"Wot 'appened, sir!" wailed Tippet. "Oh, Gord, sir! Hit came back.
Hit came for me, sir. Right hit did, sir; strite hat me, sir;
hand with long w'ite 'ands it clawed for me. Oh, Gord! Hit almost
caught me, sir. Hi'm has good as dead; Hi'm a marked man; that's
wot Hi ham. Hit was a-goin' for to carry me horf, sir."

"Stuff and nonsense," snapped Bradley. "Did you get a good look
at it?"

Tippet said that he did--a much better look than he wanted.
The thing had almost clutched him, and he had looked straight
into its eyes--"dead heyes in a dead face," he had described them.

"Wot was it after bein', do you think?" inquired Brady.

"Hit was Death," moaned Tippet, shuddering, and again a pall of
gloom fell upon the little party.

The following day Tippet walked as one in a trance. He never
spoke except in reply to a direct question, which more often than
not had to be repeated before it could attract his attention.
He insisted that he was already a dead man, for if the thing didn't
come for him during the day he would never live through another
night of agonized apprehension, waiting for the frightful end
that he was positive was in store for him. "I'll see to that,"
he said, and they all knew that Tippet meant to take his own life
before darkness set in.

Bradley tried to reason with him, in his short, crisp way, but
soon saw the futility of it; nor could he take the man's weapons