Page:The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg (1928).djvu/195

 were torn from his body. He was looking for some open grassy space where he might fall down and lie for hours in a state of unconsciousness.

Then as he pushed through the witch-hazel he came suddenly upon an open space where the thick marsh grass had been trampled down in a wide circle and in the moonlight he discovered two dancing figures, one very white and the other as black as the shadows cast by the copper moon. One was Miss Annie Spragg and the other was the black he-goat. She was quite naked with her long red hair falling to her knees. There was a wreath of honeysuckle on her head. The black he-goat capering prettily with his delicate black front hoofs raised in the air followed her round and round the trampled circle. For a little time Shamus stood watching them from behind the trunk of a great oak tree and presently, as if he could not help himself, he joined in the dance.

It was sunset of the following day when he came to his senses and found himself lying on the bruised grass in the middle of Meeker's Gulch.

When he had finished his story he slipped quietly to the grass and fell into a sleep beneath the catalpa trees. Maria Hazlett rose and covered him with a feather-bed and then raising the half-conscious Ed Hasselman got him into bed. In the morning she had to deliver the milk on the milk route in Winnebago Falls, because Ed was taken again by one of his spells.