earthquake under the bed.

Collecting my scattered wits, I tried to go to sleep again; but alas!
that fatal feast had destroyed sleep, and I vainly tried to quiet my
wakeful senses with the rustle of leaves about the window and the
breaking waves upon the beach.

In one of the pauses between the sounds of the waves, I heard a curious
noise in the house--a sort of moan, coming at regular intervals.

And, as I sat up to make out where it was, another sound caught my
attentive ear. Drip, drip, drip, went something out in the hall, and in
an instant the tale told me on Sunset Hill came back with unpleasant
reality.

"Nonsense! It is raining, and the roof leaks," I said to myself, while
an unpleasant thrill went through me, and fancy, aided by indigestion,
began to people the house with ghostly inmates.

No rain had fallen for weeks, and peeping through my curtain, I saw the
big, bright stars shining in a cloudless sky; so that explanation
failed, and still the drip, drip, drip went on.

Likewise the moaning--so distinctly now that it was clear that the
little back bed-room was next the chamber in which I was quaking at that
very moment.

"Some one is sleeping there," I said, and then remembered that all the
rooms were locked, and all the keys but mine in Mrs. Grant's pocket, up
at the house.

"Well, let the ghosts enjoy themselves; I won't disturb them if they let
me alone. Some of the ladies thought me brave to dare to sleep here,
and it never will do to own I was scared by a foolish story and an odd
sound."

So down I lay, and said the multiplication table with great
determination for several minutes, trying to turn a deaf ear to the
outside world and check my unruly thoughts.

But it was a failure; and when I found myself saying over and over "Four
times twelve is twenty-four," I gave up affecting courage, and went in
for a good, honest scare.

As a cheerful subject for midnight consideration, I kept thinking of B.
Tucker, in spite of every effort to give it up. In vain I remembered the
fact that the departed gentleman was "always polite to ladies."

I still was in great fear lest he might think it necessary to come and
apologize in person for "bothering" me.

Presently a clock struck three, and I gave a moan that beat the ghost's
all hollow, so full of deep suffering was I at the thought of several
hours of weary waiting.

I was not sure at what time the daylight would appear, and I was
bitterly sorry