It was chill autumn, and as they paced the damp grass of the graveyard
there was a smell of dead leaves in the air, and a grey mist crept up
from the Tweed that moaned as it bore its flooded waters to the sea.
When midnight came they expected to see the Hundeprest, but midnight
passed in safety, and in "the wee, sma' hours" the two laymen and one of
the monks went into the nearest cottage to warm their icy feet. Now came
the chance of the vampire. With "a terrible noise" the Hundeprest
suddenly appeared, a thing of horror, and rushed at the monk who was
slowly pacing towards the grave. The holy man bravely stood the charge,
and, as the monster was almost touching him, he swung the axe which he
carried, and drove it with all his might into the body of his diabolic
adversary. With a groan, the vampire turned and fled away, and the
friar, the tables turned, ran in pursuit until the grave of the
Hundeprest was reached, and the horror vanished.
Nothing of the encounter was to be seen when the other three watchers
returned, but grey dawn was near, and at the first sign of light the
four men, with pick-axe and spade, opened up the grave. Even as they dug
their spades turned up mingled blood and clay, and when they came to the
corpse of the Hundeprest, they found it fresh as on the day he died, but
with a terrible wound in the body, from which the blood still oozed
away.
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