"Yes; oh, what was it?" Ethan was nearer Aunt Jerusha in his alarm than he had ever ventured before.
"Dat's de bad ghos' under de stehs. De fust fall we come heah he done groan and gro-o-an like dat all de time. He been mighty still now fur a spell. Hark! yo' heah dat?"
Ethan was horribly conscious of a hideous noise somewhere in front of the dining-room.
"I think he's in the parlor," he whispered, when he could command his emotions sufficiently for speech.
"No, no; I used t' 'spect he was dah, but dat's jus' his being so cute, he didn' want nobody to know he was unner de front stehs. Come into de kitchen, Massa Efan, and I'll gib yo' a cinnamon roll."
It is useless to pretend that Ethan was a stout-hearted young gentleman. From infancy he had been a prey to a thousand unseen terrors having for the most part quite respectable Christian name and origin, such as the "worm that dieth not," "the thief in the night," the "great red dragon" of the Revelation, and "the beast with seven heads." But there are some terrors that need no inculcating. It occurred to him now that the ghost under the stairs was called Yaffti. Why "Yaffti" he could not have told, or what suggested the name to him; but Yaffti was angry when people, especially little boys, walked over his head without saying:
"Yaffti Makafti, here I am, you see;
I'll be good to you, if you'll be good to me."
His worst form of nightmare was forgetting to use this formula, and daring in his purblind sleep to stamp on the stairs directly over Yaffti's head. He realized by-and-by that the restless spirit underneath was soothed when the stairs were not used, and his young friend made the descent astride the banisters. This pleased all parties, except Mrs. Gano. Next best, from the Yaffti point of view, was walking on the narrow green border of the stair carpet, instead of in the fawn-colored centre. Little by little Yaffti enlarged his jurisdiction, and ruled the porches with a despotism as secret as it was potent, permitting no child to walk on the cracks between the boards. Yaffti was pleased, too, if in going about the town you steered clear of the cracks between the flag-stones. But all this attempt at a friendly understanding was at bottom a mere daylight truce, and with the coming on of night the hollow mockery stood exposed. Ethan, like many another, went through his childish terrors with a silent endurance that would have earned him the name of hero had he been a man, and had Yaffti boasted another name, though not necessarily a more demonstrable existence.
Nevertheless, these were wonderful and beautiful days, having in them a rapture of freedom from human interference incompatible with life under the same roof with Aunt Hannah and Grandfather Tallmadge, who seemed to have nothing better to do than to look after Ethan and spoil his fun from morning till night.