"Are we nigh the place Zeb d'ye think, we should be ... by now——"
"Not so fur your hon ... a bye-road hereabouts if 'twarn't dark, with ten thousand..."
In a while as they splashed on through the gloom the Major felt a hand on his arm.
"By your left, sir ... bye-road ... can't see on account o' dark, may the foul fiend ... by your left, so!" Thus through mud and rain and buffeting wind they rode until at word of the Sergeant they dismounted.
"Must hide the horses, sir," said he in the Major's ear. "I know a snug place hard by, wait you here sir ... some shelter under the hedge ... never saw such a plaguy night, may all the foul——" And the Sergeant was gone, venting curses at every step. Very soon he was back again and the Major stumbled after him across an unseen, wind-swept expanse until looming blacker than the dark, they saw the ruin of the haunted mill. Inside, sheltered from rain and wind the Major unloosed his heavy coat and took from under his arm a certain knobby bludgeon and twirled it in the dark while Sergeant Zebedee, hard by, struck flint and steel, but the tinder was damp and refused to burn.
"Is a light necessary Zeb—if any should observe——"
"Why sir, like as not they'd think 'twas ghosts, d'ye see. And 'tis as well to survey field of operations, wherefore I brought a lanthorn and——" The Major reached out and caught his arm.
"Hark!" said he.
Above and around them were shrieks and howlings, timbers creaked and groaned and the whole ruined fabric quivered, ever and anon, to the fierce buffets of the wind, while faint and far was an ever-recurrent roll and rumble of thunder.
"Storm's a-waxing sir ... can't last, I..." Borne on the wind above the tempest came a faint hail. "Zounds, they're close on us!" exclaimed the Sergeant. "This way, sir, keep close, catch the tail o' my coat." Thus they stumbled on through the pitchy dark, found a wall, followed it, turned a corner, brought up against another wall and so stood waiting with ears on the stretch.