“One day a man who had borrowed of John paid him a large sum of money—took up a mortgage, in fact. It was wild spring weather and the stream yonder was running full. But although it rained so hard John Robinson would not risk his money in the house over night.
“His sister and he quarreled about it. She said he was a fool to go to town to bank his money on such a day. She would have been glad to sit up all night and watch it—and every night, too. But John harnessed his decrepit mare to his ramshackle buggy, and started for town.
“‘You put the lamp in the east window for me when it comes dark, and I’ll get back all right,’ he told her.
“Sarah scolded all the time until he was gone. She even said she hoped he’d be drowned in the river—he and his money together. Oh! she was quite a savage old creature, they say.
“Along towards evening a dreadful tempest burst up in the hills—a regular cloudburst. A thunderous torrent overflowed the banks of that pretty brook yonder. It became dark and they say old Sarah did not set the lamp in the window as she usually did when John was away from home.
“In the midst of the storm and darkness she must have seen his lantern jogging along the road, under the hind axle of his carriage, just as Mr. Sitz saw it,” continued Mary, in a solemn voice. “But the old woman would not light her lamp. The old man came down to the brook in the pitch darkness, missed the ford, drove into the deeper water below the crossing, and was swept away, horse, carriage and all, by the flood!”
“Oh—oh!” was the murmured chorus.
“How awful!” cried one girl.
“What an old witch!” exclaimed Jess Morse.
“But Sarah ran to set her light in the window—when it was too late,” pursued Mary, the story teller. “And every night for years thereafter, while she lived alone here in the old house, Sarah Robinson put her lamp in the window just after dark. And they say she often puts it in the window now! But usually the ghost light is preceded by the light and carriage on the road beyond the ford.”