“How much more respectable than I,” Penelope murmured plaintively.
“Forgive me,” he implored. “I would—only you are so wet.”
The door above was locked, but Shaw swung the axe so vigorously that any but a very strong-nerved ghost must have been frightened to death once more.
“It's my house, you know,” he explained from the top step. “There we are! Come up, Penelope. The fort is yours.”
She followed him into the hall above. In silence they walked along the bare floors through empty rooms until at last he opened a door in what proved to be the left wing. To her surprise, this room was comfortably furnished. There were ashes in the big fireplace and there were lamps which had been used recently—for they were filled with oil.
“Here's where I read sometimes,” he explained. “I have slept on that couch. Last winter I came up here to hunt. My cottage wasn't finished, so I stayed here.
“I'll confess I've heard strange sounds—now, don't shiver! Once or twice I've been a bit nervous, but I'm still alive, you see.” He lighted the wicks in the two big lamps while she looked on with the chills creeping up and down her back. “I'll have a bully fire in the fireplace in just a minute.”
“Let me help you,” she suggested, coming quite close to him with uneasy glances over her shoulders.
Ten minutes later they were sitting before a roaring fire, quite content even though there was a suggestion of amazed ghosts lurking in the hallway behind them. No doubt old man Grimes and his wife, if they awoke in the course of the night, groaned deep prayers in response to the bright light from the windows of the haunted house. Shaw and Penelope smiled securely as they listened to the howling storm outside.
“Well, this is trespassing,” she said, beaming a happy smile upon him.