"A wagon or something going through to Lymptree or Herriotting."
"No, sir—tweren't a wagon. I counted the horses—four white horses, and they went by with never a sound of hoof or bridle. And that weren't——"
"Four horses! Come, Plunkett, you must have been seeing double. There's nobody about here would be driving four horses, unless it was Mr. Mortimer from Abbotts Bolton, and he wouldn't be taking his horseflesh out at midnight."
"Four horses they was, sir. I see them plain. And it weren't Mr. Mortimer, neither, for he drives a drag, and this were a big, heavy coach, with no lights on it, but shinin' all of itself, with a colour like moonshine."
"Oh, nonsense, man! You couldn't see the moon last night. It was pitch-dark."
"No, sir, but the coach shone all moony-like, all the same."
"And no lights? I wonder what the police would say to that."
"No mortal police could stop that coach," said Plunkett contemptuously, "nor no mortal man could abide the sight on it. I tell you, sir, that ain't the worst of it. The horses——"
"Was it going slowly?"
"No, sir. It were going at a gallop, only the hoofs didn't touch the ground. There weren't no sound, and I see the black road and the white hoofs half a foot off of it. And the horses had no heads."