wife; and she says:

"W-h-a-r-r's my golden arm? W-h-a-r-r's my golden arm? W-h-a-r-r's my
g-o-l-den arm?"

As Uncle Ned repeated these blood-curdling questions he would look first
one and then another of his listeners in the eyes, with his bands drawn
up in front of his breast, his fingers turned out and crooked like claws,
while he bent with each question closer to the shrinking forms before
him. The tone was sepulchral, with awful pause as if waiting each time
for a reply. The culmination came with a pounce on one of the group, a
shake of the shoulders, and a shout of:

"YOU'VE got it!' and she tore him all to pieces!"

And the children would shout "Lordy!" and look furtively over their
shoulders, fearing to see a woman in white against the black wall; but,
instead, only gloomy, shapeless shadows darted across it as the
flickering flames in the fireplace went out on one brand and flared up on
another. Then there was a story of a great ball of fire that used to
follow lonely travelers along dark roads through the woods.

"Once 'pon a time there was a man, and he was riding along de road and he
come to a ha'nted house, and he heard de chains'a-rattlin' and a-rattlin'
and a-rattlin', and a ball of fire come rollin' up and got under his
stirrup, and it didn't make no difference if his horse galloped or went
slow or stood still, de ball of fire staid under his stirrup till he got
plum to de front do', and his wife come out and say: 'My Gord, dat's
devil fire!' and she had to work a witch spell to drive it away."