In the small hours of the following night the pulse of Thrums stopped for a moment, and then went on again, but the only watcher remained silent, and the people rose in the morning without knowing that they had lost one of their number while they slept. In the same ignorance they toiled¹ through a long day.  
It was a close October day in the end of a summer that had lingered to give the countryside nothing better than a second crop of haws. Beneath the beeches² leaves lay in yellow heaps like sliced turnip³, and over all the strath was a pink haze⁴; the fields were singed⁵ brown, except where a recent ploughing gave them a mourning border. From early morn men, women and children (Tommy among them) were in the fields taking up their potatoes, half-a-dozen gatherers at first to every drill, and by noon it seemed a dozen, though the new-comers were but stout⁶ sacks, now able to stand alone. By and by heavy-laden carts were trailing into Thrums, dog-tired toilers hanging on behind, not to be dragged, but for an incentive⁸ to keep them trudging⁹, boys and girls falling asleep on top of the load, and so neglecting to enjoy the ride which was their recompense for lifting. A growing mist mixed with the daylight, and still there were a few people out, falling over their feet with fatigue¹⁰; it took silent possession, and then the shadowy forms left in the fields were motionless and would remain there until carted to garrets and kitchen corners and other winter quarters on Monday morning. There were few gad-abouts that Saturday night. Washings were not brought in, though Mr. Dishart had preached against the unseemly sight of linen¹¹ hanging on the line on the Sabbath-day. Innes, stravaiging the square and wynds in his apple-cart, jingled¹² his weights in vain, unable to shake even moneyed children off their stools, and when at last he told his beast to go home they took with them all the stir of the town. Family exercise came on early in many houses, and as the gude wife handed her man the Bible she said entreatingly¹³, "A short ane." After that one might have said that no earthly knock could bring them to their doors, yet within an hour the town was in a ferment¹⁴.
 
When Tommy and Elspeth reached the Den⁷ the mist lay so thick that they had to feel their way through it to the Ailie, where they found Gavinia alone and scared. "Was you peeping in, trying to fleg me twa three minutes syne¹⁵?" she asked, eagerly, and when they shook their heads, she looked cold with fear.
 
"As sure as death," she said, "there was some living thing standing¹⁶ there; I couldna see it for the rime¹⁷, but I heard it breathing hard."
 
Tommy felt Elspeth's hand begin to tremble, and he said "McLean!" hastily, though he knew that McLean had not yet left the Quharity Arms. Next moment Corp arrived with another story as unnerving.
 
"Has Grizel no come yet?" he asked, in a troubled voice. "Tommy, hearken to this, a light has been burning in Double Dykes¹⁹ and the door swinging open a' day! I saw it mysel', and so did Willum Dods."
 
"Did you go close?"
 
"Na faags! Willum was hol'ing and I was lifting, so we hadna time in the daylight, and wha would venture near the Painted Lady's house on sic a night?"
 
Even Tommy felt uneasy, but when Gavinia cried, "There's something uncanny in being out the night; tell us what was in Mr. McLean's bottle, Tommy, and syne we'll run hame," he became Commander Sandys again, and replied, blankly, "What bottle?"
 
"The ane I warned you he was to fling into the water; dinna dare tell me you hinna got it."
 
"I know not what thou art speaking about," said Tommy; "but it's a queer thing, it's a queer thing, Gavinia"—here he fixed²⁰ her with his terrifying eye—"I happen to have found a—another bottle," and still glaring at her he explained that he had found his bottle floating on the horizon. It contained a letter to him, which he now read aloud. It was signed "The Villain²¹ Stroke, his mark," and announced that the writer, "tired of this relentless²² persecution," had determined²³ to reform rather than be killed. "Meet me at the Cuttle Well, on Saturday, when the eight-o'clock bell is ringing," he wrote, "and I shall there make you an offer for my freedom."
 
The crew received this communication with shouts, Gavinia's cry of "Five shillings, if no ten!" expressing the general sentiment, but it would not have been like Tommy to think with them. "You poor things," he said, "you just believe everything you're telled! How do I know that this is not a trick of Stroke's to bring me here when he is some other gait working mischief²⁴?"
 
Corp was impressed, but Gavinia said, short-sightedly, "There's no sign o't."
 
"There's ower much sign o't," retorted Tommy. "What's this story about Double Dykes? And how do we ken¹⁸ that there hasna been foul²⁵ work there, and this man at the bottom o't? I tell you, before the world's half an hour older, I'll find out," and he looked significantly at Corp, who answered, quaking, "I winna gang by mysel', no, Tommy, I winna!"
 
So Tommy had to accompany him, saying, valiantly²⁶, "I'm no feared, and this rime is fine for hodding in," to which Corp replied, as firmly, "Neither am I, and we can aye keep touching²⁷ cauld iron." Before they were half way down the Double Dykes they got a thrill, for they realized, simultaneously²⁸, that they were being followed. They stopped and gripped each other hard, but now they could hear nothing.
 
"The Painted Lady!" Corp whispered.
 
"Stroke!" Tommy replied, as cautiously. He was excited rather than afraid, and had the pluck to cry, "Wha's that? I see you!"—but no answer came back through the mist, and now the boys had a double reason for pressing forward.
 
"Can you see the house, Corp?"
 
"It should be here about, but it's smored in rime."
 
"I'm touching the paling. I ken the road to the window now."
 
"Hark! What's that?"
 
It sounded like devil's music in front of them, and they fell back until Corp remembered, "It maun be the door swinging open, and squealing²⁹ and moaning on its hinges. Tommy, I take ill wi' that. What can it mean?"
 
"I'm here to find out." They reached the window where Tommy had watched once before, and looking in together saw the room plainly by the light of a lamp which stood on the spinet³⁰. There was no one inside, but otherwise Tommy noticed little change. The fire was out, having evidently burned itself done, the bed-clothes were in some disorder³¹. To avoid the creaking door, the boys passed round the back of the house to the window of the other room. This room was without a light, but its door stood open and sufficient light came from the kitchen to show that it also was untenanted. It seemed to have been used as a lumber-room.
 
The boys turned to go, passing near the front of the empty house, where they shivered and stopped, mastered by a feeling they could not have explained. The helpless door, like the staring eyes of a dead person, seemed to be calling to them to shut it, and Tommy was about to steal forward for this purpose when Corp gripped him and whispered that the light had gone out. It was true, though Tommy disbelieved until they had returned to the east window to make sure.
 
"There maun be folk in the hoose, Tommy!"
 
"You saw it was toom. The lamp had gone out itself, or else—what's that?"
 
It was the unmistakable closing of a door, softly but firmly. "The wind has blown it to," they tried to persuade themselves, though aware that there was not sufficient wind for this. After a long period of stillness they gathered courage to go to the door and shake it. It was not only shut, but locked.
 
On their way back through the Double Dykes they were silent, listening painfully but hearing nothing. But when they reached the Coffin³² Brig Tommy said, "Dinna say nothing about this to Elspeth, it would terrify her;" he was always so thoughtful for Elspeth.
 
"But what do you think o't a'?" Corp said, imploringly³³.
 
"I winna tell you yet," replied Tommy, cautiously.
 
When they boarded the Ailie, where the two girls were very glad to see them again, the e............