ing but the lightning," Minnie answered, breathlessly.

"Oh, the _fence_! The fence--and in the field!"

"_Helen_! What was it _like_?"

"Ah-ah!" she panted, "a long line of white--horrible white----"

"What _like_?" Minnie turned from the window and caught the other's
wrist in a fluttering clasp.

"Minnie, Minnie! Like long white gowns and cowls crossing the fence."
Helen released her wrist, and put both hands on Minnie's cheeks, forcing
her around to face the pane. "You must look--you must look," she cried.

"They wouldn't do it, they wouldn't--it _isn't_!" Minnie cried. "They
couldn't come in the storm. They wouldn't do it in the pouring rain!"

"Yes! Such things would mind the rain!" She burst into hysterical
laughter, and Minnie, almost as unnerved, caught her about the waist.
"They would mind the rain. They would fear a storm! Ha, ha, ha!
Yes--yes! And I let him go--I let him go!"

Pressing close together, shuddering, clasping each other's waists, the
two girls peered out at the flickering landscape.

"_Look_!"

Up from the distant fence that bordered the northern side of Jones's
field, a pale, pelted, flapping thing reared itself, poised, and seemed,
just as the blackness came again, to drop to the ground.

"Did you _see_?"

But Minnie had thrown herself into a chair with a laugh of wild relief.
"My darling girl!" she cried. "Not a line of white things--just one--Mr.
Jones's old scarecrow! And we saw it blown down!"

"No, no, no! I saw the others; they were in the field beyond. I saw
them! When I looked the first time they were nearly all on the fence.
This time we saw the last man crossing. Ah! I let him go alone!"

Minnie sprang up and enfolded her. "No; you dear, imagining child,
you're upset and nervous--that's all the matter in the world. Don't
worry; don't, child, it's all right. Mr. Harkless is home and safe in
bed long ago. I know that old scarecrow on the fence like a book; you're
so unstrung you fancied the rest. He's all right; don't you bother,
dear."

The big, motherly girl took her companion in her arms and rocked her
back and forth soothingly, and petted and reassured her, and then cried
a little with her, as a good-hearted girl always will with a friend.
Then she left her for the night with many a cheering word and tender
caress. "Get to sleep, dear," she called through the door when she had
closed it behind her. "You must, if you have to go in the morning--it
just breaks my hear