pen," said Jan, as they neared the
cottage. "We must get her in without the mother hearing, upstairs."

They had the kitchen to themselves. Hook, the father, a little the worse
for what he had taken, had gone to bed, leaving the door open for his
children. They got her in quietly, found a light, and placed her in a
chair. Jan took off her bonnet and shawl--he was handy as a woman; and
looked about for something to give her. He could find nothing except
water. By and by she got better.

Her first movement, when she fully recovered her senses, was to clutch
hold of Jan on the one side, of Mr. Bourne on the other.

"Is it gone?" she gasped, in a voice of the most intense terror.

"Is what gone, child?" asked Mr. Bourne.

"The ghost," she answered. "It came right up, sir, just after you left
me. I'd rather die than see it again."

She was shaking from head to foot. There was no mistaking that her
terror was intense. To attempt to meet it with confuting arguments would
have been simply folly, and both gentlemen knew that it would. Mr Bourne
concluded that the same sight, which had so astonished him, had been
seen by the girl.

"I sat down again after you went, sir," she resumed, her teeth
chattering. "I knew there was no mighty hurry for my being back, as you
had gone on to mother, and I sat on ever so long, and it came right up
again me, brushing my knees with its things as it passed. At the first
moment I thought it might be you coming back, to say something to me,
sir, and I looked up. It turned its face upon me, and I never remember
nothing after that."

"Whose face?" questioned Jan.

"The ghost's, sir. Mr. Fred Massingbird's."

"Bah!" said Jan. "Faces look alike in the moonlight."

"Twas his face," answered the girl, from between her shaking lips. "I
saw its every feature, sir."

"Porcupine and all?" retorted Jan, ironically.

"Porkypine and all, sir. I'm not sure that I should have knowed it at
first, but for the porkypine."

What were they to do with the girl? Leave her there, and go? Jan, who
was more skilled in ailments than Mr. Bourne, thought it possible that
the fright had seriously injured her.

"You must go to bed at once," said he. "I'll just say a word to your
father."

Jan was acquainted with the private arrangements of the Hooks'
household. He knew that there was but one sleeping apartment for the
whole family--the room above, where the sick mother was lying. Father,
mother, sons, and d