Page:Hallowe'en festivities (1903).djvu/118

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114
WERNER'S READINGS No. 31.

"Don' know," answered Jimmy; "can't tell how I do feel, on'y as if suthin' was goin' to happen."

That was jest it! I felt the same thing, an' I told him so, an' we talked about it till we both got very fidgety.

There's a purty sharp curve about twenty miles from Holbrook. The road makes a turn around a mountain, an' the river runs below ye, about forty feet, or sech a matter. It is a pokerish lookin' place when you happen to be goin' over it an' think what 'ud be if the train should pitch over the bluff inter the river.

Wall, we got to the foot o' the mountain just where the curve begins. The light from the head-lamp lit up the track and made it bright as day, about as fur as from me to the fence yonder, ahead o' the engine. Outside o' that spot, all was dark as you ever see it, I'll bet.

All to once I see suthin' right ahead, in the bright light. We allers run slow around this curve, so I could see distinct. My hair riz right up, I tell ye, fer what I see was a man a-stand-in' right in the middle o' the track, a-wavin' his hands; an' I grabbed hold o' the lever an' whistled down brakes, an' stopped the train as fast as ever I could, fer ye see I thought 'twas a live man. An' Jimmy he see it, too, an' turned round to me with an awful scart face, fer he thought sure he'd be run over.

But I began to see 'twan't any flesh-and-blood man afore the train come to a stop, fer it seemed to glide right along over the track, keepin' jest about so fer ahead of us all the time.

"It's a ghost," cried Jimmy, a grabbin' me by the arm. "You can see right through him."

An' we could!

Yes, sir, we could. When- 1 come to notice it, the figure ahead o' us was a kind o' foggy-lookin' thing; and only half hid anything that was behind it. But it was jest as much like a man as you be, an' you'd a said the same thing if you'd a seen it.

The train stopped. An' then, sir, what d'ye think happened?