"Nothing happened in our wing," protested Betty and Lloyd, in the same breath.
"Oh, girls, I'm all in a shake!" exclaimed Retta Long, almost in tears. "It frightens me nearly to death to think of being called up before the president. Such a thing never happened to me before, nor to any of our family."
"Oh, boo!" exclaimed Kitty, with a reassuring smile. "We haven't done anything so killing bad that we need care. We've only had a little fun. Come on! I'm not afraid of all the king's horses and all the king's men."
But in spite of her brave words she sat down as shyly as the rest of them when Doctor Wells, tall and commanding, motioned them to seats in front of his desk. He looked so big and dignified, standing before them erect and silent, while he waited for them to be seated, that her courage failed her. But when he sat down in his armchair and looked gravely from one frightened face to the other, Kitty saw a twinkle in the kind eyes behind the spectacles which reassured her.
"We caught a ghost in the seminary last night, young ladies," he began, abruptly, with a smile twitching an instant at the corners of his mouth. It was only for an instant. His face was unusually grave as he proceeded. "It was just in time to prevent a very serious occurrence which would have been a great calamity to the school. It made a partial confession which implicated some one in your club, and I have sent for you in order that you may clear yourselves at once. Most of your mischief has been only innocent amusement, I know, but I must have a complete history of the club, from the beginning six weeks ago, up till twelve o'clock last night."
At mention of a ghost, they looked at each other with startled faces, wondering how much he already knew. Evidently some one outside of the club had been playing their own game, and they wondered who could have made a confession which could truthfully have included them. Instinctively they turned to Betty to be their spokesman. With her truthful brown eyes looking straight into the doctor's, Betty clasped her hands in her lap and gave a simple account of the club.
She began with the verse Miss Edith had written in their albums, and the story she had told them of the girls who walked forty miles to the mountain school. She told of the impulse it had awakened in them to do something for the mountain people, and the club that had grown out of that desire.
"We didn't intend to play any pranks in the beginning," she said; "all we wanted to do was to cast our shadow-selves where we could never be. But just after Hallowe'en we met in our room one Saturday afternoon, and a girl hid in the closet next to ours and heard all our secrets and went and told them, and we decided to shadow her awhile, to punish her for being so mean. But one-half of the club lived outside the seminary, and Ida Shane resigned about that time, so we established a new order, and took these four girls in as Wraiths of Vengeance." She nodded toward the new members.
A grim smile flitted across the doctor's face as he listened to her explanation of their duties, and heard the use they had made of Lot's wife and the magic lantern. But he smoothed his white moustache to cover his amusement, and when she finished he sat in deep thought a moment, his brows drawn closely together.
"If there was any ghost around last night, we weren't responsible for its doings," she added. "It didn't belong to the club."