“I never seed no water like it afore. As black as what I does your boots with, sir; but as clear—you can see every stone in it.”
“Then the Lord have mercy on this poor parish; and especially to the old house of Lorraine! For the Woeburn has broken out again.”
“Why, Rector, you seem in a very great fright,” said Captain Chapman, recovering slowly from his sad discomfiture. “What is the matter about this water? Some absurd old superstition—is not it?”
“Superstition or not,” Mr. Hales answered shortly, “I must leave you to shoot by yourself, Captain Chapman. I could not fire another shot to-day. It is more than three hundred and fifty years since this water of death was seen. In my church you may read what happened then. And not only that, but according to tradition its course runs directly through our village, and even through my garden. My people know nothing about it yet. It may burst upon them quite suddenly. There are many obstructions, no doubt, in its course, and many hollow places to fill up. But before many hours it will reach us. As a question of prudence, I must hasten home. Shot, come to heel this moment!”
“You are right,” said the captain; “I shall do the same. Your hospitable board will excuse me to-night. I would much rather not leap the Woeburn in the dark.”
With the instinct of a man of the world, he perceived that the Rector, under this depression, would prefer to have no guest. Moreover, the clouds were gathering with dark menace over the hill-tops; and he was not the man—if such man there be—to find pleasure in a wet day’s shooting.
“No horse has ever yet crossed the Woeburn,” Mr. Hales replied, as they all turned homeward across the shoulder of the hill; “at least, if the legends about that are true. Though a hare may have leaped it to-day, to-morrow no horse will either swim or leap it.”
“Bless my heart! does it rise like that? The sooner we get out of its way the better. What a pest it will be to you, Rector! Why, you never will be able to come to the meet, and our opening day is next Tuesday.”
“Steenie,” cried the Rector, imbibing hope, “it has not struck me in that light before. But it scarcely could ever be the will of the Lord to cut off a parson from his own pack!”