satisfied that it was only a blind woman everybody knew--so old that
she had become childish. She had heard the reports of the factory
being haunted, and groping about with her half-withered brain full
of them, had found the garden and the back door open, and had
climbed to the first-floor by a farther stair, well known to her
when she used to work that very machine. She had seated herself
instinctively, according to ancient wont, and had set it in motion
once more.

Yielding to an impulse of experiment, Robert began to play again.
Thereupon her disordered ideas broke out in words. And Robert soon
began to feel that it could hardly be more ghastly to look upon a
ghost than to be taken for one.

'Ay, ay, sir,' said the old woman, in a tone of commiseration, 'it
maun be sair to bide. I dinna wonner 'at ye canna lie still. But
what gars ye gang daunerin' aboot this place? It's no yours ony
langer. Ye ken whan fowk's deid, they tyne the grip (loose hold).
Ye suld gang hame to yer wife. She micht say a word to quaiet yer
auld banes, for she's a douce an' a wice woman--the mistress.'

Then followed a pause. There was a horror about the old woman's
voice, already half dissolved by death, in the desolate place, that
almost took from Robert the power of motion. But his violin sent
forth an accidental twang, and that set her going again.

'Ye was aye a douce honest gentleman yersel', an' I dinna wonner ye
canna bide it. But I wad hae thoucht glory micht hae hauden ye in.
But yer ain son! Eh ay! And a braw lad and a bonnie! It's a sod
thing he bude to gang the wrang gait; and it's no wonner, as I say,