night, too. How frightened I should be
alone!"

"Which means you are not frightened, being with me. Miss Rose, you are
delightful!"

"Interpret it as you please. What should you say if the ghost were to
start out from these grim black trees and confront us?"

"Say? Nothing. I would quietly faint in your arms. But this is not the
ghost's walk. Wasn't it in the tamarack avenue old Margery saw it?"

"Let us go there!"

"It is too late," said Rose.

"No it is not. There is something delightfully novel in promenading with
a young lady at the witching hour of midnight, when graveyards yawn, and
gibbering ghosts in winding-sheets cut up cantrips before high heaven.
Come."

"But Mr. Stanford--"

"Reginald, I tell you. You promised, you know."

"But really Reginald, it is too late. What if we were seen?"

"Nonsense! Who is to see us! And if they do, haven't brothers and
sisters a right to walk at midnight as well as noonday if they choose?
Besides, we may see the spectre of Danton Hall, and I would give a
month's pay for the sight any time."

They entered the tamarack walk as he spoke--bright enough at the
entrance, where the starlight streamed in, but in the very blackness of
darkness farther down.

"How horribly dismal!" cried Rose, clinging to him more closely than
ever. "A murder might be committed here, and no one be the wiser."

"A fit place for a ghostly promenade. Spectre of Danton, appear! Hist!
What is that?"

Rose barely suppressed a shriek. He put his hand over her mouth, and
drew her silently into the shadow.

As if his mocking words had evoked them, two figures entered the
tamarack walk as he spoke.

The starlight showed them plainly--a man and a woman--the woman wrapped
in a shawl, leaning on the man's arm, and both walking very slowly,
talking earnestly.

"No ghosts those," whispered Reginald Stanford. "Be quiet, Rose; we are
in for an adventure."

"I ought to know that woman's figure," said Rose, in the same low tone.
"Look! Don't you?"

"By--George! It can't be--Kate!"

"It is Kate; and who is the man, and what does it mean?"

Now Rose, maliciously asking the question, knew in her heart the man was
Mr. Richards. She did not comprehend, of course, but she knew it must be
all right; for Kate walked with him there under her father's sanction.

Mr. Stanford made no reply; he was staring like one who cannot believe
his eyes.

Kate's face shown in profile was plainly visible as they dr