The weary hours passed, and my uncle did not come. I had never before been really uneasy at his longest absence; but now I was far more anxious about him than about John. Alas, through me fresh trouble had befallen my uncle as well as John! When the night came, I went to bed, for I was very tired: I must keep myself strong, for something unfriendly was on its way, and I must be able to meet it! I knew well I should not sleep until I heard the sounds of his arrival: those came about one o'clock, and in a moment I was dreaming. In my dream I was still awake, and still watching for my uncle's return. I heard the sound of Death's hoofs, not on the stones of the yard, but on the gravel before the house, and coming round the house till under my window. There he stopped, and I heard my uncle call to me to come down: he wanted me. In my dream I was a child; I sprang out of bed, ran from the house on my bare feet, jumped into his down-stretched arms, and was in a moment seated in front of him. Death gave a great plunge, and went off like the wind, cleared the gate in a flying stride, and rushed up the hill to the heath. The wind was blowing behind us furiously: I could hear it roaring, but did not feel it, for it could not overtake us; we out-stripped and kept ahead of it; if for a moment we slackened speed, it fell upon us raging. We came at length to the pool near the heart of the heath, and I wondered that, at the speed we were making, we had been such a time in reaching it. It was the dismalest spot, with its crumbling peaty banks, and its water brown as tea. Tradition declared it had no bottom--went down into nowhere. “Here,” said my uncle, bringing his horse to a sudden halt, “we had a terrible battle once, Death and I, with the worm that lives in this hole. You know what worm it is, do you not?” I had heard of the worm, and any time I happened, in galloping about the heath, to find myself near the pool, the thought would always come back with a fresh shudder--what if the legend were a true one, and the worm was down there biding his time! but anything more about the worm I had never heard. “No, uncle,” I answered; “I don't know what worm it is.” “Ah,” he answered, with a sigh, “if you do not take the more care, little one, you will some day learn, not what the worm is called, but what it is! The worm that lives there, is the worm that never dies.” I gave a shriek; I had never heard of the horrible creature before--so it seemed in my dream. To think of its being so near us, and never dying, was too terrible. “Don't be frightened, little one,” he said, pressing me closer to his bosom. “Death and I killed it. Come with me to the other side, and you will see it lying there, stiff and stark.” “But, uncle,” I said, “how can it be dead--how can you have killed it, if it never dies?” “Ah, that is the mystery!” he returned.