“Aye, I will,” replied Molly eagerly, drying her tears with the back of her hand. “Then come alang,” said Souter, ready to make amends. “Come an’ pull a stock. Gie me your hand.” She did so eagerly. “Noo shut your eyes tight; that’s it; come along noo.” But Molly braced herself and refused to move. “I’m afeered o’ the dark an’ the witches,” she faltered, her teeth chattering, her eyes so tightly closed that her face was drawn into a mass of deep wrinkles. They all crowded round the couple with words of praise and encouragement, and presently Molly was persuaded to take a step forward and then another, and finally the two moved slowly away and were swallowed up in the darkness. Meanwhile the rest of the revelers, after a whispered consultation, hurried to the outhouse, amid smothered shrieks of laughter. Molly and Souter walked slowly and timidly toward the field of corn, which looked unreal and shadowy in the pale moonlight. Molly’s few remaining teeth were now chattering so loudly that Souter began to grow nervous. He jerked her arm impatiently. “Be a mon, Molly,” he hoarsely whispered, his voice a little shaky. “I’m afeered to,” she answered, opening her eyes and looking fearfully around. They took a few more stumbling step, then stopped. “Och, get off my foot, ye towsie tyke!” cried Souter. Molly hastily removed the offending member and on they went again. Suddenly they stopped, rooted to the spot in terror. A low, blood-curdling moan had rent the stillness. Again it came, chilling the very blood in their veins by its awful weirdness. “The witches! the witches!” gasped Molly in abject fear. Turning, they beheld a sight that caused their hair to stand on end, “the marrow to congeal in their bones,” as Souter afterward explained the sensation which came over him. Coming toward them was a score or more of hideous apparitions with fire blazing from their eyes and their horribly grinning mouths, and groaning and moaning like lost souls. With a mortal cry of terror, the frightened couple sped on wings of fear back to the friendly light of the kitchen, the ghostly figures darting after them with diabolical bursts of laughter. As they slammed the door of the house behind them their pursuers stopped and quickly blew out their Jack-o’-Lanterns and then threw them to one side. “I didna ken mortal mon could e’er run so fast,” snickered Poosie Nancy to the others as they noiselessly entered the kitchen in time to hear the wonderful tale of Souter’s hairbreadth escape from the witches.