
which he had entered the field to give chase to the supposed cat; there,
on the left, was the high hedge; before him lay the length of lane
traversed that evening by the tall man, who had remained undiscovered
from that hour to this. Dan could see nothing now; no tall man, no cat;
even the latter might have proved a welcome intruder. He glanced up at
the calm sky, at the bright moon riding overhead. The night was
perfectly still; a lovely night, could Dan only have kept the ghosts out
of his mind.

Suddenly a horse, in the field on the other side the hedge, set up a
loud neigh, right in Dan's ear. Coming thus unexpectedly, it startled
Dan above everything. He half resolved to go back, and turned round and
looked the way he had come. But he thought of the gray ferret, and
plucked up some courage and went on again, intending, the moment he came
in sight of the Willow Pool, to make a dash past at his utmost speed.

The intention was not carried out. Clambering over the gate which led to
the enclosure, a more ready way to Dan than opening it, he was brought
within view of the pool. There it was, down in the dreary lower part,
near the trees. The pool itself was distinct enough, lying to the right,
and Dan involuntarily looked towards it. Not to have saved his life,
could Dan have helped looking.

Susan Peckaby had said to Jan, that her heart leaped into her mouth at
the sight of the white cow in the pound. Poor Dan Duff might have said
that his heart leaped right out of him, at sight now of the Willow
Pool. For there was some shadowy figure moving round it.

Dan stood powerless. But for the gate behind him he would have turned
and ran; to scramble back over that, his limbs utterly refused. The
delay caused him, in spite of his fear, to discern the very obvious
fact, that the shadowy figure was not that of a woman habited in
white--as the orthodox ghost of Rachel ought to have been--but a man's,
wearing dark clothes. Th