"'Yes, Mrs Privett,' said Nancy. 'Now, don't tell anybody, but I don't
mind letting you know what the reason o't is. Last night, being Old
Midsummer Eve, some of us church porch, and didn't get home till near
one.'

"'Did ye?' says Mrs Privett. 'Old Midsummer yesterday was it? Faith, I
didn't think whe'r 'twas Midsummer or Michaelmas; I'd too much work to
do.'

"'Yes. And we were frightened enough, I can tell 'ee by what we saw.'

"'What did ye see?'

"(You may not remember, sir, having gone off to foreign parts so young,
that on Midsummer Night it is believed hereabout that the faint shapes
of all the folk in the parish who are going to be at death's door within
the year can be seen entering the church. Those who get over their
illness come out again after awhile; those that are doomed to die do not
return.)

"'What did you see?' asked William's wife.

"'Well,' says Nancy, backwardly--'we needn't tell what we saw or who we
saw.'

"'You saw my husband,' said Betty Privett in a quiet way.

"'Well, since you put it so,' says Nancy, hanging fire, 'we--thought we
did see him; but it was darkish and we was frightened, and of course it
might not have been he.'