"I don't know, sir; I fell asleep for some time, and then I woke! . . ."
"Where did you find yourself?"
"I was in the drawing-room."
"Come, Crossjay, you're not a fellow to be scared by ghosts? You looked it when you made a dash at my midriff."
"I don't believe there are such things. Do you, colonel? You can't!"
"There's no saying. We'll hope not; for it wouldn't be fair fighting. A man with a ghost to back him'd beat any ten. We couldn't box him or play cards, or stand a chance with him as a rival in love. Did you, now, catch a sight of a ghost?"
"They weren't ghosts!" Crossjay said what he was sure of, and his voice pronounced his conviction.
"I doubt whether Miss Middleton is particularly happy," remarked the colonel. "Why? Why, you upset her, you know, now and then."
The boy swelled. "I'd do . . . I'd go . . . I wouldn't have her unhappy
. . . It's that! that's it! And I don't know what I ought to do. I wish
I could see Mr. Whitford."
"You get into such headlong scrapes, my lad."