Violet Jacob > Stories told by the miller

IO STORIES TOLD BY THE MILLER
made a snatch at them. The Nix dived under
again and went back like a flash to the dark¬
ness by the wheel.
But all day long she sat there, singing to
herself all she could remember of the song of
the pedlar ; she was like one possessed :
“ By the grey banks near the sea,”
she sang, rocking herself about,
“ In the caves across the sea.”
Now, as time went on her longing grew
stronger and stronger: all the day she thought
of the sea and the grey caves of the coast, and
all night she sat on the wall, looking out east¬
wards and listening for any sound of water that
might come inland. (It was at this time that
the miller’s man saw her.) Why this happened
to her I can’t tell, for I don’t know. Perhaps
her relations were those sea-kelpies that haunt
the Baltic.
Be that as it may, one night she crept out of
the pool and followed the banks of the wet
ditch by which it escapes, making for the river.
It must have been a queer sight to see her as
she went, with her wet garments clinging round
her, running down the fields; I always used to