The upshot was that he gaed to the window an’ stood glowrin’ at Dule water. The trees are unco thick, an’ the water lies deep an’ black under the manse; an’ there was Janct washin’ the cla’es wi’ her coats kilted. She had her back to the minister, an’ he, for his pairt, hardly kenned what he was lookin’ at. Syne she turned round, an’ shawed her face; Mr. Soulis had the same cauld grue as twice that day afore, an’ it was borne in upon him what folk said, that Janet was deid lang syne, an’ this was a bogle in her clay-cauld flesh. He drew back a pickle and he scanned her narrowly. She was tramp-trampin’ in the cla’es, croonin’ to hersel’; and eh! Gude guide us, but it was a fearsome face. Whiles she sang louder, but there was nae man born o’ woman that could tell the words o’ her sang; an’ whiles she lookit side-lang doun, but there was naething there for her to look at. There gaed a scunner through the flesh upon his banes; and that was Heeven’s advertisement. But Mr. Soulis just blamed himsel’, he said, to think sae ill of a puir, auld afflicted wife that hadnae a freend forbye himsel’; an’ he put up a bit prayer for him and her, an’ drank a little caller water—for his heart rose again the meat—an’ gaed up to his naked bed in the gloaming. That was a nicht that has never been forgotten in Ba’weary, the nicht o’ the seeventeenth of August, seventeen hun’er’ an twal’. It had been het afore, as I hae said, but that nicht it was hetter than ever. The sun gaed doun amang unco-lookin’ clouds; it fell as mirk as the pit; no a star, no a breath o’ wund; ye couldnae see your han’ afore your face, and even the auld folk cuist the covers frae their beds and lay pechin’ for their breath. Wi’ a’ that he had upon his mind, it was gey and unlikely Mr. Soulis wad get muckle sleep. He lay an’ he tummled; the gude, caller bed that he got into brunt his very banes; whiles he slept, and whiles he waukened; whiles he heard the time o’ nicht, and whiles a tyke yowlin’ up the muir, as if somebody was deid; whiles he thocht he heard bogles claverin’ in his lug, an’ whiles he saw spunkies in the room. He behoved, he judged, to be sick; an’ sick he was—little he jaloosed the sickness. At the hinder end, he got a clearness in his mind, sat up in his sark on the bed-side, and fell thinkin’ ance mair o’ the black man an’ Janet. He couldnae weel tell how—maybe it was the cauld to his feet—but it cam’ in upon him wi’ a spate that there was some connection between thir twa, an’ that either or baith o’ them were bogles. And just at that moment, in Janet’s room, which was neist to his, there cam’ a stramp o’ feet as if men were wars’lin’, an’ then a loud bang; an’ then a wund gaed reishling round the fower quarters of the house; an’ then a’ was aince mair as seelent as the grave.