When my grandfather was a little boy in Italy, he and his father were walking home to their farm at night on a dark and lonely road. My great-grandfather was carrying something as they went (I never asked what it was he was carrying, but I always got the impression it was a sack of seed or flour).
At one point the road crossed over a river, and as they walked across the bridge a dark stranger approached them. The stranger asked my great-grandfather for a match to light his pipe. As my great-grandfather put down the sack to retrieve the match from his pocket, my grandfather saw the stranger jump over the side of the bridge into the fast-moving river below.
But they never heard a splash. When they looked over the side, they saw the stranger laughing and “dancing on the water”. My great-grandfather then said, “Now I know who you are,” and he picked up the sack and took my grandfather by the hand as they hurried off the bridge.
They had encountered the ghost which had been seen in that part of the countryside for over a hundred years.
My grandfather was not one to exaggerate.
Story by Rick Bruno from Quora.