“Oh! I wish he would come, I certainly wish he would! This thing is beyond me or anything in my experience. I almost begin to believe that Bible days have returned and you are possessed of the evil spirit.”
Millikins-Pillikins returned to her play in supreme indifference. She knew what she knew. Couldn’t a body believe one’s own eyes? Didn’t the chef often say that “Seeing is believing,” when the scullery maid stole the raisins and he found them in her pocket? She couldn’t help Auntie Prin being stupid; and—
“Oh, oh, oh! Hughie’s come! Hughie’s come! Oh! you darling brother boy, let’s go and seek that debbil!”
The youth who entered and into whose arms his little sister had sprung, held her away from him and gasped. Then answered merrily:
“That gentleman doesn’t belong in good society, kiddie. It’s not good form even to mention him. I’d rather go the other way.”
Then he set her gently down and turned to acknowledge his aunt’s introduction to Dorothy. He was well used to meeting the Oak Knowe girls, but wondered a little at finding one at this hour in the Lady Principal’s private parlor. As he opened his lips to address some courteous remark to her, a shriek of utter terror rang through the house and a housemaid burst unceremoniously in, white and almost breathless, yet managing to say:
“Oh! Ma’am, I’m leavin’—I’m leavin’ the now! Sure, ’tis a haunted house and Satan hisself dwells in it!”