CHAPTER XIII--THE HAUNTED HOUSE
Every girl had brought a box of luncheon, and besides, somebody had"toted" two huge pots for chocolate and the little individual cups theyall carried made sufficient drinking vessels. Mary O'Rourke, with thehelp of Laura and another girl who knew something about wood-lore, builta campfire, while two other girls climbed down to the road and followedit across the brook on the stepping-stones and up the hill to thenearest farmhouse for milk. There was a spring of clear water in thehillside at the edge of the plateau.
The red sun dropped behind the forest-clad hills upon the distant shoreof Lake Luna. They could see the rippling water sparkle in the last raysof the sun. A white sail was set in this background of red and purpleglory, like a single, flashing diamond. The birds were winging homewardto their nests in the hills behind the girls' camp.
"What a quiet, soothing picture," sighed one of the seniors.
"It might be altogether too quiet up here after dark if there weren'tsuch a bunch of us," said Josephine Morse. "Ugh!"
"The haunted house, eh?" suggested Laura.
"Don't say a word! I bet there _are_ ghosts in it," declared anothergirl, with a shiver.
"I'll guarantee there are rats in it," laughed Laura.
"You're so brave!" exclaimed Jess, with scorn. "But you wouldn't want togo into that house even in the daytime."
"I don't like rats," admitted her chum.
"That's all right," put in Celia Prime. "But there really is a ghostconnected with the old Robinson house."
"There always is," laughed Laura.
"Mary will tell you about it," said the senior, gravely. "You have beenbrought here for that purpose, you candidates. Wait until after supper."
"Oh!" squealed one of the Lockwood twins. "A real ghost story?"
"Just as real as any ghost story possibly can be," said Mary O'Rourke,laughing. "Gather around the fire, you infants. Never mind the smoke--itwill keep away the mosquitoes. Here come Jennie and Belle with the milk,and we can make the chocolate. The table is spread--and we've got tohurry so as to get our share away from the black ants."
"Oh--o! Don't!" begged somebody. "Don't remind us of them. I feel themcrawling all over me _now_!"
"To say nothing of the spiders," laughed the wicked Mary.
"Oo--h! That's the only trouble with picnics. Somebody ought to go aheadand sweep off the grass," declared Dorothy Lockwood.
"That would surely be 'adorning nature'--'painting the lily'--and allthat," laughed Mary.
The shadows were creeping up from the valley. The electric lightsflashed out all over the city and made a brilliant spectacle below them.The night wind rustled the trees and the whip-poor-will began hiscomplaint from his pitch upon a dead branch.
A bell began to toll at intervals from somewhere far up the hillside.Some wandering cow wore this bell, but it sounded ghostly.
"Listen!" commanded Mary O'Rourke, standing beyond the fire where shecould be seen and heard by all the candidates, at least, who weregrouped in one place. "And especially you infants who this night appearbefore our solemn body for initiation into its ancient rites andmysteries. Listen!
"Before it grew dark we could all see right down there beyond thefording place in the brook, where the road crosses a ploughed field onthe other side. Not a year ago, this farmer from whom Bell bought themilk, Mr. Sitz, was driving home just on the edge of the evening, withhis son and his father-in-law, in a spring wagon. He drove a pair ofyoung horses, and was giving them particular attention, so he says. Butas they came up the hill toward the brook he saw a light moving down theroad between them.
"In his opinion it was a lantern under a carriage. He saw the lightflash back and forth, low above the ground, as though a horse's legswere between the lantern and those approaching it.
"'Here comes a carriage, Dad,' said his son.
"'It's a top-buggy, Israel,' declared the old gentleman on the otherside of Mr. Sitz.
"The young horses sprang forward nervously as they reached the ford. Thewagon splashed through the brook and out upon the hard road. The horseshad crowded over to the left hand, and Mr. Sitz knew that he was notgiving the coming carriage sufficient room to pass.
"But as he pulled his team back to the right hand side of the road heglanced ahead again and saw that the light had disappeared. Black as thenight was he was confident there was no vehicle there--where he hadexpected to see one.
"'What's come o' that carriage, Father?' he asked the old man.
"'Why--why it went by, didn't it?' returned his father-in-law.
"'I didn't see it,' declared the son.
"'It did not pass us on the high side,' Mr. Sitz declared.
"'Must have turned into the ploughed field,' suggested the boy again.
"Mr. Sitz stopped his horses and gave the lines to his son to hold. Heclimbed down with his own lantern and searched for wheel tracks in thefield beside the road. He was positive no vehicle had passed his wagonon the right hand side of the road. He could find no marks of the wheelsanywhere in the soft ground. But as he turned back to climb into hiswagon again he saw a light flash up for an instant in the windows ofthat front room yonder--in the haunted house," said Mary, with emphasisand pointing dramatically.
"Mr. Sitz will tell you about it, if you ask him. He will also tell youwhat the mysterious carriage and the mysterious light in the hauntedhouse meant."
"Oh, dear!" murmured Jess in Laura's ear. "Doesn't she make you feelcreepy?"
"Not yet," whispered Laura. "Lots of people have seen intermittentlights on marshy ground, and the flare of light in the window of the oldhouse was the reflection of his own lantern, perhaps."
"Silence!" commanded Mary, sternly. "No comments. Besides, those who tryto explain ghost stories have a thankless job on their hands," and shelaughed. "We all are like the old woman who declared she didn't believein ghosts, but she was awfully afraid of them!
"This is the weird tale: Years ago an old man named Robinson and hisunmarried sister lived in that house. They were the last of theirfamily, and both were miserly. For that reason they had never married,for fear the other would get the larger share of the property here onthe side of the mountain. And they had money, too.
"Sarah Robinson," pursued Mary, "was of that breed of misers who delightin handling their gold, and worshipping it. She could not enjoy figuresin a bank-book as she enjoyed handling the actual money. But JohnRobinson was of a more practical turn, and he banked his money as hemade it.
"One day a man who had borrowed of John paid him a large sum ofmoney--took up a mortgage, in fact. It was wild spring weather and thestream yonder was running full. But although it rained so hard JohnRobinson would not risk his money in the house over night.
"His sister and he quarreled about it. She said he was a fool to go totown to bank his money on such a day. She would have been glad to sit upall night and watch it--and every night, too. But John harnessed hisdecrepit mare to his ramshackle buggy, and started for town.
"'You put the lamp in the east window for me when it comes dark, andI'll get back all right,' he told her.
"Sarah scolded all the time until he was gone. She even said she hopedhe'd be drowned in the river--he and his money together. Oh! she wasquite a savage old creature, they say.
"Along towards evening a dreadful tempest burst up in the hills--aregular cloudburst. A thunderous torrent overflowed the banks of thatpretty brook yonder. It became dark and they say old Sarah did not setthe lamp in the window as she usually did when John was away from home.
"In the midst of the storm and darkness she must have seen his lanternjogging along the road, under the hind axle of his carriage, just as Mr.Sitz saw it," continued Mary, in a solemn voice. "But the old womanwould not light her lamp. The old man came down to the brook in thepitch darkness, missed the ford, drove into the deeper water below thecrossing, and was swept away, horse, carriage and all, by the flood!"
"Oh--oh!" was the murmured chorus.
"How
awful!" cried one girl.
"What an old witch!" exclaimed Jess Morse.
"But Sarah ran to set her light in the window--when it was too late,"pursued Mary, the story teller. "And every night for years thereafter,while she lived alone here in the old house, Sarah Robinson put her lampin the window just after dark. And they say _she often puts it in thewindow now!_ But usually the ghost light is preceded by the light andcarriage on the road beyond the ford."
"I declare! I thought I saw a light flare up in the old house justthen!" cried one of the girls on the outskirts of the sitting crowd oflisteners.
"Very likely," returned Mary O'Rourke, in a sepulchral voice; "for it ison a night like this that the ghost of Sarah Robinson is supposed towalk."
The Girls of Central High; Or, Rivals for All Honors Page 13