"The Dream" had pestered Millie Davis for months now and she was fed up with it. She was pregnant and hoped the dream would go away once she started her second trimester. It didn't. If anything it intensified.

It came at least once a week and always on a Friday night.
The man was thin to the point of emaciation.
There were two fair- haired children with him, a little girl in a faded dress and boy of about five or six dressed in a pair of overalls too big for him, with a dirty cotton singlet under it.
Both children were barefoot. The man held a sack in his hand and spoke to someone apparently behind where Millie stood.
Then, suddenly the dream changed. Instead of turning away and leaving, the man reached into the bag. There was a kaleidoscope of moving figures that tracked across Millie's eyes until there was a loud explosion from somewhere behind her and Millie awoke.

The morning after, Millie was toasting bread in the coals of the kitchen fire.
"What happened last night?" John asked.
Millie 's face was pale as she spoke.
"It was the dream again.The first part is always the same. There's the man holding a sack with the two children at his side.
Then last night I saw a woman.She was pregnant. Like me. I saw her drop to her knees. She was pleading with someone. I couldn't see who.It was as if they were behind me. Suddenly there was an explosion and I woke up."
John had drawn her gently back under the covers from her sitting bolt upright state and spoken softly to her. She fell asleep again almost immediately.
He had a growing suspicion the dream wasn't a figment of Millie's imagination. She had a strong psychic talent that being pregnant had intensified.
He had heard stories about strange happenings at Hungry Hill Farm before they'd moved in, but time was short and they had no chance to look further afield.
So they moved into the small, neat farm house and set about planting crops.
Nothing grew.
Potatoes got a nasty black blight, beans were eaten off the vines by a plague of grubs that vanished as swiftly as they appeared and that was the story with every other crop he'd tried.
He decided to ask Millie more questions about the dream and waited until they were in bed.

She was surprised, because he had never shown any belief in her dreams and "visitations" as she called them. She told him every detail and fell asleep in his arms.

The next day he took a shovel and began digging around the perimeter of the latest disastrous effort. He found an old, rotten sack that sent a chill down his shoulder blades

He dropped it next to Millie's foot and watched as her expression changed from one of surprise to fear. "It's HIS sack, John," she whispered." Where is HE?"

She ran out to their latest ruinous planting, John following.
In the middle of the patch she threw her arms open wide as if in supplication.
Figures began to form around her. A man, a woman and two small children. Then, another figure appeared. It was a man holding a gun.
He aimed at the thin man and fired. Then, he took careful aim at the children and shot them. The woman had sunk to her knees, pleading for their lives, but he reloaded and shot her too.

Millie grabbed the shovel and began to dig where she stood.
The second thrust hit something hard and organic and she hesitated for a moment.
"I'll do it," said John, thrusting the shovel into the earth. "We need Sgt. Mcguire."
Millie nodded."I'll ring from next door."
That night it rained. The drought was over.
A week later one of the hens brought out a clutch of chickens and proudly took them down to where the new crop was growing with no brown stains on crisp, green stalks.
The remains found in the paddock were interred with all rites in the cemetery.
Sgt. McGuire  put his skills to work and found their names in the list of missing persons.
Th man with the gun was dead, Lost in a dust storm and found a week later as dry as a husk of wheat.
Hungry Hill Farm was haunted no more .