"You—don't!"
"Yes, I do. I did. This very last night that ever was; and talk about liking this ride? Huh! I'm more glad than I can say to get away from home just this little while, even. Yet mother and father are left there, and if IT should come and frighten them while I'm not there—O Jim! It scared me almost into a fit. Scared me so stiff and still I could neither move nor speak. Now I'm rather glad I didn't. It may not come again, though It has two or three times."
They were nearly at the top of a long hill and, partly to rest the perfectly untired horse, partly to hear in silence this remarkable story, Jim drew aside into the shade of a wayside tree and commanded:
"Silly Dolly! There ain't no such things; but—out with the hull business, body an' bones!"
"I'm glad to 'out' with it. It's seemed as if I should burst, keeping it all to myself, and the worst is I feel that father wouldn't believe me. There's something else, too. Jim, do you believe that Peter Piper is really harmless? He follows me everywhere I go. He doesn't come near the house because mother doesn't like him and shows that plain enough even for him to understand. She never did like beggars down home in Baltimore, and she's taken a fearful dislike to Peter."
"Stick to what you started to tell; not get a body's ideas all on edge, then switch off onto Peter Piper. As for that poor feller, he won't hurt nobody what don't hurt him. But he ain't a ghost. Tell what you saw."
"Will you promise not to laugh nor—nor disbelieve?"
"I won't laugh an' I will believe—if I can."
"You dear good Jim! I can always rely upon you to help me in my troubles!" cried Dorothy, gratefully.
With comfortable complacency Jim replied: "That's so."