The Journal of Jonathon Lindey From the main part of the journal - Page 7
If the events of this May were unusual, then I can only say that those of June have been downright alarming, and so I take up my pen once again to continue my tale. Where it will end I cannot say, but I will endeavour to record the events to the best of my recollection. It seemed at first, in the period following the events I described previously, that things were in the process of returning to normal. I resumed my regular routine, and, at length cleared the backlog of my work. Late in May I attended the funeral of poor Mr McCandlass at a nearby Presbyterian church. Most of the mourners were family for he had few close friends. It was a small congregation that gathered to hear the funeral service and stand at the graveside. The church stood in a small hollow and as it was still early strands of fog swirled around the graveyard. When the coffin had been lowered I made my excuses and turned to leave the family to their grief. As I did so, a puff of wind parted the mist for a moment and revealed a tall, gaunt, man, dressed in black, watching the funeral. Even as I saw him he backed away and was lost in the mist. Though I hurried to the spot were he had been standing there was no sign of him. There was not even a footprint in the damp earth. I had begun to fear that my imagination was running riot when one of the men who had helped lower the coffin appeared at my elbow. "You saw him too?", the fellow enquired. I nodded. "Strange character", the man confided. He had never seen the man before today, it turned out. He had noticed the man earlier, but when he went to ask if he could help the man vanished into the mist. At that moment there was the crack of a whip and a clatter of hooves from the road running along the edge of the cemetery. We turned as one person in time to catch a fleeting glimpse of a black carriage before it plunged deeper into the morning fog and was lost to sight. "Strange", commented my erstwhile friend. "That carriage definitely wasn't there when the service started." He shrugged and moved off to the graveside to finish covering the coffin. Slowly I made my way back to the office. Needless to say I had difficulty concentrating on my work that afternoon. |
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