nspection.

"Oh no; there's nothing wrong with your hand. This was differently
shaped; fatter; and the middle finger was stunted, and shorter than the
rest, looking as if it had once been broken, and the nail was crooked
like a claw. I called out, "Who's there?" and the light and the hand
were withdrawn, and I saw and heard no more of my visitor."

"So sure as you're a living man, that was him!" exclaimed Tom Wyndsour,
his very nose growing pale, and his eyes almost starting out of his
head.

"Who?" I asked.

"Old Squire Bowes; 'twas _his_ hand you saw; the Lord a' mercy on us!"
answered Tom. "The broken finger, and the nail bent like a hoop. Well
for you, sir, he didn't come back when you called, that time. You came
here about them Miss Dymock's business, and he never meant they should
have a foot o' ground in Barwyke; and he was making a will to give it
away quite different, when death took him short. He never was uncivil to
no one; but he couldn't abide them ladies. My mind misgave me when I
heard 'twas about their business you were coming; and now you see how it
is; he'll be at his old tricks again!"

With some pressure, and a little more punch, I induced Tom Wyndsour to
explain his mysterious allusions by recounting the occurrences which
followed the old Squire's death.

"Squire Bowes, of Barwyke, died without making a will, as you know,"
said Tom. "And all the folk round were sorry; that is to say, sir, as
sorry as folk will be for an old man that has seen a long tale of years,
and has no right to grumble that death has knocked an hour too soon at
his door. The Squire was well liked; he was never in a passion, or said
a hard word; and he would not hurt a fly; and that made what happened
after his decease the more surprising.

"The first thing these ladies did, when they got the property, was to
buy stock for the park.

"It was not wise, in any case, to graze the land on their own account.
But they little knew all they had to contend with.

"Before long something went wrong with the cattle; first one, and then
another, took sick and died, and so on, till the loss began to grow
heavy. Then, queer stories, little by little, began to be told. It was
said, first by one, then by another, that Squire Bowes was seen, about
evening time, walking, just as he used to do when he was alive, among
the old trees, leaning on his stick; and, sometimes, when he came up
with the cattle, he would stop and lay his hand kind