"Did she tell you any thing?" said the apparition again.
"Then I must," said the creature. "You go no nearer to your own house to-night."
"Say you sae?" said I; "but I'll gang to my ain house the night, though sax like you stood atween me an' it."
"I charge you," said the thing again, "that you go not nearer to it. For your own sake, and the sakes of those that are dearest to you, go back the gate you came, and _go not_ to that house."
"An' pray wha may you be that's sae peremptory?" said I.
"A stranger here, but a friend to you, Laidlaw. Here you do not pass to-night."
I never could bide to be braved a' my life. "Say you sae, friend?" quo' I; "then let me tell ye, stand out o' my way; or be ye brownie or fairy--be ye ghaist, or be ye deil--in the might o' Heaven, I sall gie ye strength o' arm for aince; an' here's a cudgel that never fell in vain."
"So saying, I took my stick by the sma' end wi' baith my hands, an' heaving it ower my shoulder I came straight on to the apparition, for I hardly kend what I was doing; an' my faith it had gotten a paik! but it had mair sense than to risk it; for when it saw that I was dementit, it e'en steppit quietly aff the road, and said, wi' a deep grane, "Ye're a wilfu' man, Laidlaw, an' your wilfu'ness may be your undoing. Pass on your ways, and Heaven protect your senses."
"I dredd sair I was doing wrang, but there was something in my nature that wadna be contrair'd; sae by I went, an' lookit full at the thing as I past. It had nouther face nor hands, nor head nor feet; but there was it standing like a lang corn sack. L----d tak me, (as Serjeant Macpherson said,) if I kend whether I was gaun on my feet or the crown o' my head.
"The first window that I came to was my ain, the ane o' that room where Maron and I slept. I rappit at it wi' a rap that wont to be weel kend, but it was barred, an' a' was darkness and vacancy within. I tried every door and window alang the foreside o' the house, but a' wi' the same effect. I rappit an' ca'd at them a', an' named every name that was in the house when I left it, but there was nouther voice, nor light, nor sound. 'Lord have a care o' me!' said I to mysel, 'what's come o' a' my fock? Can Clavers hae been here in my absence an' taen them a' away? or has the Brownie o' Bodsbeck eaten them up, stoop an' roop? For a' that I hae wearied to see them, here I find my house left unto me desolate. This is a waesome welcome hame to a father, an' a husband, an' a master!--O Lord! O Lord! what will come o' puir auld Wat now?'