"I've heard of this same witch in my boyhood. But what should we fear? She is flesh and blood like ourselves; and, in spite of the prevailing belief, I could never suppose power would be granted to some, generally the most wicked and the most worthless, which from the rest of mankind is capriciously withholden."
"Hush, Gervase; thou knowest not how far the arch-enemy of mankind may be permitted to afflict bodily our guilty race. I could tell thee such tales of yonder creature as would stagger even the most stubborn of unbelievers."
"I will speak to her, nevertheless. Tarry here, I prithee, Grace. It were best I should go alone."
"Oh, do not—do not! None have sight of her, as I've heard, but mischief follows. What disaster then may we not expect from her evil tongue. I shudder at the anticipation. Stay here. I will not be left; and I cannot cross this dangerous swamp."
Buckley was, however, bent on the adventure. His natural curiosity, inflamed by forbidden longing after the occult and the mysterious to which he was too prone, even though sceptical as to their existence, rendered him proof against his mistress' entreaties.
Probably from situation, or rather, it might be, the distance was judged greater than in reality it proved, but the form before them looked preternaturally enlarged, and, as she raised her head, her arms were flung out high above it like withered and wasted branches on each side. Trembling in every limb, Grace clung to her lover, and it was after long persuasion that she suffered him to lift her over the morass, and was dragged unwillingly up the hill. As though she were the victim of some terrible fascination, her eyes were constantly riveted on the object. A raven wheeled round them, every moment narrowing the circle of its flight, and the malicious bird looked eager for mischief.
As they approached nearer to the summit this ill-omened thing, after having brushed so close that they felt the very breath from its wings, alighted beside the Red Woman, who hardly seemed to notice, though well aware of their proximity.
They paused when several paces distant, and she rose up suddenly, extending both arms, apparently to warn them from a nearer approach. Her skinny lips rapidly moving to and fro, and her dark, withered, bony, and cadaverous features, gave her more the appearance of a living mummy, or a resurrection from the charnel-house, than aught instinct with the common attributes of humanity.
Buckley was for a moment daunted. The form was so unlike anything he had ever seen. He was almost persuaded of the possibility that it might be some animated corpse doomed to wander forth either for punishment or expiation. Her lips still moved. A wild glassy eye was fixed upon them, and as she yet stood with extended arms, Gervase, almost wrought to desperation, cried out,
"Who art thou? Thy business here?"