"Oh!" squealed Nellie again.

"Do come on!" muttered Jess. "I'm just as scared as you are; but don't let those girls know how bad we feel. They're just enjoying themselves."

"And of course there's nothing, or n.o.body, here," Laura added. "They are just having fun with us. Even if something does startle us in this old house, it will be nothing worse than rats."

"But I don't like ra-rats," wailed Dora, under her breath.

"Does anybody?" snapped Jess. "Come on!"

They entered the house, Laura leading. The door of the east room was open and some light entered through the broken windows-light enough to show them the way. Laura stepped carefully over the floor, fearing that some broken board might trip them.

But once in the big, empty, musty room, there seemed nothing to bother them. Even the owl had flown away.

"Now we'll drive the nails as quickly as possible and get out again,"

said Laura in a low, but perfectly even, tone.

She stooped and fumbled her first nail for a moment. Then she smote the head of it a sharp blow with the hammer.

On the heels of that sound came a scream from Nellie.

"Look! Oh, look!" she shrieked.

She was standing erect, pointing through the east window.

"The light! The ghost light!" cried Jess.

Laura raised up a little and saw a light, dancing close to the ground, and on the other side of the brook. It was just about where a lantern under a carriage would have been.

"Come away!" gasped Jess, and she turned and ran. Nell and Dora ran with her. And it must be confessed that Laura was heartily frightened herself, and their panic was communicated to her.

She scrambled to her feet and tried to run. But something seized her skirt and dragged her back to the floor!

Laura screamed aloud then, herself. She tried to get up once more, but the ghostly hand again tugged at her garments and dragged her back upon the floor of the haunted house.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SOMETHING SEIZED HER SKIRT AND DRAGGED HER BACK TO THE FLOOR!]

CHAPTER XV-A VERY REAL GHOST INDEED

For a moment or two Laura Belding held to some shreds of courage. Of course she did not believe in ghosts! It was no supernatural thing that had either appeared as light to them, or had attacked her.

Yet when she essayed a third attempt to rise, she was cast to the floor once more, seemingly by the same strong hand, and this time she turned her ankle sharply. Her terror and pain made her cry out, and she lay there for a moment, helpless, watching the moving reflection of the ghostly lantern on the wall!

Suddenly between her and this reflected light, appeared a figure in white. It seemed immensely tall. It glided out of the shadowy portion of the room and came toward her.

_The figure of old Sarah Robinson!_

Outside the running girls shrieked appallingly. And their cries were re-echoed by the larger number of their schoolmates down by the campfire.

Laura closed her eyes for a moment. Consciousness left her.

The white-clad figure moved nearer. It stooped above the prostrate girl.

With swift hands it tied Laura's hands together before her tightly. Then a thick veil, doubled many times, was pa.s.sed across the helpless girl's mouth and tied tightly so that her voice would be m.u.f.fled should she attempt to cry out.

It took less than a minute for this very palpable ghost to do this.

Then, as silently as it had appeared, it glided away and, a moment later, a door might have been heard to bang at the back of the old house.

But the girls without had been so terrified that none of them heard this sound. The bobbing lantern light across the brook had been seen by those around the campfire as well as by the girls who had entered the haunted house. Mary O'Rourke's story had made a strong impression upon the minds of them all. Mary herself was startled by the appearance of the light.

Besides, panic is catching. And the three girls who ran from the house were certainly panic-stricken. Their screams of horror started many of the other girls off, and some of the waiting ones turned and ran from the plateau and down the steep path before Jess, and Dora, and Nellie reached the fire.

"The ghost! the ghost! It's after us!" shrieked the doctor's daughter, and kept right on, following the girls who had already decamped.

It was useless for any of the braver ones to try to stop the stampede.

n.o.body wanted to remain in the vicinity of the haunted house. They had all seen enough.

An early rising moon cast a ghostly light on the path through the wood, and the girls' feet fairly flew over this way. Celia Prime and Mary O'Rourke were among the last to run; but they did run finally, and never had a hundred or more girls become so entirely panic-stricken as the members of the M. O. R.'s and their candidates for initiation. The ceremony was there and then, and without a dissenting voice, postponed to a more favorable time!

"Where is Laura?" gasped Jess, running hard behind the Lockwood twins.

"Oh, yes! she's so brave!" panted Dora. "She ran first of all, I believe. I bet she's 'way ahead of us."

Jess knew that Laura could outrun most of the girls, whether they were frightened or not. So she took this statement for the truth.

But when they arrived at the inn and the regular picnic grounds, Laura was not there. But some of the girls who had started first had already pa.s.sed through the gates and were on the road to the cars.

Of course, most of them had stopped running now. They were ashamed of their fright, and did not want to explain it to the people at the inn.

But you couldn't have hired one of them to return to the plateau before the haunted house just then.

"I think Laura is just too mean not to wait for us," panted Nellie Agnew.

"She's ashamed, I expect," said one of the twins.

"It isn't like her," Jess said.

"She was scared, all right," said Nellie.

"Well! who wouldn't be?" demanded Jess.

They went on to the car tracks at a slower pace. Some of the first girls to arrive, however, had not waited for the two special cars that stood upon the side track, but took a regular one back to town.

"I believe I saw Hester Grimes get aboard that car that just pa.s.sed,"

said one of the twins. "I wonder what she was doing out here?"

"Lots of people ride out this way in the evening," returned another girl. "I suppose Hessie has a right to come, too."